New Study Shows Emotional Suppression has Negative Outcomes on Children

Various studies show that kids are good at picking up "emotional residue" from their parents, according to Sara Waters, Ph.D., assistant professor in the department of human development at Washington State University. Because kids are good at picking up subtle cues from emotions, if they feel something negative has happened but parents are acting normal and not addressing it, they get confused from the two conflicting messages being sent, says Dr. Waters. Rather than suppressing emotions in front of your children, a study published in the journal Emotion by Dr. Waters and co-authors from the University of California, Berkley and the University of California, San Francisco, suggests that the best course of action is to let kids see a healthy conflict, from start to resolution, which will benefit their long-term emotional intelligence.

"We wanted to look at how we suppress emotions and how that changes the way parents and kids interact," said Dr. Waters, who oversaw and co-authored the findings of the study. "Kids pick up on suppression, but it's something a lot of parents think is a good idea to do.

The study observed 109 mothers and fathers with their children in San Francisco. First, the researchers gave the parents a stressful task: to speak publicly with negative feedback from the audience. Parents were then given an activity to complete with their children, with some randomly told to suppress their emotions while others were told to act naturally. All parent-child pairs had to work together to assemble a Lego project. Kids ages 7-11 were given instructions and had to direct their parents without touching the Legos.