Browsing by Author "Kuzgun, Sena"

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Parenting styles and Turkish children’s emotion regulation: The mediating role of parent-teacher relationships
(Springer, 2021-09) Acar, İbrahim Hakkı; Veziroğlu-Çelik, M.; Çelebi, Şevval; İngeç, Duygu; Kuzgun, Sena; Psychology; ACAR, Ibrahim Hakkı
The current study examined the contributions of parenting styles (inductive reasoning and punishment) and parent-teacher relationships to Turkish preschool children’s emotion regulation, with a specific focus on the mediating role of parent-teacher relationship between parenting styles and children’s emotion regulation. A total of 140 preschoolers (59 girls), their parents and teachers were recruited for the current study. Children’s age ranged from 39 to 77 months (M = 62.56, SD = 8.52). All teachers (n = 10) were female and working at a state-funded school. Mothers reported on their parenting styles and teachers reported on parent-teacher relationship and children’s emotion regulation. Results from regression analysis showed that parents’ inductive reasoning was positively associated with children’s emotion regulation and parent-teacher relationship. Higher parent-teacher relationship was positively associated with higher levels of children’s emotion regulation. In addition, parent-teacher relationship mediated the association between inductive parenting and emotion regulation of children. Limitations and future directions of the current study are discussed.
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The role of maternal mentalization in mothers' emotional availability and toddlers' attachment security
Kuzgun, Sena; Arıkan, Gizem; Arıkan, Gizem; Acar, İbrahim Hakkı; Sümer, N.; Department of Psychology; Kuzgun, Sena
Secure attachment to a primary caregiver in early childhood is related with positive child outcomes in the short- and long-run. The formation of secure attachment is influenced by maternal cognitive and behavioral characteristics. In this study, I aimed to examine maternal mentalization as an aspect of maternal cognitive characteristics, emotional availability that encompasses sensitivity, structuring, non-hostility, and non-intrusiveness as maternal behavioral characteristics, and toddlers' attachment security in a low socio-economic-status (SES) group in Istanbul, Turkey. One hundred and thirteen mothers (Mage= 30.30 years, SD= 4.77) and their 11-38 months old toddlers (Mage= 23.22 months, SD= 6.84, 45.1% female) took part in the study. The participants were visited at home and videotaped for two hours. During these two hours, they went on their normal routines, engaged in instructed 10-minutes free play, and filled out a questionnaire pack. Maternal mentalization was assessed by self-report Parental Reflective Functioning Questionnaire (PRFQ; Luyten et al., 2009). Free play footages were coded for Emotional Availability Scales (EAS; Biringen, 2008) by 2 trained reliable coders. Two-hour naturalistic home observation of toddlers was coded by 2 trained reliable coders for attachment security using Attachment Q-Sort (AQS; Waters & Deane, 1995). The results showed that maternal pre-mentalizing, a subscale of PRFQ indicating maladaptive and hostile elements of mentalization, negatively predicted attachment security of toddlers. Mothers' interest and curiosity in their toddlers' mental states was positively related with maternal sensitivity, but other dimensions of mothers' emotional availability were not associated with maternal mentalization. Also, none of the dimensions of EAS were related with toddlers' attachment security. More than half of the mothers were assigned to complicated zone in EAS, which reflects insecure-ambivalent/resistant characteristics. Therefore, I conducted a subgroup analysis with 63 mother-toddler dyads in the complicated zone. Complicated mothers' pre-mentalizing modes negatively predicted maternal sensitivity and toddlers' attachment security. In addition, maternal sensitivity in EAS predicted attachment security and fully mediated the relationship between mentalization and attachment security. The results demonstrated that mentalization characteristics of mothers from low SES can vary based on their attachment-specific individual differences in dyadic relationships. Hence, interventions targeting low SES mothers should consider both mentalization and behavioral indicators.