Young Chinese children's anger and distress: Emotion category and intensity identified by the time course of behaviors

A hierarchical cluster analysis of the time course of the videotaped reactions of 75 Chinese 2–4-year olds to mothers’ toy-removal identified Distress, Low Anger, and High Anger behavior clusters. Anger often begins at low intensity; some children then escalate. The face-validity of Low and High Anger-cluster classifications was supported in that High Anger was displayed by a subset of the children who had first showed Low Anger. The three clusters had different and interpretable correlations with mothers’ temperament ratings. Developmentally, 2-year-olds displayed more Distress, including crying; 3-year-olds showed more Low Anger, including stamp-jump. While Low Anger is predominant during toy-removal in Chinese children, it is, contrastingly, the least-frequent component in the tantrums of North American children.

Source: International Journal of Behavioral Development - July 10, 2013 Category: Child Development Authors: He, J., Qiu, P., Park, K. Y., Xu, Q., Potegal, M. Tags: Articles Source Type: research