Empathic stress in the mother-child dyad: Multimodal evidence for empathic stress in children observing their mothers during direct stress exposure.

Autor/inn/en	Blasberg, Jost Ulrich; Jost, Joana; Kanske, Philipp; Engert, Veronika
Titel	Empathic stress in the mother-child dyad: Multimodal evidence for empathic stress in children observing their mothers during direct stress exposure. Gefälligkeitsübersetzung: Empathischer Stress in der Mutter-Kind-Dyade: Multimodale Belege für empathischen Stress bei Kindern, die ihre Mütter während direkter Stressbelastung beobachten.
Quelle	In: Journal of experimental psychology. General, 152 (2023) 11, S. 3058-3073 PDF als Volltext kostenfreie Datei Link als defekt meldenVerfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	0096-3445; 1939-2222
DOI	10.1037/xge0001430
Schlagwörter	Empathie; Erleben; Mutter-Kind-Beziehung; Persönlichkeitsmerkmal; Hydrokortison; Stress; Herzfrequenz; Dyade
Abstract	Relationship closeness determines the propensity to spontaneously reproduce another's emotional and physiological stress response. We investigated whether psychosocial stress in mothers is causally linked to such empathic stress in children. Mothers (N = 76) completed either a standardized laboratory stressor or a stress-free control task, while their middle childhood-aged children (8-12 years old) were watching. Mother-child dyads simultaneously provided multiple cortisol, heart rate, high-frequency heart rate variability (HF-HRV), and subjective stress samples. We found that stress-group children had a greater propensity to show physiologically significant cortisol release, especially boys. Watching stressed mothers also triggered stronger subjective, state empathy, and HF-HRV stress responses, with the latter relying on elevated trait cognitive empathy ratings. Only in the stressed dyads, children's HF-HRV resonated with those of their mothers'. We conclude that young children, although only mildly stressed, spontaneously reproduce maternal stress. (ZPID).
Erfasst von	Leibniz-Institut für Psychologie, Trier
Update	2024/2