Mechanisms in the Development of Emotional Organization

In a series of elegant studies the authors of this Monograph test the hypothesis that children are negatively affected by parental marital conf lict because they fear that the well-being of the family is threatened. By combining results from two methods, the analogue method and longitudinal, correlational designs, and across two countries, the authors provide compelling evidence for the role of emotional security in the link between marital conflict and children’s outcomes. The emotional security theory holds a unique and influential position in the literature on marital conflict. Although other theories suggest that the experience of fear is important in understanding children’s outcomes, no other theory makes either of the striking claims that this is the central mechanism or that it is only information on security compiled into schemas that will be responsible for a range of emotional outcomes. This Monograph thus provides an original and impressive contribution, both theoretical and empirical, to our understanding of the negative effects of marital conflict on children. The quest for theoretical specificity is admirable. The authors explicate three different theories in the literature on marital conflict, and evaluate the success of each in explaining the data. Through this process of comparison and evaluation they elucidate not only risks but the mechanisms involved in the links between adverse environments and children’s development. Specificity in the links between a family dyad and children’s representational functioning with respect to that dyad is demonstrated in this Monograph. In one of the studies reported, the functioning of the marital dyad was found to be associated with children’s security within the marital dyad but not with their security within the parent-child dyad. Similarly the functioning of the parent-child dyad was associated with children’s security within the parent-child dyad but not with security MONO 673-COM