What is it about?
In this study, the extent to which Mexican American mothers value familismo (close family bonds), respeto (respect), and traditional gender roles is linked to their supportive or suppressive responses to their toddlers' negative emotions (i.e., anger, fear, sadness). Specifically, we found that valuing familismo predicted supportive responses to toddlers' emotions, like encouraging their emotional expression and providing emotional or problem-solving support. Valuing respeto (respect) was associated with more suppressive reactions, like punishing, minimizing, or reacting with distress. Traditional gender role values promoted more suppressive and less supportive responses.
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Why is it important?
How young children learn about emotions in early childhood lays the foundation for future social and emotional well-being. Given that toddlers are still developing self-regulatory skills, mothers play an essential role in co-regulating their toddlers' emotions and physiology through their behavioral responses to their children's emotions. Most existing work centers on preschool-aged children and their parents; however, the present study sheds light on emotion socialization earlier in development. Mexican American children make up the biggest percentage of Latinx children in the U.S. This study is important because it explores emotion socialization in a cultural context, investigating the influence of Mexican heritage cultural values on maternal emotion socialization.
Perspectives
Research like this acts as both a mirror and a window. A mirror for Mexican heritage parents to, perhaps, see their experiences reflected in the work; a window for parents from other cultural backgrounds to reflect on the ways that the values they learned from their families and communities influence how they respond to their young children's emotions. This work underscores the need for cultural humility in parenting programs aimed at supporting Mexican American child development. By cultural humility, I mean honoring people's cultural beliefs, customs, and values. Within Mexican American families, there is a lot of variability and not every parent will resonate with the findings of this study. I am forever grateful for the families in Northern California (Sacramento area) who participated and generously shared their experiences to make early childhood research more inclusive and representative of Latinx communities.
Andrea Buhler-Wassmann
University of Wisconsin Madison
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Toddlers’ emotion socialization in context: Associations with Mexican heritage cultural values., Journal of Latinx Psychology, August 2025, American Psychological Association (APA),
DOI: 10.1037/lat0000303.
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