8 . Many parents worry that showing negative emotions in front of their children will cause them to suffer. For example, children may end up thinking it’s their fault or simply“catch”the emotion. Indeed, this worry has a sound basis—the phenomenon of “emotional contagion” (情绪感染) is real, and one recent study found that parents can transfer their fear of going to the dentist, for example, to their children.
On the other hand, there is the natural idea that we should “be real”with our children, and that they will benefit from watching a parent who struggles and eventually deals with their negative emotions like any other human being.
There are three concepts to consider when it comes to emotional display in front of children: suppression (压抑) “uncontained”expression, and talking about emotions. Suppression of emotion is when you hide the outward signs of an emotion. Unfortunately, it doesn’t work very well —the act of suppressing your emotion actually increases your blood pressure. Observers can pick up on your distress despite your efforts to hide it, making them feel stressed. The recent research has also found that when parents feel negative emotions and keep them from their children, they experience lower relationship quality and decreased responsiveness to their child’s needs.
On the other hand, “uncontained”expression of anger and sadness by the parent is also not salutary for the child. Uncontained means high intensity emotion, with no attempts to regulate or take ownership of it. Shouting, smashing (摔)things and blaming someone else for“making you angry”are all example of this.
So, what is the middle ground?That would be talking about emotion taking ownership of them and showing your child that you are trying to deal with them. Classic research found that six-year-old kids had better emotional understanding and perspective-taking skills if their mothers had talked to them about their emotions at the age of three. In fact, the more the mothers had talked, the better the outcome would be.
So next time you feel sad, angry or frustrated and your child is watching you expressing emotion, do explain what’s going on in terms they can understand.
1. The author uses the example of going to the dentist mainly to| A．explain parents’ common fear |
| B．introduce the topic of negative emotions |
| C．show children may catch parents’ emotions |
| D．present the consequences of transferring negative emotions |
| A．Enough. | B．Beneficial. | C．Necessary. | D．Reliable |
| A．To encourage parents to “be real”with our children. |
| B．To call on parents to develop a positive attitude to life. |
| C．To inform parents of the consequences of negative emotions. |
| D．To recommend parents to talk about negative emotions with children. |
A． | B． |
C． | D． |
| A．is broadcasting | B．has broadcast |
| C．is being broadcast | D．has been broadcast |
| A．is to hold, are | B．is to be held, was |
| C．are to hold, is | D．are to be held, is |
