어머니의 상위정서와 정서사회화가 유아의 정서지능에 미치는 영향

The main purpose of this study was to examine the direct and indirect effects of maternal meta-emotion on preschoolers' emotional intelligence through mothers' emotion socialization. A total of 252 preschool-aged children and their mothers residing in the Seoul Metropolitan and Gyeonggi-do areas participated in this study. The mothers completed questionnaires regarding their meta-emotion, emotion socialization and preschoolers' emotional intelligence. The results of the study indicated that maternal meta-emotion did not have a direct effect on preschoolers' emotional intelligence. However, maternal meta-emotion did indeed have an indirect effect on preschoolers' emotional intelligence through emotion socialization styles. That is, mothers who had desirable beliefs about emotions provided supportive reactions to children's negative emotion expression and showed positive emotions more frequently in the family. In addition, the preschoolers of mothers who showed positive emotion socialization styles were reported to be more emotionally intelligent. The findings of this study suggest that maternal meta-emotion and emotion socialization are important in predicting preschoolers' emotional intelligence.