| dc.description.abstract | Abstract Authors: Vaarin Radem Amundsen and Amalie Gjesmoe Title: Exploring the Relationship Between Parental Socialization of Emotion and Low Risk and High Risk Alcohol Use in a Non-Clinical Norwegian Sample. Supervisor: Stella Tsotsi Co-supervisor: Evalill Bølstad Background: Contemporarily, there has been a substantial growth in interest regarding how parental behaviors influence the development of emotional competence in children through their reactions to children’s emotions, referred to as parental emotion socialization. Although alcohol use as a parental characteristic has previously been studied in conjunction with various facets of parenting, it has only recently, and scarcely, been examined in combination with emotion socialization. There remains a lack of research investigating various forms of parental alcohol use, especially lower levels, within the context of emotion-related aspects of parenting. Therefore, the aim of our study was to examine the association between parental alcohol use, including low and high risk, and emotion-related socialization behaviors (ERSBs) while also exploring the potential moderating effect of parent sex in this association. Methods: This quantitative study was part of the larger research project “Parenting Practices in Norway” (Norwegian: Foreldrepraksis i Norge (FiN)). The present study’s sample consisted of 4,107 (1,594 fathers) parents of children aged 4-13. The study’s data involved emotion socialization and alcohol use measured through parental self-reports on the Coping with Children’s Negative Emotions Scale (CCNES) and Alcohol Use Disorder Identification Test - Consumption (AUDIT-C), respectively. In addition, parental mental health and stress were measured through Parental Stress Scale (PSS) and Hopkins Symptom Checklist-5 (HSCL-5), respectively. Finally, participant demographics (socioeconomic status, relationship status, birth order, and biological/adoptive child status) were also collected with the utilization of questionnaires. Results: The results supported some of our hypotheses. Our findings indicated that increased parental alcohol use was associated with lower levels of supportive and higher levels of non-supportive ERSBs. Both low and high risk alcohol use was significantly associated with lower levels of supportive ERSBs and higher levels of non-supportive ERSBs when compared to the no risk group. Finally, parent sex did not moderate the relationship between alcohol use and supportive and non-supportive ERSBs. Conclusion: Overall, various levels of parental alcohol use predicted poorer emotion socialization, which was additionally similar for mothers and fathers. These findings illustrate that the consumption of alcohol, including low risk, is associated with how parents socialize emotions. This further support previous literature on the role of parental alcohol use in parenting practices and add novel knowledge regarding the association between various levels of parental alcohol use and ERSBs in a Norwegian context. Theoretical implications of our findings include empirical support on proposed theoretical models on parental emotion socialization (e.g., Eisenberg et al.’s Socialization of Emotion Model) by identifying both lower and higher levels of alcohol use as important parent characteristics which may influence ERSBs. An important applied implication of these findings is that early intervention and prevention work in Norway should focus on multiple levels of parental alcohol use. Additionally, the present study contributes greatly to a research field that has scarcely concerned parental ERSBs in conjunction with parental alcohol use, especially in the context of less severe or detrimental alcohol consumption practices. | eng |