Narrative structure and emotional references in parent-child reminiscing: associations with child gender, temperament, and the quality of parent-child interactions

The present research examined child gender, temperament, and the quality of parent-child interactions as predictors of narrative style and references to emotion during mother-child and father-child reminiscing. Although models predicting parents' narrative styles were non-significant, results revealed significant interactions between parental hostility/intrusiveness during an interaction task and difficult child temperament. For mothers, greater hostility/intrusiveness was associated with fewer emotional references, but only when perceived difficult temperament was high. For fathers, greater hostility/intrusiveness was associated with more emotional references, but only when perceived difficult temperament was high. Additionally, greater paternal supportive guidance was associated with more references to positive emotions for fathers. No child gender effects were found to be significant.