Linking autonomic physiology and emotion regulation in preschoolers: The role of reactivity and recovery.

Physiological recovery from negative emotions may be important for effective self-regulation, but little is known about recovery processes in children. The current study investigated links between autonomic physiology, anger expressions, and emotion regulation in a sample of eighty-three 3.5-year-olds. Respiratory sinus arrhythmia and pre-ejection period were measured during an anger induction task as parasympathetic and sympathetic indices, respectively. We examined whether preschoolers' anger expressions and emotion regulation behaviors were associated with individual differences in physiology. Autonomic changes were more strongly linked with emotion regulation than with expressed anger. Verbalized regulatory strategies were linked with greater sympathetic reactivity and also with greater recovery. In contrast, attention diversion was associated with blunted patterns of sympathetic reactivity followed by increased sympathetic arousal in the recovery phase. Disengaging from an emotional challenge may be linked with reduced physiological arousal in the short term, this behavior but also appears to have delayed consequences for physiological recovery.