ABSTRACT
The ability to regulate emotions is a core feature of socioemotional competence and mental health. Its origins begin when children are born. The deliberate, effortful self-regulation of emotion begins to appear in early childhood, but we know relatively little about its development during this formative age period. In this chapter, we define emotion and emotion regulation, arguing that these are dynamic, moment-to-moment processes. We then review the evidence of developmental changes in self-regulation of positive and negative emotions, in strategy use in the period between toddler and kindergarten ages, and in parents’ contributions to children’s self-regulation. Our review of the evidence points to next steps developmental scholars can address in filling gaps in knowledge of the development of emotion regulation in early childhood. We contend that those next steps will benefit from conceptualizing emotion regulation as a matter of time and illustrate the promise of using multiple time scale approaches to address gaps; for example, how does effective self-regulation of emotion develop between toddlerhood and school age? The use of multiple time scales will advance our knowledge of the development of emotion regulation as a dynamic process involving quick time scale changes that emerges, grows, and matures with age, involving slower time scale changes.
