Articles

Marital Conict, Childrens Representations of Family Relationships, and Childrens Dispositions Towards Peer Conict Strategies
Tina D. Du Rocher Schudlich, Haya Shamir, and E. Mark Cummings, University of Notre Dame

Abstract The links among marital relations and childrens representations were examined. Forty-seven children between the ages of 5 and 8 completed the Family Stories Task (FAST) to obtain their narrative representations of family relations and performed a variation of a puppet procedure (Mize & Ladd, 1988) to assess childrens dispositions towards peer conict strategies. Their parents completed a set of questionnaires regarding marital quality. Results demonstrated relations between marital conict and childrens dispositions towards peer conict strategies in conict situations. Childrens more negative dispositions towards peer conict and aggressive behavior in the peer conict scenarios were each associated with more overt conict behaviors by mothers and fathers, respectively, and more covert conict behavior by mothers. In addition, childrens internal representations of parentchild relations served as a mediator between marital conict and childrens notions about conict behavior towards peers. Keywords: marital conict; peers; family; aggression Until recently, little attention has been paid to possible linkages between the family and peer systems. However, in the last few years, numerous researchers have begun to address the possibility that the nature of childrens interactions with peers has its origins within the family, including marital conict (Parke et al., 2001). For example, marital conict has been found to be associated with both problematic sibling and peer relationships (Stocker & Youngblade, 1999). Children from high conict families are more likely to have problems with their peers than children from low conict homes (Vandewater & Lansford, 1998), and older adolescents from violent homes have been found to use violent tactics similar to their parents when interacting with peers (Cantrell, MacIntyre, Sharkey, & Thompson, 1995). Although research examining the links between the marital relationship and childrens peer relationships is burgeoning, studies specically comparing parents
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to E. Mark Cummings, Department of Psychology, 215 Haggar Hall, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN 46556. Email: Cummings.10@nd.edu
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conict histories to childrens own conict styles are rare. Most studies have looked more generally at childrens peer interactions or playtime or examined general assessments of the marital relationship, rather than specically examining the link between parents marital conict strategies and childrens own conict strategies with their peers. Furthermore, many questions remain about the particular mechanisms that could account for the transfer of behaviors acquired in the family context to peer settings (Ladd, LeSieur, & Prolet, 1993; Parke et al., 2001). This present study examines relations between marital conict and childrens dispositions towards peer conict strategies, with a particular focus on the effects of marital conict on childrens representations and the possible mediating role of representations of family relationships. Because these issues begin to be particularly important as children enter school and are beginning to develop a more extended peer network, children who are in their early years of schooling will be studied. Marital conict has consistently been found to be a strong predictor of childrens behavioral and emotional outcomes (Cummings & Davies, 1994; Grych & Fincham, 2001). For example, verbal anger, physical aggression and other negative forms of marital conict have been linked to reactions of distress such as anxiety and sadness, aggression, heightened involvement and/or enmeshment in parents problems, and greater internalizing and externalizing problems in children (Cummings & Davies, 2002; Grych & Fincham, 2001). On the other hand, collaboration, resolution, explanation and other more constructive forms of marital conict induce fewer negative emotions in children and are associated with childrens positive affect, independent play, distraction of and physical contact with their parents, all of which are associated with normal healthy children (Cummings & Davies, 2002). Thus, general effects of conict on children are well established and the way in which marital conict is handled clearly has a differential impact on children, but how different types of marital conict affect childrens own dispositions towards conict strategies with peers is unclear. Understanding the link between marital conict and childrens dispositions towards peer conict strategies requires moving beyond merely indexing putative effects of targeted family processes, to broadening the scope of theories to include the interface between family and peer conict. In particular, the understanding of families inuence requires examination of mechanisms that may be responsible for such effects (Rubin, Bukowski, & Parker, 1998). Several investigators (Bowlby, 1982; Parke et al., 2001; Shamir, Du Rocher Schudlich, & Cummings, 2001) have suggested internal models of relationships as a potential linking mechanism across differing social contexts. Moreover, Dodge (2001) suggested that a childs early relationship experiences become internalized in the form of expectations about how one is likely to be treated by others. These expectations or schemata are hypothesized to affect an individuals social adjustment by inuencing how the individual encodes, interprets, and responds to others behavior. Relationships with parents are likely to be particularly important in these internalizing processes pertaining to social adjustment, since interactions with ones parent(s) generally precede other interactions (Coie & Dodge, 1998). Studies examining the links between childrens cognitions about relationships and childrens social relations have found childrens cognitive representations of self and relationships with others to be associated with peer competence (Boivin & Hymel, 1997). For example, Rudolph, Hammen, and Burge (1995) found childrens negative representations of self, family, and peers were signicantly associated with higher levels of peer rejection and lack of social competence, supporting the notion that
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general cognitive representations of relationships and social experiences are interrelated. McHale, Johnson, and Sinclair (1999) also found support for the mediating role of family representations in the relations between family dynamics and preschoolers behavior with peers. Their results extended previous evidence of behavioral continuity between family and peer functioning to the level of cognitive representations, thus providing support for the operation of psychological mediators at the level of cognitions and laying a foundation for understanding the effects of marital conict on childrens dispositions towards conict strategies with peers. The emotional security hypothesis provides a model for how marital conict may affect childrens functioning in terms of multiple domains of responding and multiple family systems (Davies & Cummings, 1994). The conceptual proposition is that marital conict affects childrens sense of security about family functioning. Specically, childrens representations of family relationships are posited as a particularly important class of processes reecting emotional security, and, at the same time, mediating relations between marital conict and childrens socio-emotional functioning (Cummings & Davies, 1996). Moreover, as a dimension of parental behavior in the home with particular meaning for childrens assessments of the emotional security of family environments, interparental conicts are expected to inuence childrens representations of multiple family relationships, including childrens representations of motherchild, fatherchild, and marital relationships, and also their representations of themselves in the context of the marital relationship. A recent study by Shamir et al. (2001) found that both mothers and fathers marital conict strategies were related to childrens representations of multiple family systems. For both parents, negative marital conict strategies were linked with negative representations of family relationships, whereas for fathers, positive parenting styles were associated with positive representations of family relationships. The present study examines links between marital conict and childrens notions about peer conict and childrens internal representations as a mediator to those relations. In assessing childrens internal representations of family relationships, we are in fact assessing childrens schemas, rather than actual behaviors constituting these relationships. Measuring schemas, as opposed to behaviors, provides the advantage of a greater reection of internal cognitive models that guide and direct childrens reactions towards others more generally, whereas measures of parentchild behavioral interactions are more likely to be closely linked to these specic relationships and the temporal and interactional context of these relationships. Predictions are that greater marital discord will be directly related to childrens dispositions towards more negative peer conict and that marital conict will be associated with childrens internal representations of different family systems. Furthermore, childrens internal representations are expected to serve as a mediator, as assessed by Baron and Kennys (1986) criteria, in the relations between marital conict and childrens dispositions regarding peer conict.

Method Participants The participants were 47 married couples (mothers M age = 34.5 years, SD = 5.1; fathers M age = 36.3 years, SD = 6.0) with a child between the ages of 5 and 8 from a Midwestern community. The families were recruited using iers and newspaper ads.
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Before the laboratory visit families were contacted by phone for a screening interview; 81% of those contacted who met the screening criteria (i.e., married, with a child between the ages of 5 and 8) agreed to participate. The mean age of the children was 6.5 years (SD = 1.4) and the couples mean length of marriage at the time of participation was 9.8 years (SD = 4.89). The sample was 85.7% European American, 5.8% African American, 3.8% Asian American, 1.9% Hispanic, and 1.9% reported other ethnicity. The mean yearly family income was between $40,000 and $60,000. Husbands had an average of 14.9 years (SD = 3.5) of education, and wives had an average of 15.8 years (SD = 2.6). Procedures Questionnaires were sent to the parents to complete prior to arrival at the laboratory. Both parents were asked separately to complete them (all mothers and 41 fathers returned the questionnaires). One parent was asked to accompany the child to the laboratory. Upon arrival at the laboratory the child was taken into a play room with the investigator where the child completed the Family Stories Task (FAST) and the puppet procedure. The order of presentation of tasks was counterbalanced to prevent spillover effects. Family Stories Task. The procedures built upon and extended the narrative story stem approach to assessing childrens representations of family relationships described in the MacArthur Story Stem Battery (MSSB; Bretherton, Oppenheim, Buchsbaum, Emde, and the MacArthur Narrative Group, 1990). Historically, the MSSB had dual origins from two different conceptual interests. One is the attachment area, as reviewed in Bretherton, Oppenheim, et al. (1990), and the other is the area of family conicts and moral development (Buchsbaum & Emde, 1990; Buchsbaum, Toth, Clyman, Cicchetti, & Emde, 1993; Oppenheim, Emde, Hasson, & Warren, 1997). The FAST (Shamir et al., 2001) includes a more extensive assessment of childrens representations of multiple family systems than in past research, including assessments of childrens representations of systems in addition to the parentchild relationship. The battery of stories included 4 stories concerned with fathermother dyads (marital system; home late, ice cream, phone bill, and lost hat), 2 stories about motherchild dyads (motherchild system; puppy and candy), 3 stories concerned with fatherchild dyads (fatherchild system; TV, newspaper, and band-aid), and 3 stories about father motherchild triads (marital and children system; brushing teeth, owers, and pick up). In one example of the fathermother dyad stories, the child was told to imagine a box of ice cream was left out on the counter and had melted all over. A brief dialogue between the mother and father dolls ensues. Mother doll: Hey! Why didnt you put the ice cream away? Father doll: You said you were going to put it away. Mother doll: Just look at this mess! The child was then asked to respond. In an example from the triadic stories the child was instructed to imagine that the doll child (Sebastian) was supposed to be picked up from school by his parents, but they were a half hour late. When his parents arrive, the following dialogue occurs: Sebastian: What took you guys so long?! Ive been standing out here forever! Mother doll: Well, if your Dad would have been ready on time . . . ! Father doll (to Mom): No, you made us late! You took too long at the store! The child was instructed to respond then. In one example from the fatherchild dyad stories the child was told to imagine that the child doll (Sebastian) is pretending to be a famous chef making a delicious meal.
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Sebastian knows he is not supposed to cook with knives, but he took a knife out of the drawer to cook with anyway. While he is playing, he cuts his nger and it starts to bleed. Then the father doll comes running into the room and the child is asked to respond. See Shamir et al. (2001) for complete stories. One more story was used for fatherchild dyads than for motherchild dyads to ensure that stories would adequately assess this understudied family system. Thus, although the procedures for administering the FAST were similar to past studies using the story stem approach, and in some instances used very similar story stems, assessments were made of a wider range of childrens representations of family systems and particular efforts were made to assess previously neglected family systems (i.e., marital system; fatherchild system). Stories were introduced using small family action gures: a mother, father, and son or daughter matching the childs gender and ethnicity. The children were told they would be making up some stories using the action gures. The examiner began each of the stories and instructed the children to use the gures to tell the rest of the story. The action gures were positioned to depict the story being told, and the examiner used different dramatic, animated voices to involve the children as much as possible in the telling and development of the stories. Verbal prompts such as, and then what happened? or how did that happen? or what next? or what would the dad say then? were used to encourage the children to elaborate on their stories as needed. The childrens story telling was encouraged until at least one additional action was described that was not in the story stem. Note that some children could spontaneously give more than just one response. The number of prompts used varied depending on how many prompts it took in order for children to give an additional action that was not in the story stem, which was the stopping rule for encouraging children to respond further. The childrens story narratives were videotaped for later coding. Childrens narrative responses were scored for representations of family systems, based on categories of responding that have been linked to the quality of family functioning, especially in studies of parentchild systems, and children and marital systems (Cummings & Davies, 1994; Davies & Cummings, 1994). Coding reected an assessment of the positive and negative contents of childrens behavioral descriptions of qualities of family emotions and behaviors, without assumptions about defensive processes or other, more interpretative, evaluations (e.g., scoring for coherency). Moreover, the aim in coding was to characterize childrens positive and negative representations as relatively straightforward reections of their emotional security about family relationships at the level of representations (Cummings & Davies, 1996; Davies & Cummings, 1998). Categories were rened in preliminary coding and irrelevant or rarely occurring categories were omitted. Categories were sorted into positive and negative groupings according to conceptual criteria based on the research literatures on positive and negative parenting and marital behaviors (Cummings, Davies, & Campbell, 2000). The resulting positive grouping consisted of 8 codes reecting positive representations, including sharing, caregiving, affection, helpfulness, forgiving, instructiveness, collaboration, and conict resolution. The negative grouping consisted of 14 categories of negative representations, including avoidance-capitulation, intervention in others interactions, verbal aggression, physical aggression, stalemating, ignoring, inconsistency, nagging, rejection, neglect, harsh discipline, hostility, helplessness, and blaming (see Shamir, et al., 2001 for denitions).
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Consistent with coding procedures used for the MSSB in previous work (Oppenheim et al., 1997), within each story we coded whether the behavior occurred or not for each individual in that story. Thus, even if a child reported multiple instances of a response for a parent (e.g., harsh discipline), the maximum score for that behavior for that parent for a given story was 1. Each category was summed across the different story types and then divided by the number of stories within each representation. For example, caregiving was summed across all of the fatherchild stories and then divided by 3. This approach to score derivation ruled out the possibility that there would be higher scores for fatherchild versus motherchild representation due to a larger number of stories. Reliability was obtained by having two independent coders code 25% of the videotapes. Inter-rater agreement was calculated by comparing the responses of the independent coders for each coding category for each parent. Alpha coefcients ranged from .90 to 1.00 across the individual coding categories for mothers and from .71 to 1.00 across the individual coding categories for fathers. Although the basis for grouping was conceptual, a subsequent principal components analysis conrmed the existence of two factors, one with high positive loadings for positive representations and one with high positive loadings for negative representations, with eigenvalues greater than 3.0. Moreover, 16 of the 22 categories had loadings of .30 or more on the factor on which it had been sorted based on conceptual criteria alone; the lowest loadings were .15 for affection on the positive representations factor, .21 for nagging, -.02 for avoidance, and .09 for stalemating on the negative representations factor. Factor loadings from the principal components analysis are presented in Table 1. Results from the principal components analysis were used only to conrm the two theoretical factors and their loadings; no subsequent changes to the factors or the categories loading on them were made. Chronbachs alphas for the resulting factors were .73 for the negative factor and .81 for the positive factor. For the purposes of reducing the number of analyses with the limited sample size, categories of negative representations were summed to create a negative prole, and positive representations were summed to create a positive prole, for each family system. Previous research has also shown that these behaviors merit being considered collectively as negative and positive composites from the childrens perspective (Cummings, Goeke-Morey, Papp, & Dukewich, 2002; Goeke-Morey, Cummings, Harold, & Shelton, 2003). Thus, scores for positive and negative representations, respectively, were created for the fatherchild (M = 1.13, SD = .94; M = .52, SD = .82), motherchild (M = 1.59, SD = 1.45; M = .51, SD = .67), marital (M = 1.45, SD = 1.46; M = .84, SD = 1.00), and triadic (fathermotherchild) (M = 1.24, SD = 1.05; M = .75, SD = .98) family systems. Note, since these means were calculated per story, the values reect that at least half the stories had at least one negative representation and the average story had slightly more than one positive representation. Puppet Procedure. Utilizing puppets in various hypothetical vignettes has been widely employed by researchers for the assessment of childrens peer relations and peer conict (e.g., Costin & Jones, 1992; Eisenberg, Fabes, Minore, et al., 1994; Hay, Zahn-Waxler, Cummings, & Iannotti, 1992; Laursen, Hartup, & Koplas, 1996; Measelle, Ablow, Cowan, & Cowan, 1998; Murphy & Eisenberg, 1997). Childrens enacted puppet responses are related to their actual behavior in real life situations, including behaviors that include anger. Using this procedure, Mize and Ladd (1988) found that the quality of childrens enacted puppet responses predicted actual social
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Table 1. Principal Components Analysis of Representations of Family Relations for the FAST Components Positive Resolution Processes Resolution Sharing Forgiving Collaboration Caring Helpfulness Instructiveness Affection Blaming Ignoring Responsibility Intervention by Others Harsh Discipline Hostility Ignoring Physical Aggression Stalemating Helplessness Nagging Verbal Aggression Inconsistency Neglect Avoidance .80 .64 .60 .53 .43 .42 .38 .15 -.01 -.03 .15 -.21 -.19 -.29 -.50 -.12 -.28 .21 -.28 -.37 .38 -.26 Negative Resolution Processes -.01 .11 -.09 -.21 .38 .39 .23 .14 .75 .71 .58 .53 .50 .44 .31 .09 .02 .07 .03 .00 -.09 -.02

behavior. Moreover, Eisenberg and colleagues found childrens friendliness of enacted responses was related to individual differences in emotionality, regulation, and social functioning. Preschoolers who enacted friendly puppet responses tended to use constructive verbal objections to escape behavior during actual anger situations with peers and tended to use no physical retaliation (Eisenberg et al., 1994), whereas perceptions of the peers anger in the puppet vignettes were positively related to maternal ratings of aggressiveness, and negatively related to maternal reports of self-regulation. Although many previous studies used a puppet procedure with younger, preschoolaged children because of the helpfulness of such props in engaging children in tasks, there is no evidence that older children, up to age 8, cannot or will not use them, or that older children nd them awkward to use. In fact, the use of puppets in hypothetical vignettes has been employed successfully with older children, up to age 10 (Eisenberg and colleagues). The puppets help children to act out what they feel, think, and want to do. In other studies of marital conict and children (e.g., Cummings, Vogel, Cummings, & El-Shiekh, 1989) we have found that props (e.g., pictures of
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faces depicting various emotions, dolls) help children in the present age range provide answers. To capture childrens dispositions towards conict styles in our study, we adapted a puppet procedure from Mize & Ladd (1988) and Eisenberg et al. (1997). Children were asked to use puppets to act out how they would behave in ve peer conict situations. The ve different enacted scenarios were two ambiguous situations, two negative situations, and one positive situation. The last situation served to debrief the child and to ameliorate any negative emotions which may have arisen due to the childs perceptions of the conictual situations (see Appendix A). The children were instructed to pick one of the puppets that they would pretend to be, and the experimenter pretended to be one or two of the other puppets as the situation demanded. After each situation was enacted, the experimenter waited for a response from the children, thereby resulting in open-ended, unconstrained responses. If none was forthcoming, the children were asked, what would you do then? until they had satisfactorily responded as they wished and a codable behavior was obtained. The children in this study related very well the puppet task, with many of them expressing excitement at the prospect of using them. All children seemed adequately engaged in the task and none expressed disinterest in or displeasure with the task. The enactments were recorded by a video camera and later coded from the videotapes. Childrens responses to the puppet procedure were coded by criteria adapted from previous work (Eisenberg et al., 1997; Mize & Ladd, 1988). Childrens responses to each of the situations were coded by two independent raters into strategy idea units, which are actions/statements by the child that describe a single response or event. An example of a strategy idea unit would be the child attempting to resolve the situation through verbal communication (e.g., the child politely suggesting that the puppets could share the toys). Each of these strategies were rated on a ve-point scale for quality of peer relations, that is, positive versus negative peer relations (based on likelihood of a prosocial versus negative outcome for the peer). A rating of 5 included behaviors such as polite suggestions and considering the most positive outcome for both puppets. A rating of 1 included behaviors such as name calling. A rating of 3 indicated neutral behaviors. In addition, aggression was coded as 1 for occurring and 0 for not occurring. Physical aggression was operationalized as any threat or actual incidence of physical contact with the other puppet, with the intent to harm. Physically aggressive strategies are inherently negative in nature and the mere presence of such strategies is informative in and of itself. Thus, the most parsimonious way to code it was in terms of its presence or absence, rather than degrees of it. The scores for each of the strategies were then averaged, resulting in one score for hostility versus friendliness, and one score for aggression per story. Means and standard deviations for childrens conict behavior in each of the situations are presented in Table 2. The coders for the puppet task were different coders than those who completed coding for the FAST coding. Reliability for the puppet procedure was obtained by having two independent coders code 25% of the videotapes. Alpha coefcients were computed to assess the coders agreement with each other for each storys hostility versus friendliness score. The mean alpha coefcient was .89 (range .721.0). Kappa coefcients were computed to assess inter-rater agreement for the presence or absence of aggression in each story. The mean kappa coefcient was .86 (range .431.0). Marital Conict. The Conicts and Problem Solving Scale (CPS; Kerig, 1996) was used to measure marital conict. This self-report measure was administered to both
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Table 2. Means and Standard Deviations for Childrens Conict Behavior in Puppet Task Story 1 M Child Quality of Peer Relations Child Physical Aggression 3.5 .11 SD 1.01 .32 Story 2 M 4.12 .04 SD 1.08 .21 Story 3 M 3.01 .27 SD 1.25 .45 Story 4 M 2.32 .25 SD 1.24 .44

parents to assess the frequencies of specic positive and negative interactional styles during conict. Parents reported on their own use of particular strategies, as well as their perceptions of their partners use of the same strategies. Self and partner reports were averaged to create one score for each parent on each of the subscales. The CPS consists of six subscales: Stalemate (e.g., complain, bicker without really getting anywhere, enlist friends or family to support own point of view), AvoidanceCapitulation (e.g., leave the room, try to ignore problem, avoid talking about it), Physical Aggression (e.g., throw something at partner, slap partner), Verbal Anger (e.g., name-calling, cursing, insulting, raise voice, yell, shout), Child Exposure (e.g., involve the child(ren) in our argument, argue in front of the child(ren)), and Collaboration (e.g., try to understand what partner is really feeling, try to nd a solution that meets both of our needs equally). The range of possible scores is 021 for Stalemate, Physical Aggression and Collaboration, 015 for Child Exposure, and 024 for Avoidance-Capitulation and Verbal Anger. Because of the interest of the present study in patterns of negative marital conict behaviors rather than specic strategies, Collaboration was not considered for analyses; Stalemate and AvoidanceCapitulation were summed to create a category of Covert Conict (M = 18.78, SD = 6.09, for males; M = 19.30, SD = 6.64, for females); and Physical Aggression, Verbal Anger, and Child Exposure were summed to create a category of Overt Conict (M = 20.70, SD = 9.49, for males; M = 19.95, SD = 8.43, for females). Correlations between Stalemate and Avoidance-Capitulation were r = .64, p < .001 and r = .38, p < .05, for fathers and mothers, respectively. Correlations between the subscales used to create the overt conict scale are presented in Table 3. Possible scores ranged from 045 for the Covert Conict category and 060 for the Overt Conict category. Internal consistency of the CPS ranges between .70.98. Results No statistically signicant age or sex differences were found, although the power to detect developmental changes across this age period was limited. Accordingly, these variables were excluded from subsequent analyses to optimize cell sizes and the generalizability of ndings. Data analyses proceeded in two stages: (1) relations between parents self-report measures of patterns of marital conict, childrens internal representations, and childrens outcomes as presented in simulated peer conict scenarios;
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Table 3. Correlations Between the CPS Overt Conict Subscales Physical Aggression .46** .42**

Verbal Anger Verbal Anger Physical Aggression Child Exposure .47** .75***

Child Exposure .65*** .40**

Note: Correlations for fathers appear above the diagonal and correlations for mothers appear below the diagonal. * p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001.

and (2) childrens internal representations as a mediator between marital conict and childrens outcomes. Relations Between Family Constructs, Childrens Internal Representations, and Childrens Outcomes In the rst stage of data analyses, correlational analyses were conducted to determine the relations between parents self-report measures of marital relations, childrens internal representations of family relationships, and childrens outcomes as presented in simulated peer conict scenarios. To examine relations between family background and childrens internal representations of family, we rst examined the relations between childrens responses on the FAST and parents reported marital conict patterns (see Table 4). Ten out the 32 possible correlations were signicant, which is greater than would be expected by chance. Childrens negative fatherchild representations were associated with mothers covert conict style. Childrens negative motherchild representations were associated with mothers covert conict style and fathers overt conict style. Childrens negative marital representations were associated with mothers and fathers covert and overt conict styles. Finally, childrens negative triadic representations were associated with mothers covert and overt conict styles and fathers overt conict. No signicant relations were found between childrens positive representations of various family subsystems and parents conict strategies. Next, the relations between parents self-report marital conict styles and childrens peer conict behaviors were examined. Table 5 presents the relations between childrens peer conict behavior in the puppet procedure and marital measures. Six out of 8 possible correlations were signicant, greater than what would be expected due to chance alone. Childrens more negative dispositions towards peer conict and aggressive behavior in the simulated conict scenarios were each associated with more overt conict behaviors by mothers and fathers, respectively, and more covert conict behavior by mothers. The last part of this section of analyses discusses the relations between the childrens internal representations as presented in FAST and outcomes as presented in the puppet procedure. Correlational analyses were conducted to assess these relations between the FAST and the puppet procedures (see Table 6). Three out of 16 possible
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Table 4. Correlations Between Childrens Internal Representations of Family Relationships and Marital Measures Marital Conict Styles Mothers Overt Negative Representations FatherChild MotherChild FatherMother Triadic Positive Representations FatherChild MotherChild FatherMother Triadic Covert Overt Fathers Covert

.26 .33 .42** .38*

.48** .45** .45** .50**

.30 .46** .46** .34*

.24 .24 .53** .31

.09 .04 -.16 -.06

.16 .07 -.01 -.02

.05 -.02 -.06 .01

.09 .05 -.11 .03

* p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001.

Table 5. The Relations Between Childrens Peer Conict Behavior in Puppet Task and Marital Measures Childrens Conict Behavior in Puppet Task Marital Conict Styles Mothers CPS Covert Conict Overt Conict Fathers CPS Covert Conict Overt Conict Child Aggression Child Quality of Peer Relations

.31* .35*

-.34* -.43**

.30 .47**

-.30 -.44**

Note: Scores for quality of peer relations ranged from positive (5) to negative (1). * p < .05; ** p < .01.

correlations were signicant. Childrens internal representations of negative father child relations and negative motherchild relations were associated with more child aggression. Additionally, childrens negative representations of fatherchild relations were associated with poorer peer relations. No relations were found between conict
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Table 6. Correlations Between Childrens Internal Representations as Presented in Story Telling and Childrens Conict Behavior in Puppet Task Internal Representations as Presented by Story Telling Father Father Mother Mother Father Father Child Child Child Child Mother Mother Triad Triad Positive Negative Positive Negative Positive Negative Positive Negative .10 .18 .43** -.39* .13 .18 .43** -.24 -.15 .29 .28 -.10 .06 .11 .13 -.21

Puppet Task Child Aggression Child Quality of Peer Relations

Note: Scores for quality of peer relations ranged from positive (5) to negative (1). * p < .05; ** p < .01.

behavior in the puppet task and positive representations of family relationships. Also, no signicant relations were found for representations of the marital relationship or the triadic relationship. Childrens Internal Representations as a Mediator Between Family Constructs and Childrens Outcomes In the second stage of data analyses, a series of multiple regressions were conducted in order to determine the mediating role of internal representations, as illustrated by the FAST, in the relations between marital conict and childrens dispositions towards peer conict behavior, as illustrated by puppet interactions. Baron and Kenny (1986) proposed several rigorous criteria for a variable to be considered a candidate to be a mediator. Applying their ideas to the present study, childrens internal representations of family relations can be considered a candidate for a mediator only if all three criteria are met: on the basis of zero-order correlations, (a) the marital discord predictors are signicantly correlated with the outcome, childrens peer conict behavior; (b) the marital discord predictors are signicantly correlated with the mediator, childrens internal representations of family relations; and (c) the mediator, childrens internal representations of family relations, is signicantly correlated with the outcome, childrens peer conict behavior. If all these criteria are met, it is permissible to construct a regression model and use the standardized regression coefcients to test two additional criteria: (d) the relationship between the mediator (childrens internal representations of family relations) and the marital discord predictors, and between the mediator and the outcome (childrens peer conict behavior) must continue to be signicant in the regression model; and (e) the introduction of the mediator, childrens internal representations of family relations, into the model must reduce prior, significant zero-order relationships between the marital discord predictors and the outcome, childrens peer conict behavior.
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Thus based on Baron and Kennys criteria, only variables meeting the rst three criteria can be tested for mediation, which resulted in the testing of four models. Variables in this study that met these criteria and were to be tested for the last two are presented in Figures 1 4. Three different pathways are depicted in each of the gures: (a) childrens internal representations of family relations regressed on marital discord predictors, (b) childrens peer conict behavior regressed on marital discord predictors, and (c) childrens peer conict behavior regressed on both their internal representations of family relations and marital discord predictors. Standardized betas are presented for each pathway. Despite the rigorous criteria, in multiple instances childrens internal representations of family relations were found to be mediators in the relations between types of marital conict behaviors by mothers or fathers and

Maternal Covert Marital Conflict

.33*b

.25c

Childrens Dispositions Towards Aggression Towards Peers .38*c

.48**a Childrens Negative Representations of FatherChild Relations

Figure 1. Childrens negative representations of fatherchild relations as a mediator between maternal covert marital conict and childrens aggression towards peers in the puppet task.

Maternal Covert Marital Conflict

.33*b

.20c

Childrens Dispositions Towards Aggression Towards Peers .36*c

.45**a Childrens Negative Representations of MotherChild Relations

Figure 2. Childrens negative representations of motherchild relations as a mediator between maternal covert marital conict and childrens aggression towards peers in the puppet task.
-.38*b -.30c

Maternal Covert Marital Conflict

Childrens Dispositions Towards Prosocial vs Hostile Peer Conflict -.31*c

.48**a

Childrens Negative Representations of FatherChild Relations

Figure 3. Childrens negative representations of fatherchild relations as a mediator between maternal covert marital conict and childrens quality of peer relations in the puppet task.
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Paternal Overt Marital Conflict .47**b .29c Childrens Dispositions Towards Aggression Towards Peers .38*c

.46**a Childrens Negative Representations of MotherChild Relations

Figure 4. Childrens negative representations of motherchild relations as a mediator between paternal overt marital conict and childrens aggression in the puppet task. childrens peer conict behavior. Figures 1 and 2 demonstrate that childrens internal representations of parentchild relations served as a mediator between maternal covert marital conict and childrens aggression towards peers. Figure 3 demonstrates childrens internal representations of negative fatherchild relations serve as a mediator between maternal covert marital conict and childrens quality of peer relations. Figure 4 depicts the mediating role of childrens internal representations of negative motherchild relations between paternal overt marital conict and childrens aggression. Supporting the results outlined in the gures, steps 1 and 2a in Tables 7 and 8 provide results comparing the predictive power of marital conict behaviors (overt and covert) when entered (a) as the only predictor in regression analyses (unmediated model) and (b) as a predictor in the second step after partialling out childrens internal representations of parentchild relations in the rst step (mediated model). The R2 change value indexed the reduction in variance accounted for after partialling out childrens internal representations. Given that some researchers have argued that there should be a signicant reduction in R2 to fully support a mediational model (e.g., Baron & Kenny, 1986), signicant R2 changes are denoted by asterisks. Following these guidelines, childrens internal representations of parentchild relations served as a mediator of marital conict behaviors in all 4 of the models, predicting childrens dispositions towards peer conict behavior (i.e., aggression towards peers and prosocial vs. hostile behavior). Although the model for the mediational role of negative fatherchild representations in the prediction of childrens prosocial behavior provided evidence for mediation, the Beta for marital conict only decreased from -.38 to -.30 after adding in representations. The reduced Beta value for marital conict was similar to the Beta for the mediator (fatherchild representations) itself, thus it was not a particularly strong mediating relationship. To determine more explicitly the relative magnitude of childrens representations as mediators between parents marital conict and childrens dispositions towards peer conict behavior, the percentage of the total effect that was mediated was calculated using the formula ab / [ab + t] (MacKinnon & Dwyer, 1993), where a represents the independent variable-mediator path, b represents the mediator-dependent variable path, and t represents the independent variable-dependent variable path. Examining each model in turn, for the maternal covert model, 42% of the effect of maternal covert conict on childrens disposition towards aggression was mediated by childrens negative representations of fatherchild relationships. Fifty-ve percent of the effect of maternal covert conict on childrens disposition towards aggression was mediated by childrens negative representations of motherchild relationships. Thirty-three percent of the effect of maternal covert conict on childrens disposition towards prosocial
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Table 7. Regression Analyses Testing the Mediational Role of Childrens Internal Representations in the Link Between Maternal Covert and Paternal Overt Marital Conict and Childrens Disposition Towards Aggression in Puppet Task Childrens Disposition Towards Aggression Variable Step 1: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Step 2a: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Negative Representations of FatherChild Step 2b: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Negative Representations of ParentChild Step 1: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Step 2a: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Negative Representations of MotherChild Step 2b: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Negative Representations of ParentChild Step 1: Paternal Overt Marital Conict Step 2a: Paternal Overt Marital Conict Negative Representations of MotherChild Step 2b: Paternal Overt Marital Conict Negative Representations of ParentChild
* p < .05; ** p < .01.

b .33*

R2 .11 .25

DR2 .11* .14*

.25 .38* .28 .19 .44** .11 .33* .23 .20 .36* .28 .19 .44** .21 .47** .33 .29 .38* .40 .30 .46** .19** .12* .21* .17** .12* .11* .17**

versus hostile behavior was mediated by childrens negative representations of fatherchild relationships. For the paternal overt marital conict model, 38% of the effect of paternal overt marital conict on childrens disposition towards aggression was mediated by childrens negative representations of motherchild relationships. Finally, mediational models were tested to determine whether the effects of one parents negative marital conict tactics are most likely to be troublesome when children have negative representations of their relationships with the other parent as well. These results are presented as step 2b in Tables 7 and 8. A composite variable, combining childrens negative representations of both parents was created and entered in
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Table 8. Regression Analyses Testing the Mediational Role of Childrens Internal Representations in the Link Between Maternal Covert Marital Conict and Childrens Disposition Towards Prosocial vs. Hostile Behavior in Puppet Task Childrens Disposition Towards Prosocial vs. Hostile Behavior Variable Step 1: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Step 2a: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Negative Representations of FatherChild Step 2b: Maternal Covert Marital Conict Negative Representations of ParentChild
* p < .05; ** p < .01.

b -.38*

R2 .14 .24

DR2 .14* .09*

-.30* -.31* .22 -.28 -.29 .07

the regression equations as a potential mediator. Following the guidelines above, childrens negative internal representations of both parentchild relations served as a signicant mediator of marital conict behaviors. In terms simply of comparisons of values for variance explained, negative representations of both parents explained more variance in predicting childrens dispositions towards peer conict behavior (i.e., aggression towards peers) than negative representations of only one parent in all but one of the models tested. Having negative representations of both parents did not pose a greater risk for childrens dispositions towards prosocial vs. hostile behaviors than having a negative representation of just the fatherchild relationship in the presence of covert marital conict. Discussion The present results demonstrated that marital conict strategies were signicantly related to childrens notions about conict strategies with peers. Specically, childrens dispositions towards more negative conict strategies with peer and aggressive behavior in the simulated conict scenarios were associated with more covert and overt conict behaviors by mothers and fathers, and more overt conict behaviors by fathers. These results are consistent with the body of literature linking negative marital relations to childrens more problematic peer relationships (Cantrell et al., 1995; Erel, Margolin, & John, 1998; Gottman & Katz, 1989; McHale et al., 1999; Stocker & Youngblade, 1999; Stocker et al., 1997; Vandewater & Lansford, 1998). Moreover, a contribution for process-oriented models for how marital conict affects childrens functioning was evidence that childrens representations of relationships with parents partially mediated effects of marital conict on childrens representations of relationships with peers in the puppet procedure.
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These ndings can be interpreted to support the notion that childrens representations of family relationships are one class of processes mediating the effects of marital conict on childrens socio-emotional functioning (Crockenberg & Langrock, 2001; Grych & Fincham, 1990). Relatedly, consistent with the emotional security hypothesis (Davies & Cummings, 1998), the results suggest that conicts that threaten emotional security negatively affect childrens representations of how to function in stressful situations, which would include conict situations with peers. In this regard, it is consistent with the theory that childrens positive representations were unrelated to childrens representations about how to cope with hypothetical conicts with peers. Perhaps when children are presented with a potentially negative conict situation what comes to mind is the way their parents behave in negative situations, which is reected in the negative family representations, rather than recall what to do in more constructively handled conict. Future work could provide a better understanding by including positive and neutral as well as negative hypothetical scenarios with peers. This could help to determine if positive representations are associated more with neutral or positive situations with peers, and if negative representations are associated more with the negative scenarios. The ndings regarding mediators provided preliminary support for the scant literature on processes underlying relations between marital conict and peer relations. Thus, the result that negative internal representations of fatherchild relationships mediated relationships between marital conict and peer relations is consistent with Stocker and Youngblades (1999) nding that fathers hostility towards children mediated links between marital conict and problematic peer relationships. The present study adds that childrens negative internal representations of motherchild relationships also mediated childrens more negative dispositions towards peer conict. Interestingly, representations of negative relationships with fathers mediated the effects of maternal marital conict on peer relationships in conict simulations in two instances, and negative internal representations of motherchild relationships mediated the effects of fathers marital conict behavior. One might expect that parents marital conict behaviors would affect the quality of childrens representations of their relationship with that particular parent, which, in turn, would then possibly have implications for childrens representations of relationships with peers (evidence for this pathway was obtained in one instance). One interpretation for the unexpected ndings is that the effects of one parents negative marital conict tactics are most likely to be troublesome when children have negative representations of their relationships with the other parent as well, that is, children have negative behavioral models or internal representations for both parents. Analyses addressing this question partially supported this hypothesis; childrens dispositions towards aggressive, but not prosocial, behavior in the puppet task was more negatively affected when children had negative representations of both parents than when they had negative representations of just one parent. It is also intriguing that representations of parentchild relationships, as opposed to representations of marital or triadic relationships, best mediated the prediction of quality of peer relations based on marital conict. One might expect that the most inuential avenue for the impact of marital conict would be through the effects of childrens representations of marital relationships. The literature suggests that to some extent the effects of marital conict on children are mediated by effects of marital conict on parenting (Cummings & Davies, 2002), and it may be that this pathway has especially important implications for how children relate to peers in conict
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situations. Alternatively, offering variations of an argument already made, it may be that negative effects for peer relationships are most likely to be obtained when negative behavioral models or internal representations are already found for more than one family system (i.e., marital; parentchild). Notably, however, marital conict was associated with childrens negative representations of multiple forms of family relationships, including parentchild and marital. That is, marital conict and childrens representations of multiple family systems were frequently interrelated, so that a caution for these interpretations is that pathways are likely to be more complex than are represented by statistical tests. Also of note is the absence of sex or age differences in this study. Given the small sample size, this may be an artifact of limited power in testing these differences. Furthermore, effects of child age and gender on responding to exposure to marital conict are typically inconsistent and weak across studies (Cummings & Davies, 1994, 2002). Numerous previous studies examining childrens representations have also found an absence of signicant age and gender differences (Cassidy, 1988; Oppenheim et al., 1997; Verschueren, Marcoen, & Schoefs, 1996; Warren, Emde, & Sroufe, 2000). Given the modest variation in responding typically found for age and gender in the literature, and the saliency of conict stimuli in inuencing childrens responding in past work, it is not entirely surprising that age and gender did not exert significant inuence. As children develop over time, they are likely to develop more complex and possibly conicting schemas to guide their behavior in situations with peers, but their primary and most salient schemas are likely to be those of their family, those schemas rst developed. Longitudinal data are needed to examine these propositions, as well as to determine the direction of effects posited by the models tested in this study. It is also important to consider other possible mechanisms not examined in this study that may account for part of the relations between marital conict and childrens dispositions towards peer conict strategies. Childrens self-regulation of emotions, or emotional reactivity, is another important correlate of childrens peer competence (Eisenberg & Fabes, 1994; Parke & ONeil, 1997). Children with greater emotional reactivity tend to be described by peers as less prosocial and more aggressive (Park et al., 2001). Furthermore, childrens emotional reactivity has been posited to mediate links between marital conict and child outcomes (Cummings & Davies, 1994), implicating it may play an important role in the relations between marital conict and childrens peer conict strategies. Additionally, other various aspects of emotional development (encoding, decoding, and cognitive understanding) as well as parental practices that inuence childrens affect management, play an important role in accounting for variations in the nature of childrens peer relations (Park et al., 2001), suggesting it is plausible that they may also be indirect pathways through which marital conict has its impact on childrens peer conict. In addition, caution should be exercised in interpreting these results for childrens actual behavior with peers, since the assessment context pertained to childrens representations of behavior with puppets representing hypothetical conicts, and childrens actual peer relations are not assessed and no peer/teacher ratings or sociometric data were available. Studies examining similar constructs and processes based on other methodologies (e.g., behavioral observation) are needed in future research. At the same time, measurements of childrens representational processes are a signicant level of analysis, and may capture processes underlying childrens socioemotional functioning that have particular stability and import for the conceptualization and prediction of
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childrens development over time. Representations are likely to remain stable because they are mental structures comprising old information which are used to comprehend new information, thus new experiences are interpreted based on old information and assimilated accordingly. The present results support past work in suggesting the use of a puppet procedure for assessing representational processes concerning relationships outside of the family for younger children (Mize & Ladd, 1988; Eisenberg and colleagues). Finally, this article supports the proposition of relationships among marital functioning, parenting, and childrens representations of relationships, including representations of relationships with non-family members. The ndings thus provide encouragement for future research on childrens representations as an explanatory mechanism for understanding the effects of family processes on childrens socioemotional functioning.

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Appendix A Situation One Ambiguous: The child will be told to pretend that he/she has been making a picture, he/she had worked really hard on it, and is so proud that he/she wants everyone to see it. The experimenter puppet will approach the childs puppet and say what a neat picture it is and that he/she wants to show it to the people downstairs. The experimenter puppet takes the picture under the table and switches it for the picture with the mark on it underneath the table so that the child does not see him/her doing so. The marked picture is brought back up to table where the child puppet is and the experimenter puppet exclaims in surprise, Oh no! Theres a mark on it! (If asked, the experimenter will claim total ignorance of any inquiries as to the origin of the mark.) Situation Two Ambiguous: The experimenter uses two puppets now and plays with two toys. The child is told to approach the experimenters playing puppets and ask them if he/she can play with them. When the child asks the puppets if he/she can play with them, one of puppets will say, Theres only two toys here to play with (i.e., neither overtly denying nor allowing the child to play), and continue playing without him/her. Prompts will be used as necessary. The experimenter will be exible and go along with what the child suggests (e.g., if he/she suggests sharing). Situation Three Negative: The child will be instructed to pretend to play with a toy. The experimenter puppet will approach the childs puppet and say, Youre a baby, youre playing with baby toys! Prompts will be used as necessary. Situation Four Negative: The child will be told to play with a toy again. The experimenter puppet will approach the childs puppet and say, I want that, and take away his/her toy. Prompts will be used as necessary. Situation Five Positive/Friendly: The experimenter puppet will tell the child that they will pretend to play together nicely now and have the puppets play with a ball together or some other toy. The experimenter puppet will say, Okay, lets play nicely now. We were just pretending before, but Im sorry I called you a baby. That wasnt a nice thing to do, I shouldnt have said that. And Im sorry I stole your toy away from you. I should have asked you for it nicely, not just grabbed it. Im sorry and I know thats not how we should play. It sure is nice that we can play together nicely now and share. This is much better than being mean. When nished the experimenter will say, Okay, were all done pretending now. Thank you for playing with me.

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