Date of Award

2025

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Psychology

Specialization

Clinical Psychology

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Ellen Flannery-Schroeder

Abstract

Mental health challenges represent a key construct to focus on in support of childhood and adolescent well-being. Mental health challenges represent the leading cause of disability among children and adolescents. Recent research on critical periods in brain development shows that early childhood and adolescence mark times in which behavioral, neurodevelopmental, and mental health features arise. Anxiety disorders, which involve the excessive presence of fear and anxiety, are among the most common psychiatric disorders affecting youth and adults today. Emotion regulation (ER) and behavioral inhibition are important constructs correlated to anxiety which may be leveraged to predict and intervene on the onset of anxiety disorders among children. While research has begun to elucidate relationships between ER and behavioral development, more is needed to advance age-appropriate, child-based interventions at this stage to support mental health gains later in childhood.

This paper conducts a systematic review of recent literature (2015-2025) that examines ER in preschool-aged children (ages 2-5) as a predictor of behavioral inhibition symptoms in later childhood (ages 6-17). The current review follows Problem/Population/Patient, Intervention/Exposure, Comparison, and Outcome (PICO) and (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) PRISMA systematic review frameworks to examine responses to the following question in current literature: Do ER skills measured during the preschool years longitudinally predict behavioral inhibition among school-aged children? Boolean terms were used to investigate this question using APAPsycArticles, Embase, and PubMed databases. Results were added to a Covidence account systematic review project where two independent reviewers first assessed titles and abstracts for relevance to the research question and then assessed full papers for inclusion and exclusion criteria. Finally, included papers were assessed using the Downs and Black (1998) 27-item review checklist to assess for reporting transparency, external validity, internal validity, selection bias, and power. The two included papers in the systematic review suggest that alterations in emotion regulation skill development during the preschool years may predict greater behavioral inhibition symptoms later in childhood.

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