Parental emotion socialization: a cross-cultural perspective from Colombia and Italy, and its role as moderator of SEL-based school intervention

Study 1 focuses on validating the Emotion as a Child Scale (EAC; Magai, 1997), specifically examining the emotions of anger and sadness in two countries: Italy and Colombia. This scale is widely used in international literature to measure Parental Emotion Socialization (PES; Eisenberg et al., 1998), yet it lacks an adequate validation process. The hypothesis posits that confirmatory factor analysis in Italy and Colombia will reveal two factors (supportive and unsupportive parenting practices) for both anger and sadness. Study 2 builds upon the findings of Study 1 and investigates the association between PES and children's social-emotional adjustment. The hypothesis suggests that higher levels of negative affectivity, greater irritability, and increased parental rumination will be associated with more unsupportive emotion socialization practices and fewer supportive practices. Additionally, it is hypothesized that greater use of unsupportive practices will be linked to higher internalizing and externalizing symptoms in children. Finally, Study 3 examines the moderating role of PES on the effectiveness of an intervention program, V-Robotator, designed to promote children's social-emotional competencies through subgroup activities facilitated by a virtual agent. It is hypothesized that children from less supportive family environments will benefit more from the V-Robotator intervention program.