The purpose of this research is to observe the emotional regulation strategy of adolescents from divorced families attending high school . and to discuss it in the theological perspective based on the Gross' theory. Accordingly, the research problems ...
The purpose of this research is to observe the emotional regulation strategy of adolescents from divorced families attending high school . and to discuss it in the theological perspective based on the Gross' theory. Accordingly, the research problems are set as 1) How the cognitive, behavioral and experiential strategies of emotional regulation would appear to the adolescents from divorced families? and 2) What is the emotional regulation strategy that would affect the depression of adolescents from divorced family.
For this, 320 adolescents attending a general high school, specialized school and alternative school were responded for the questionnaires. Among the collected questionnaires, 294 were analyzed except 26 questionnaires with missing items or improper answers. As a result of measurement, there was no significant difference of recognition in general and specialized schools but significant in the alternative school. Therefore, the subject sampled in this research was 100 adolescents attending the alternative schools.
To perform this research, the researcher visited the school from October 15th to November 5th to request for the questionnaire response and visited again to collect the questionnaires after being notified that the questionnaires were completed.
As a measurement tool, depression scale and emotional regulation strategy scale were used. For depression scale, SDS (Self-Rating Depression Scale) of Zung and Durhamec (1965) were used, which were categorized into 5 depression categories, affective depression, periodic depression, other physiological depression, psychomotor depression and ideological depression. The questionnaire consists of total 20 questions with 4 point scale each, and the score is ranged from 20 to 80 points. The higher the score is, the higher the degree of depression is.
It is observed that the value of Cronbach's a was .75. For emotional regulation strategy scale, 69 questionnaires of ERSQ (Emotion Regulation Strategy Questionnaire) proposed by Lee, Ji Young (2008) was applied. ERSQ with 69 questionnaires consists of 29 questionnaires regarding cognitive strategies in which subordinate factors consists of 5 factors, 'to think positively', 'to thing negatively', 'to blame others', to think passively', and 'to accept cognitively'. For 18 questions for the experiential strategies, the subordinate factors includes 5 factors, 'to spurt negative emotion to others in a safe situation', 'to accept emotion', 'to image joyfully', ' to express and accept the emotion', and the subordinate factors for the 22 questionnaires of behavioral strategies includes 6 factors, 'to meet intimacies, 'to take problem solving action, 'to ask advice or help', 'to overeat', 'to be addicted', and 'recreation activity'. In Lee's research, the reliability and validity showed high. In this research, the value of Cronbach's a was high with .80 in 'to ask advice or help' in the behavioral strategy. In the experiential strategy, 'to spurt negative emotion in a safety situation' was .74 and 'to accept the emotion' was .70, while, in the experiential strategy, 'to spurt the negative emotion' was .74 and 'to accept the emotion' was .70. In the cognitive strategy, 'to think negatively' was .85 and 'to think positively' was .84.
As the result of analysis on the emotional regulation of adolescents from divorced families, 'to think negatively' and 'to accept cognitively' were shown to be highest in the cognitive strategy.
In the behavioral strategy, 'to overeat' was high next to separation by death. In the experiential strategy, 'to express emotion and open empathy were high next to separation by death.
As the result of analysis on the emotional regulation and depression of both divorced and non-divorced families, it is observed that 'to think positively' and 'ot blame others' in the congitive strategy would reduce the depression. In other word, 'to think positively' and 'to blame other' should be strengthened first to reduce the depression.
This significant difference came out because majority of students in the alternative schools consist of adolescents who have experienced deprivation and delinquency.
Therefore, the limitation of this research are presented in the followings.
First, this research was carried out for the emotional regulation of adolescents from divorced families focused on the Gross' theory. It would be significantly meaningful to research the emotional regulation of adolescents from divorced families.
However, as the quantitative analysis of questionnaires was peformed without phenomenological qualitative research, the qualitative research program should be developed based on this research in the future.
Second, it would be necessary to develop future program with purpose of changing 'to think negatively' to 'to thing positively'. Therefore, applying a program related to Gross' emotional regulation, this research proposes the necessity of subsequent researches and developments for the depression and overeat.
Third, this research would propose the necessity of professional counselors' consistent research who can plant positive hope to the adolescents who are expressing repressed emotions and showing internalized and externalized behavioral problems based on the negative emotional experience of adolescents from divorced families.
This research approached to the emotional regulation of adolescents from divorced families with the analyzed result of questionnaires and discussed in perspectives of the theology and christian counseling based on the Gross' emotional regulation theory, but quality research has not been performed due to phenomenological restriction. Thus, the result cannot be assured how much it would affect the adolescent from divorced families.
Specifically, as this research was restricted to the adolescents from divorced families only in Daejeon not nationwide, it would be difficult to generalize the find