Abstract

This study explored the effects of parental emotional invalidation and expressed emotion experienced during childhood on the psychological health of young adults. Based on a sample of 248 college and graduate students, the relationships among emotional invalidation, expressed emotion, emotional dysregulation, internalizing problems, and externalizing problems were clarified using a structural equation model. The results revealed that paternal emotional invalidation affected children’s internalizing problems, while emotional dysregulation fully mediated the relationships between parental expressed emotion and internalizing-externalizing problems. For male participants, some direct paths of parental emotional invalidation and expressed emotion leading to internalizing-externalizing problems were found to be significant, while, for female participants, emotional dysregulation mediated the paths. The implications and limitations of the study and suggestions for further studies are discussed.