Child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness: The indirect associations through teachers' emotion regulation and coping

Journal of School Psychology 59 (2016) 83–96

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Journal of School Psychology journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jschpsyc

Child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness: The indirect associations through teachers' emotion regulation and coping Lieny Jeon a,⁎, Eunhye Hur b, Cynthia K. Buettner b a b

School of Education, Johns Hopkins University, United States Department of Human Sciences, The Ohio State University, United States

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history: Received 27 October 2015 Received in revised form 25 March 2016 Accepted 27 September 2016 Available online xxxx Keywords: Child-care chaos Emotion regulation Coping Early childhood education Teachers' responsiveness

a b s t r a c t Teachers in early child-care settings are key contributors to children's development. However, the role of teachers' emotional abilities (i.e., emotion regulation and coping skills) and the role of teacher-perceived environmental chaos in relation to their responsiveness to children are understudied. The current study explored the direct and indirect associations between teachers' perceptions of child-care chaos and their self-reported contingent reactions towards children's negative emotions and challenging social interactions via teachers' emotional regulation and coping strategies. The sample consisted of 1129 preschool-aged classroom teachers in day care and public pre-K programs across the US. We first found that child-care chaos was directly associated with teachers' non-supportive reactions after controlling for multiple program and teacher characteristics. In addition, teachers in more chaotic child-care settings had less reappraisal and coping skills, which in turn, was associated with lower levels of positive responsiveness to children. Teachers reporting a higher degree of chaos used more suppression strategies, which in turn, was associated with teachers' non-supportive reactions and fewer expressive encouragement reactions to children's emotions. Results of this exploratory study suggest that it is important to prepare teachers to handle chaotic environments with clear guidelines and rules. In order to encourage teachers' supportive responses to children, intervention programs are needed to address teachers' coping and emotion regulation strategies in early childhood education. © 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Society for the Study of School Psychology.

1. Introduction In early child-care settings, teachers are key socializers of children's social and emotional competence through guiding children's expression and regulation of emotions and social behaviors (Denham, Bassett, & Zinsser, 2012; Jennings & Greenberg, 2009). Although teachers play an important role in facilitating children's social and emotional competence in child-care settings, teachers often report that dealing with children's emotions and challenging behaviors is a major source of stress (Montgomery & Rupp, 2005). Coupled with the fact that teaching is an intensive psychological process, this stress may limit teachers' ability to interact with children in a positive way or even prompt expression of negative emotions towards children (Ahn & Stifter, 2006). There is a lack of understanding, however, of antecedents associated with teachers' contingent reactions to children's ⁎ Corresponding author at: School of Education, Johns Hopkins University, 2800 N Charles St, Baltimore, MD 21218, United States. E-mail address: [email protected] (L. Jeon). Action Editor: Sherrie L. Proctor

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jsp.2016.09.006 0022-4405/© 2016 Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of Society for the Study of School Psychology.

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negative emotions and challenging social behaviors (Denham et al., 2012), and a critical need to explore how teachers might better respond to children's social and emotional challenges. In the parenting literature, higher degrees of chaotic home environments have been found to be associated with parental psychological difficulties (Deater–Deckard, Chen, Wang, & Bell, 2012) and parenting behaviors (Corapci & Wachs, 2002). Likewise, in more chaotic child-care environments, teachers may experience higher levels of stress, emotional arousal, and burnout, which interfere with their abilities to positively respond to children. In the current study, we first explored teachers' perceptions of childcare chaos, which can be considered an environmental aspect of child-care, and its direct associations with teachers' contingent reactions to children, reported by teachers. In addition, when child-care environments are more chaotic, teachers themselves may need to utilize emotion regulation strategies and coping skills in an effective way to positively respond to children's negative social and emotional displays. If teachers are more capable of remaining calm, regulating their own emotions, and coping with difficulties, they are more likely to provide positive guidance for children (Jennings & Greenberg, 2009). For example, Jennings (2015) found that when preschool teachers have higher levels of mindfulness (i.e., nonjudgmental attention and awareness that promote emotion regulation and resiliency and buffer stress), they tend to show more sensitivity in their discipline approaches and better emotional support. Despite the importance of child-care climate and teachers' emotional abilities in their responsiveness to children, there is a lack of research examining this process. Therefore, we explored the direct and indirect associations between child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness to children's negative emotions and challenging social interactions with peers through teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills. 1.1. Teachers' responsiveness in child-care Children's social and emotional competence can be taught and developed through early childhood teachers' effective responsiveness and guidance (Denham et al., 2012). For example, Ahn (2005) showed in a qualitative study that preschoolers could identify precipitants of negative emotions and could express the emotions in a constructive way when teachers encouraged emotion-related discussions. When teachers or caregivers respond to children's negative emotions using supportive reactions, children tend to demonstrate a better understanding of their own and others' emotions (Davidov & Grusec, 2006; Morris, Denham, Bassett, & Curby, 2013), stronger social skills, and less problem behaviors (Eisenberg, Fabes, & Murphy, 1996). Supportive reactions towards children's negative emotions include helping children identify their own emotions and regulate undesirable behaviors, providing children with opportunities to solve problems by themselves, and encouraging children to express their emotions in a positive way to maintain healthy relationships with peers (Fabes, Poulin, Eisenberg, & Madden-Derdich, 2002). On the other hand, caregivers' non-supportive reactions, including punitive or minimization responses that ignore the seriousness of problems, are associated with lower levels of social functioning, coping skills, and emotion regulation in children (Eisenberg et al., 1996; Perry, Calkins, Nelson, Leerkes, & Marcovitch, 2012). In addition to positively responding to children's negative emotions, it is also important to teach children how to negotiate conflicts constructively and how to make respectful choices in challenging social situations (CASEL, 2013). It is possible that children are more likely to learn and internalize social cues and rules when teachers provide more adequate guidance on managing conflicts with peers in child-care settings. Children whose teachers appropriately intervene with challenging peer interactions are expected to learn ways to overcome challenging interactions. Despite its importance, there is a lack of studies that measure and examine teachers' responsiveness and guidance in children's challenging social interactions. In the current study, we developed a teacher-report measure that examines teachers' responsiveness in children's challenging social interactions. The measure was developed to parallel, in terms of format, an established measure, the Coping with Children's Negative Emotions Scale (CCNES). The CCNES assesses teachers' responsiveness to children's negative emotions (Fabes et al., 2002) by providing a set of short scenarios and potential responses from which teachers choose the one they would employ in the described situation. The current study examined the antecedents of teachers' responsiveness that supports children's social and emotional learning to explore ways to improve teachers' supportive responses on both children's negative emotions and challenging social interactions. 1.2. The role of child-care chaos Child-care is the place where teachers and children interact on a daily basis. The overall climate of child-care, including physical environment, has been studied in relation to teachers' caregiving behaviors, emotional support, sensitivity, and responsiveness (e.g., Gordon, Fujimoto, Kaestner, Korenman, & Abner, 2013; Mashburn et al., 2008). For example, Mashburn et al. (2008) found that teachers in well-structured and well-organized classrooms, which are measured by the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale–Revised (ECERS–R), tended to show better emotional and instructional support. In addition, the way in which teachers organize routines and learning activities has been found to be correlated with overall child-care quality (Hamre, Goffin, & Kraft-Sayre, 2009). However, the focus of these studies does not include examination of how chaotic the environment is and how such an environment might uniquely affect a teacher's responsiveness. Chaotic environments are defined as having high levels of noise, crowding, instability, unpredictability, disorganization, and a lack of structure, routines, or regularities (Matheny, Wachs, Ludwig, & Phillips, 1995). Some dimensions of chaotic environments, such as teacher-to-child ratio, group size, and routines, have been studied separately as a measure of child-care structural quality (Clarke-Stewart, Vandell, Burchinal, Brien, & McCartney, 2002), and a few studies found that higher levels of noise (Hambrick-Dixon, 1988; Linting, Groeneveld, Vermeer, & van Ijzendoorn, 2013; Maxwell & Evans, 2000) or crowding (Maxwell, 1996) in child-care were related to young children's visual attention, reading skills, and social-emotional wellbeing. Only one study, to our knowledge, utilized a comprehensive measure of

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child-care chaos, which was adapted from parenting studies. In that study, Wachs, Gurkas, and Kontos (2004) found that teacherreported chaos in early childhood classrooms was associated with preschool children's compliance behaviors, even after controlling for observed child-care quality, children's temperament, and caregiver's use of control (Wachs et al., 2004). However, no other studies have examined the relations between environmental chaos in child-care settings and teachers' responsiveness to children. In the parenting literature, household chaos has been well-established as an important aspect of the physical environment that is related to adverse outcomes in children as well as parents (e.g., Evans, Gonnella, Marcynyszyn, Gentile, & Salpekar, 2005; Petrill, Pike, Price, & Plomin, 2004). For example, a lack of routines and predictability interfered with children's ability to regulate their emotions and manage their behaviors (Evans et al., 2005). In addition, higher levels of household chaos were related to children's heightened levels of psychological distress (Fiese & Winter, 2010; Muñiz, Silver, & Stein, 2014) and lower levels of cognitive functioning (Hart, Petrill, Deater–Deckard, & Thompson, 2007). Chaotic home environments were also associated with parental wellbeing, such as lower levels of executive functioning and higher levels of stress (Deater–Deckard et al., 2012) and negative parenting behaviors, as well as less involvement and greater parental insensitivity (e.g., Corapci & Wachs, 2002; Dumas et al., 2005). Particularly, Valiente, Lemery-Chalfant, and Reiser (2007) found that household chaos was related to parents' contingent reactions to children's emotions, which in turn, were associated with children's diminished executive functioning and increased externalizing behavior problems. Additionally, higher degrees of chaos hampered parents' supportive responses and decreased the level of children's executive functioning and increased their externalizing behavior problems. Likewise, we hypothesized that child-care chaos would be associated with teachers' responsiveness to children. There are several possible explanations for why environmental chaos might be associated with caregiver's insensitivity and negative caregiving behavior or responsiveness. First, Corapci and Wachs (2002) argued that there are limits on the individual's ability to process stimulation. In chaotic environments, the level of stimulation would be high and might overwhelm a teacher's ability to initiate positive responsiveness. In addition, child-care chaos may narrow the range of children's cues to which teachers would be able to attend to and intervene (Corapci & Wachs, 2002). Second, continued exposure to chaos (e.g., noise, crowding and a lack of organization) may increase teachers' fatigue or tension, which would increase their tendency to respond to others (e.g., children) in more negative ways (Evans, Maxwell, & Hart, 1999). Finally, if teachers view classroom chaos as beyond their capacity to control and cope with, they may lack the motivation to actively change the environment and may avoid dealing with the difficulties, which in turn, would increase their stress and burnout (Valiente et al., 2007). Because stress and burnout are the leading within-person factors related to teachers' caregiving behaviors and sensitivity (Hall-Kenyon, Bullough, MacKay, & Marshall, 2014), we expect that it will also interfere with teachers' ability to provide positive responses for children. Based on these assumptions, we first hypothesized that higher levels of child-care classroom chaos would be directly associated with poorer teachers' responsiveness towards children.

1.3. Emotion regulation and coping as mediators As discussed, teachers' inability to regulate their own emotions and to cope with stressors may indirectly explain the negative associations between a chaotic environment and teachers' responsiveness (e.g., excessive stimulation and decreased capacity to attend to children, increased levels of fatigue and stress, and a lack of motivation). When teachers encounter challenging situations where children express negative emotions or display conflicts between peers, they would first need to control and regulate their own thoughts and emotions in order to generate desirable responses and reduce negative reactions. However, chaotic classroom environments may limit overwhelmed teachers' emotional ability to reassess and respond sensitively in accordance with children's emotional state and to generate constructive thoughts to solve problems (Corapci & Wachs, 2002). Although teachers' emotions are key factors that influence every aspect of teaching (Schutz & Lanehart, 2002), there is a lack of studies examining associations between teachers' emotional abilities and classroom quality, such as their responsiveness towards children in early childhood settings (Denham et al., 2012). Thus, there is a need to increase understanding of teachers' emotional ability in the context of child-care environments by the level of chaos and its relation to teachers' contingent reactions. In the current study, we examined teachers' emotion regulation (reappraisal and suppression) and problem-focused coping strategies, which are important factors of individuals' emotional health and ability to manage stressful situations such as chaotic environments. Individual's emotion regulation and problem-focused coping strategies generally help one evaluate and appraise stressful situations and deal with negative emotional arousal (Lazarus, 2006). Specifically, emotion regulation accounts for individuals' strategies that aim to change the way they are thinking and feeling about stressors, situations, and events (Gross, 2002; Gross & John, 2003). To measure teachers' emotion regulation, we included reappraisal emotion regulation strategies, the ways that individuals re-evaluate the emotional arousal to increase pleasant emotions and to decrease unpleasant emotions (Gross & John, 2003), and suppression emotion regulation strategies that inhibit expression of emotional arousal and hide true emotions (Lazarus, 2006). Studies have demonstrated that reappraisal emotion regulation was associated with an increase in pre-service early childhood teachers' supportive responsiveness (Swartz & McElwain, 2012) and suppression emotion regulation increased teachers' stress and burnout in relationship to dealing with students' misbehavior (Chang, 2009, 2013). Conversely, problem-focused coping includes active behavioral strategies that individuals use to change stressful situations such as trying to eliminate a stressor and seeking help to solve a problem (Carver, 1997) when they perceive stressful environments as modifiable (Montgomery & Rupp, 2005). Teachers with better problem-focused coping strategies are less likely to experience burnout and are more likely to take direct actions to change situations (Chang, 2013).

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Although teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills are rarely studied in the early childhood literature, we propose that teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills will be associated with their caregiving behaviors towards children the same as mothers' self-regulation, emotion regulation, coping skills and executive functioning have been found as important contributors of sensitive caregiving (Deater–Deckard et al., 2012). For example, mothers with poorer executive functioning exhibited harsher parenting behavior when children displayed negative behaviors (Deater–Deckard et al., 2012). 1.4. The present study Although it is clear that the degree of chaos at home is related to parental caregiving behavior (Deater–Deckard et al., 2012; Vernon-Feagans, Garrett-Peters, Willoughby, & Mills-Koonce, 2012) and children's cognitive and social-emotional functioning (Muñiz et al., 2014; Pike, Iervolino, Eley, Price, & Plomin, 2006), the role of chaos in child-care settings is not well established. There is a body of literature examining teachers' emotional regulation and coping strategies in relation to their reactions to students' social-emotional behaviors in primary or secondary school classrooms (e.g., Garner, 2010); however, preschool teachers' emotion regulation and coping strategies are understudied. Identifying the role of child-care chaos and emotional health in teachers' responsiveness may lead to new approaches in professional development interventions that address the importance of managing child-care chaos as well as teachers' personal emotional health to better facilitate teachers' responsiveness to children in early childhood education settings. The goals of the current study are to explore the direct and indirect associations between teachers' perceptions of child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness through teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills. We first explored the direct associations between chaotic environments (e.g., noise, crowdedness, unpredictability, and lack of routines and rules) and teachers' responsiveness to children's negative emotions and challenging social interactions in childcare classrooms. We hypothesized that environmental chaos in child-care settings would reduce teachers' positive reactions and increase teachers' negative reactions. Second, we examined the indirect associations between child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness through teachers' emotion regulation and coping strategies. We hypothesized that child-care chaos would interfere with teachers' ability to regulate their own emotions and to cope with stressors from the environment, which in turn, would reduce teachers' supportive reactions and would increase non-supportive reactions to children. 2. Method 2.1. Participants The sample consisted of 1129 teachers, working with preschoolers, in child-care centers or public pre-K programs across the United States (US). As described in Table 1, most teachers were female (97.2%) and white, non-Hispanic (84.9%). More than a half of teachers had at least a Bachelor's degree (66.7%), which was higher than a recent finding from the National Survey of Early Care and Education which indicated that 45.1% of teachers serving children age three through five years have a Bachelor's degree (National Survey of Early Care and Education, 2013). A total of 346 teachers were from public pre-K programs (30.7%); 65.7% were from non-profit programs; 10.2% were from Head Start programs; and 31.1% were from nationally accredited programs. The average program size (the number of children from birth to 72 months of age enrolled in the program) was 31–60; and 37.7% of the programs were full-time, 29.2% were part-time, and 33.1% were both full-time and part-time.

Table 1 Participants. Variables Teacher characteristics Gender (1 = female) Race/Ethnicity White, non-Hispanic Black, non-Hispanic Hispanic Other race Marital status (1 = single) Educational attainment Less than an Associate degree Having at least an Associate degree Having at least a Bachelor's degree ECE experience years General health Depression General perceived stress Classroom/program characteristic Head Start status The number of IEP children

n

Mean/%

SD

97.21%

–

84.86% 7.76% 1.94% 5.45% 25.34%

– – – – –

1114 1112 1129 1129

20.02% 13.26% 66.73% 15.56 1.99 3.06 11.97

– – – 9.62 0.78 3.66 5.66

1104 1064

10.24% 3.04

– 4.35

1110 1083

1101 1109

Note. SD = standard deviation; ECE = early childhood education; IEP = Individualized Education Program.

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2.2. Procedures Data were collected in 2014 using proportional stratified random sampling by two child-care types (i.e., 70% from day care centers and 30% from public pre-K programs) and nine geographic regions: New England, Middle Atlantic, East North Central, West North Central, South Atlantic, East South Central, West South Central, Mountain, and Pacific, defined by the US Census Bureau. All 50 states and DC were included in the 18 strata used for the random sampling. We calculated the proportion of child care centers in each strata using the number of child-care centers in each state reported in the Child Care Aware of America (2013) data, and a 7:3 ratio of child-care centers and public pre-K programs. Because there is a lack of national/state lists of teachers in early child care settings, we purchased a list of child-care programs (n = 7500) from an education mailing list service, Market Data Retrieval (MDR), which has been used before in early childhood education studies (e.g., Pianta, Cox, Taylor, & Early, 1999; Rous, Hallam, McCormick, & Cox, 2010) and is updated every year. We asked MDR to proportionally and randomly select child-care programs from each strata—the proportion of each strata from the MDR list was consistent with our suggested proportion. We then asked the directors of the selected programs to distribute the survey to the preschool teacher (i.e., serving three- to five-year-old children) whose birthday was closest to the day they received the survey packet. The questionnaire was developed by the authors and early childhood education experts using a multiple review process, and was piloted in a university child-care center. The responses and feedback from teachers in the pilot sample were considered in the revision of the questionnaire. We mailed 7500 survey packets to the directors of the randomly selected early child care and education programs: the survey packet included a letter to the director and a sealed teacher packet having a questionnaire, a $1 bill as an incentive, and a business reply envelope. A reminder postcard was mailed to the directors three weeks after the survey packet was sent. Our final sample included 1129 teachers representing a 16% response rate – 455 packets among the 7500 packets were returned because the addresses were undeliverable (e.g., closed programs) or the program did not have a classroom serving preschoolers. The proportion of the final participants from each strata and the proportion we mailed to each strata were not statistically different. 2.3. Measures 2.3.1. Classroom chaos The child-care version of Confusion, Hubbub, and Order Scale (CHAOS-D, Wachs et al., 2004) was utilized to measure classroom chaos in the child-care classroom. The original CHAOS scale was developed by Matheny et al. (1995) and has been widely used in the parenting literature. Teachers responded on 16 items asking their perceptions of environmental confusion, crowding, noise, and the degree of control and organization of space and time (e.g., “We almost always seem to be rushed.” and “There is very little commotion in our classroom setting.”). The CHAOS-D originally had a true-false format, however, we used a 5-point scale (1 = Definitely untrue, 5 = Definitely true), which has been validated in the parenting literature (Johnson, Martin, BrooksGunn, & Petrill, 2008). The mean of 16 items was calculated for our analysis (Cronbach's α = 0.81). The test-retest stability of this scale was reported as 0.87 and the scale has been significantly correlated with global child-care quality (Wachs et al., 2004). 2.3.2. Emotion regulation We asked teachers to complete 10 items using a 7-point scale (1 = Strongly disagree, 7 = Strongly agree) from the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (Gross & John, 2003) to measure two types of emotional regulation strategies: 6 items on reappraisal (e.g., “When I want to feel more positive emotion (such as joy or amusement), I change what I'm thinking about.”) and 4 items on suppression (e.g., “I keep my emotions to myself.”). The reappraisal subscale had a Cronbach's alpha of 0.83 and the suppression subscale had one of 0.73. We calculated the means of each subscale; the higher scores represented a higher degree of using reappraisal strategies and a higher degree of using suppression strategies. 2.3.3. Problem-focused coping Teachers' problem-focused coping strategies were measured by 6 items adapted from the Brief COPE scale (Carver, 1997). We asked teachers to think about the last stressful event that they had, and score the frequency of using coping strategies on a 4-point scale (1 = I didn't do this at all, 4 = I did this a lot). The items described active coping strategies (e.g., “I concentrated my efforts on doing something about the situation I was in.”), use of instrumental support (e.g., “I tried to get advice or help from other people about what to do.”), and planning coping strategies (e.g., “I thought hard about what steps to take.”). All three strategies represent problem-focused coping skills (Carver, 1997) and a mean of the six items was obtained (Cronbach's α = 0.79). A higher score represents better coping strategies. 2.3.4. Teachers' responsiveness We measured teachers' responsiveness to children's emotions and social interactions by asking teachers to respond to a shortened version of Coping with Children's Negative Emotions Scale (CCNES, Fabes, Eisenberg, & Bernzweig, 1990) and a newly developed Coping with Children's Challenging Social Interactions (CCCSI) scale. The CCNES was originally developed to measure parents' responsiveness and provides 12 situations in which children might experience and express negative emotions. For each situation, the scale offers three possible non-supportive reactions from parents (distress reactions, punitive reactions, and minimization reactions) and three possible supportive reactions (expressive encouragement, emotion-focused reactions, and problem-focused reactions) using a 7-point scale (1 = Very Unlikely, 7 = Very Likely). The original author provided revised

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items for use with teachers and we chose 5 of the 12 situations that were most appropriate for a sample of preschool teachers (e.g., If a child in my class accidentally breaks a favorite toy, and then gets upset and cries, I would…). Additionally, we removed the Distress Reactions items because they have been shown to have a high correlation with social desirability (Eisenberg et al., 1996). Therefore, we presented a total of 25 items representing five different types of reactions under five scenario situations. In the previous literature, the CCNES has had either two factors (positive reactions and negative reactions) or six factors representing each subscale (three positive ones and three negative ones). In the current study, we found three factors we labeled: Negative Reactions (α = 0.82), Expressive Encouragement (α = 0.77), and Positively-focused Reactions (α = 0.76). The details of the factor analyses are described in the Results section. We developed the CCCSI to measure teachers' responsiveness on children's challenging social interactions. Following the same format used in the CCNES, we provided two scenarios of challenging social interactions (e.g., “If two children in my class want to use the same toy [e.g., a new fire truck] and become distressed and/or aggressive, I would…” and “If a child in my class hit another child for the first time, I would…”) and 11 reactions for each situation representing positive social guidance (e.g., help the children develop a plan to share the toy or ask the child who hit how he/she can make the other child feel better) and negative social guidance (e.g., tell the children that fighting is unacceptable and ask them both to walk away and choose a different activity) using a 7-point scale (1 = Very Unlikely, 7 = Very Likely). The 11 items were developed using CASEL's (2013) social and emotional learning competences that support children's developmental outcomes. The reliability of Positive Social Guidance was 0.82 and Negative Social Guidance was 0.63. 2.3.5. Covariates We included a set of covariates, including teachers' professional background, demographics, health, social desirability, and program characteristics. Teachers' professional background was measured by teachers' educational attainment (dummy coded ‘less than an Associate degree’ as a reference category, ‘having an Associate degree,’ and ‘having a Bachelor degree’) and teaching experience years in the early childhood education field. Teachers' demographic covariates included their gender (dummy coded, 1 = female), race/ethnicity (dummy coded ‘White, non-Hispanic’ as a reference category, ‘Black, non-Hispanic,’ ‘Hispanic,’ and ‘Other race’), and marital status (dummy coded, 1 = single). We also controlled for teachers' health, including depressive symptoms, perceived stress, and general health. Teachers' depressive symptoms were measured by 9 items from the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D, Radloff, 1977). The sum of nine items was used in the current study (Cronbach's α = 0.84). We also asked 10 items on teachers' general perceived stress using the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS, Cohen, Kamarck, & Mermelstein, 1983). The sum of 10 items was used in the current study to represent teachers' stress (Cronbach's α = 0.84). Teachers also responded to one item asking their health in general using a 5-point scale (1 = excellent, 5 = poor) from the Respondent-assessed Health Status Scale (Adams, Kirzinger, & Martinez, 2012). In addition, because we used all self-reported responses from teachers, we controlled for teachers' tendency to respond in socially favorable ways on a self-report format survey using 10 items (true/false format) from the short form of the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960). The short form of the original scale demonstrated strong validity in Fischer and Fick (1993)'s study. The Cronbach's α in the current study was 0.55 and a sum was calculated. Finally, we controlled for classroom or program characteristics such as the number of children in the teacher's classroom who have or could qualify for an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) or an Individualized Family Service Plan (IFSP), and whether or not the program is Head Start (dummy coded, 1 = Head Start). 2.4. Data analytic strategy Using a split-half sample (n = 566), we first conducted a set of exploratory factor analyses (EFA) in STATA 13.0 to examine the factor structure of the CCCSI scale and the CCNES. An oblique promax rotation was used because the factors were assumed to be correlated (Ford, MacCallum, & Tait, 1986). We examined eigenvalues (greater than 1), scree plot, and interpretation of items to identify the number of factors in the EFA (Costello & Osborne, 2005). We only considered rotated factor loadings N0.30 as significant (Hair, Anderson, Tatham, & Black, 1998) and dropped items for which the loading was not in the significant range of N0.30 using an iterative model modification process. Once the number of factors and items were determined by EFA, we tested the measurement model fit of each scale on the second half sample (n = 563) using the maximum likelihood estimation method in the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) framework. We utilized multiple indices of overall model fit: (1) chi-square statistics (χ2) should be nonsignificant (p N 0.05), however, because χ2 is sensitive for the sample size, other fit indices can be considered if it is significant (Bollen, 1989); (2) a comparative fit index (CFI) N0.90 indicates good fit; and (3) a root-mean-square error of approximation (RMSEA) b 0.08 indicates an adequate fit (MacCallum, Browne, & Sugawara, 1996) and b 0.05 is indicative of a close fit (Browne & Cudeck, 1993). There were 3.45%–7.62% of missing data on each of the CCNES variables and 2.39%–7.88% of missing data on each of the CCCSI variables. Missing data were handled in the CFA model using Full Information Maximum Likelihood (FIML) estimation, which allows us to preserve all available data (Arbuckle, 1996). A path analysis was then conducted in STATA 13.0 using the sem command to simultaneously test the direct paths from child-care chaos to teachers' responsiveness to children's negative emotions and challenging social interactions in classrooms and the indirect paths by way of the mediators, teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills, above and beyond covariates. In order to examine the hypothesized path model, we simultaneously included child-care chaos, three mediators, five outcomes representing teachers' responsiveness, and all covariates in our primary analysis. We utilized the same set of model fit indices as used in the CFA and missing data was also handled by FIML estimation. The missing data ranged from 0% to 6.2% on the variables included in the path analysis model. The number of

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respondents on each of covariates and key variables are presented in Tables 1 and 2. The indirect effects were calculated using 5000 bootstrap samples. 3. Results 3.1. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis The EFA for the 25 items in the CCNES scale produced three distinct factors (Table 3), which we labeled as Negative Reactions (NR), Expressive Encouragement (EE), and Positively-Focused Reactions (PFR). Items on punitive reactions and minimization reactions from the original scale were loaded on a single factor, NR, in our analysis, which is consistent with the previous literature (Davidov & Grusec, 2006). We dropped two items because of low factor loadings, resulting in a total of 8 items being included in the NR subscale (factor loadings from the CFA ranged from 0.41 to 0.82). The second factor consisted of five items representing teachers' EE (factor loadings from the CFA ranged from 0.45 to 0.78); this was consistent with the psychometrics of the original scale (Fabes et al., 2002). The items on emotion-focused reactions and problem-focused reactions from the original scale loaded on a single factor in our sample, which we labeled as Positively-Focused Reactions (factor loadings ranged from 0.41 to 0.82). We dropped 2 of the 10 items due to the low factor loadings, which yielded 8 items on the factor. Using the second half-split sample, the model fit of the three-factor structure was adequate, χ2 (171, n = 563) = 408.20, p b 0.01, RMSEA = 0.050 (90% CI [0.043, 0.056]), CFI = 0.935. Using the CCCSI scale, two factors emerged from the EFA. Table 4 shows the results from the EFA and CFA. As hypothesized, 7 of the 11 items representing positive social guidance loaded on the first factor (factor loadings from the CFA ranged from 0.53 to 0.66) and the remaining four negatively-worded items representing negative social guidance loaded on the second factor (factor loadings from the CFA ranged from 0.37 to 0.67). Model fit with the second half-split sample was also adequate, χ2 (34, n = 563) = 224.94, p b 0.01, RMSEA = 0.071 (90% CI [0.062, 0.079]), CFI = 0.935. Tables 3 and 4 also show the correlations between each factor and teachers' self-reported social desirability. 3.2. Path analysis Table 2 provides descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations of the key variables. As preliminary analyses, we tested group differences in the mediators, such as coping, reappraisal emotion regulation and suppression emotion regulation, and in the dependent variables by teachers' sex, race/ethnicity, marital status, educational attainment, and by program type (Head Start or Non-Head Start) using the Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) and the t-test. We found that there were statistically significant differences in teachers' usage of reappraisal and suppression emotional strategies by race (reappraisal F = 2.77, p b 0.05; Black, non-Hispanic teachers had a higher reappraisal mean than White, non-Hispanic teachers; suppression F = 7.76, p b 0.001; Black, non-Hispanic teachers had a higher suppression mean than White, non-Hispanic and other race teachers), and differences in teachers suppression emotion regulation and problem-focused coping skills by educational attainment (suppression F = 7.87, p b 0.001; teachers having at least a Bachelor's degree had a lower suppression mean than teachers having less than an Associate degree; coping F = 3.91, p b 0.05; teachers having at least a Bachelor's degree had greater coping skills than teachers having less than an Associate degree). In addition, there were differences in teachers' Negative Emotion Reactions by race (F = 2.71, p b 0.05; Black, non-Hispanic teachers had a higher mean than White, non-Hispanic), marital status (t = −2.51, p b 0.05; single teachers Table 2 Descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations between key variables. 1 1. Child-care chaos 2. Reappraisal ER 3. Suppression ER 4. Coping skills 5. Negative reactions 6. Expressive encouragement 7. Positively-focused reactions 8. Positive social guidance 9. Negative social guidance n Mean Standard deviation Theoretical range Range Number of items Cronbach's alpha Note. ⁎ p ⁎⁎ p ⁎⁎⁎ p

ER = emotion regulation. b 0.05. b 0.01. b 0.001.

1 –0.15⁎⁎⁎ 0.14⁎⁎⁎ –0.19⁎⁎⁎ 0.13⁎⁎⁎ 0.04 –0.12⁎⁎⁎ –0.06⁎ 0.05 1120 2.23 0.47 1–5 1.2–4.1 16 0.81

2 1 0.09⁎⁎ 0.25⁎⁎⁎ 0.00 0.21⁎⁎⁎ 0.20⁎⁎⁎ 0.20⁎⁎⁎ 0.04 1116 5.46 0.97 1–7 1.5–7 6 0.83

3

1 –0.17⁎⁎⁎ 0.18⁎⁎⁎ –0.07⁎ 0.04 –0.05 0.13⁎⁎⁎ 1114 3.24 1.17 1–7 1–7 4 0.73

4

1 –0.04 0.12⁎⁎⁎ 0.13⁎⁎⁎ 0.15⁎⁎⁎ 0.00 1114 3.45 0.49 1–4 1–4 6 0.79

5

1 –0.16⁎⁎⁎ –0.18⁎⁎⁎ –0.25⁎⁎⁎ 0.28⁎⁎⁎ 1059 1.36 0.63 1–7 1–7 8 0.82

6

1 0.37⁎⁎⁎ 0.53⁎⁎⁎ –0.16⁎⁎⁎ 1096 5.31 1.15 1–7 1–7 5 0.77

7

1 0.57⁎⁎⁎ 0.22⁎⁎⁎ 1129 5.77 0.88 1–7 1–7 8 0.76

8

9

1 –0.03 1126 5.92 0.94 1–7 1–7 7 0.82

1 1084 3.97 1.45 1–7 1–7 4 0.63

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Table 3 Rotated factor loadings from the coping with children's negative emotions scale.

Tell the child… to stop crying or he/she won't be allowed to play with the toy anytime soon. to straighten up or he/she will have to sit out for a while. that if he/she starts crying then he/she will have to sit out for a while. that he/she must stay nearby and interact with visitors appropriately. not to make a big deal about missing the activity. that he/she is overreacting. that he/she is overreacting. that he/she is acting like a baby. Encourage the child to express his/her feelings of anger and frustration. Tell the child it's OK to cry. Encourage the child to talk about his/her feelings. Tell the child it's OK to cry when he/she feels bad. Tell the child that it is OK to feel nervous. Soothe the child and do something fun with him/her to make him/her feel better about missing the activity. Comfort the child and try to get him/her to forget about the accident. Comfort the child and try to make him/her feel better. Comfort the child and suggest an activity to change his/her focus. Try to make the child feel better by talking about fun things we can do with new people. Help the child think about other ways that he/she can participate. Tell the child that I'll help him/her practice so that he/she can do better next time. Help the child think of things to do that would make meeting new people less intimidating. Dropped items Send the child to a different area to cool down. Tell the child that he/she will feel better soon. Help the child figure out how to fix the toy Help the child think of constructive things to do when other children are hurtful. Correlations with social desirability

Original subscalea

Negative emotion reactions

PR

0.74 (0.76)

PR PR PR MR MR MR MR EEE EEE EEE EEE EEE EFR

0.68 (0.82) 0.74 (0.73) 0.45 (0.41) 0.56 (0.45) 0.73 (0.80) 0.71 (0.80) 0.70 (0.73)

Expressive encouragement

Positively-focused reactions

0.55 (0.45) 0.76 (0.54) 0.58 (0.78) 0.74 (0.67) 0.54 (0.53) 0.48 (0.48)

EFR EFR EFR EFR

0.62 (0.41) 0.56 (0.64) 0.61 (0.56) 0.55 (0.60)

PFR PFR

0.34 (0.51) 0.46 (0.82)

PFR

0.41 (0.55)

PR MR PFR PFR −0.05

0.08⁎

0.11⁎⁎⁎

Note. Rotated factor loadings from the exploratory factor analysis were reported. Factor loadings from the confirmatory factor analysis were reported in the parentheses. a Original subscales are from the Fabes et al.'s (1990) Coping with Children's Negative Emotions Scale. PR = punitive reactions; MR = minimization reactions; EEE = expressive encouragement; EFR = emotion-focused reactions; PFR = problem-focused reactions. ⁎ p b 0.05. ⁎⁎⁎ p b 0.001.

had a higher mean than non-single teachers), and Head Start status (t = 2.34, p b 0.05; non-Head Start teachers had a higher mean than Head Start teachers), Expressive Encouragement by Head Start status (t = −2.88, p b 0.01; Head Start teachers had a higher mean than non-Head Start teachers), and Negative Social Guidance by educational attainment (F = 13.94, p b 0.001; teachers having

Table 4 Rotated factor loadings from the coping with children's challenging social interactions. Positive social guidance Ask the children to share their own ideas and feelings with one another. Ask the children to think about how the other child feels and what he/she wants. Help the children develop a plan to share the toy. Ask the child who is hurt to tell the other how he/she feels. Ask the child who hit how he/she can make the other child feel better. Ask the child who hit why he/she hit and discuss what he/she could do next time. Discuss with the child who hit how he/she can handle his/her negative emotions next time. Tell the children that fighting is unacceptable and ask them both to walk away and choose a different activity. Tell the children that one can use the toy now and the other child in 5 min. Send the child who hit to a space to be alone until I determine he/she can play again. Tell the child who hit to say “I'm sorry.” Correlations with social desirability

Negative social guidance

0.63 (0.56) 0.63 (0.53) 0.57 (0.59) 0.69 (0.66) 0.66 (0.64) 0.60 (0.56) 0.62 (0.60)

0.09⁎

0.56 (0.60) 0.41 (0.37) 0.59 (0.67) 0.55 (0.54) −0.02

Note. Rotated factor loadings from the exploratory factor analysis were reported. Factor loadings from the confirmatory factor analysis were reported in the parentheses. ⁎ p b 0.05.

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less than an Associate degree had a higher mean than teachers having an Associate degree or a Bachelor's degree) and Head Start status (t = 4.00, p b 0.001; non-Head Start teachers had a higher mean than Head Start teachers). In path analysis, overall, the hypothesized mediation model on teachers' responsiveness fit the data well, χ2 (147, n = 1159) = 170.97, p = 0.09, RMSEA = 0.012 (90% CI [0.000, 0.019]), CFI = 0.98. The model explained 7.2%, 7.3%, 7.8%, 5.8%, and 6.8% of the variance in negative emotion reactions, expressive encouragement, positively-focused reactions, positive social guidance, and negative social guidance, respectively. In addition, 6.1% of the variance in reappraisal, 7.4% of the variance in suppression, and 7.2% of the variance in problem-focused coping were explained by child-care chaos and other covariates. Fig. 1 and Table 5 show the standardized direct and indirect path coefficients using 5000 bootstrap samples with Full Information Maximum Likelihood (FIML) estimation. 3.2.1. Direct associations As shown in Fig. 1 and Table 5, child-care chaos was directly associated with teachers' negative responses, including negative emotion reactions and negative social guidance, and with positively-focused reactions. The direct associations between child-care chaos and teachers' expressive encouragement and positive social guidance were not statistically significant. 3.2.2. Indirect associations Examining the indirect associations between teacher-perceived child-care chaos and responsiveness through three mediators, coping, reappraisal emotion regulation, and suppression emotion regulation strategies, we found that teachers in more chaotic child-care classrooms had less reappraisal emotion regulation (β = − 0.09, SE = 0.04, 95% CI = [− 0.16, − 0.02]) and problem-focused coping (β = −0.18, SE = 0.03, 95% CI = [− 0.24, − 0.11]), which in turn, was associated with lower levels of positive responsiveness on children's emotions. More specifically, reappraisal emotion regulation mediated the associations between child-care chaos and expressive encouragement (indirect β = −0.02, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [−0.04, − 0.00]), positivelyfocused reactions (indirect β = −0.01, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [−0.03, −0.00]), and positive social guidance reactions (indirect β = −0.02, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [−0.03, −0.00]). In addition, problem-focused coping mediated the associations between child-care chaos and positively-focused reactions (indirect β = − 0.03, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [− 0.05, − 0.01]) and positive social guidance reactions (indirect β = − 0.03, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [− 0.06, − 0.01]). On the other hand, teachers who reported a higher degree of chaos used more suppression strategies (β = 0.15, SE = 0.03, 95% CI = [0.08, 0.21]), which in turn, was related to teachers' higher levels of negative emotion reactions (indirect β = 0.03, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [0.01, 0.04]) and negative social guidance (indirect β = 0.02, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [0.01, 0.03]), and lower levels of expressive encouragement reactions to children's emotions (indirect β = −0.01, SE = 0.01, 95% CI = [−0.02, −0.00]). 4. Discussion This is the first study to examine the associations between teacher-perceived environmental chaos and their self-reported responsiveness to children in early child-care settings. We first found that there are direct associations between child-care chaos and teachers' non-supportive reactions including negative reactions towards children's emotions and negative social guidance after controlling for teachers' professional background, demographics, psychological and physical health, and social Negative Emotion Reactions

.10** .18***

Emotion Regulation: Reappraisal -.09

.21*** .15***

**

-.08

**

Expressive Encouragement

.18***

Child-care Chaos

-.18***

Problem-focused Coping

Positively-focused Reactions

.09**

-.07** .09** .15***

Emotion Regulation: Suppression

-.06

*

.12*** .07

*

Positive Social Guidance

Negative Social Guidance

Fig. 1. The results of path analysis. Standardized path coefficients are reported. Non-significant paths and covariances were not shown. The omitted covariates include teachers' educational attainment, experience years, race/ethnicity, marital status, general health, stress, depression, perceived child outcomes, the number of children receiving an Individualized Education Program (IEP), program size, Head Start status, and social desirability. ⁎p b 0.05; ⁎⁎p b 0.01; ⁎⁎⁎p b 0.001.

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Variables

Direct associations Child-care chaos Reappraisal ER Suppression ER Coping skills Indirect associations Through reappraisal Through suppression Through coping

Negative emotion reactions

Expressive encouragement

Positively-focused reactions

Positive social guidance

Negative social guidance

β

β

β

β

β

SE

95% CI

0.07⁎ 0.02 0.12⁎⁎⁎ 0.05

0.03 0.03 0.03 0.03

[0.00, 0.13] [−0.04, 0.08] [0.06, 0.18] [−0.02, 0.11]

0.00 0.01 0.02

[−0.01, 0.00] [0.01, 0.03] [−0.06, 0.01]

SE

95% CI [0.03, 0.16] [−0.07, 0.06] [0.11, 0.24] [−0.04, 0.06]

0.02 0.21⁎⁎⁎ –0.08⁎⁎

0.01

0.03 0.03 0.03 0.03

0.00 0.03⁎⁎ –0.00

0.00 0.01 0.01

[−0.01, 0.01] [0.01, 0.04] [−0.01, 0.01]

0.10⁎⁎ –0.00 0.18⁎⁎⁎

SE

95% CI

0.05

0.03 0.03 0.03 0.03

[−0.04, 0.07] [0.15, 0.28] [−0.15, −0.02] [−0.01, 0.11]

–0.02⁎ –0.01⁎ –0.02

0.01 0.01 0.01

[−0.04, −0.00] [−0.02, −0.00] [−0.05, 0.01]

SE

95% CI

SE

95% CI

–0.07⁎ 0.15⁎⁎⁎ 0.02 0.09⁎⁎

0.03 0.03 0.03 0.03

[−0.13, −0.01] [0.08, 0.21] [−0.04, 0.09] [0.03, 0.15]

0.00 0.18⁎⁎⁎ –0.06† 0.09⁎⁎

0.03 0.03 0.03 0.03

[−0.05, 0.06] [0.11, 0.24] [−0.13, 0.00] [0.03, 0.15]

–0.01⁎ 0.00 –0.03⁎⁎

0.01 0.00 0.01

[−0.03, −0.00] [−0.01, 0.00] [−0.05, −0.01]

–0.02⁎ –0.01† –0.03⁎

0.01 0.01 0.01

[−0.03, −0.00] [−0.02, 0.00] [−0.06, −0.01]

–0.00 0.02⁎⁎ –0.02

Note. All independent variables, mediators and five dependent variables were simultaneously analyzed in path analysis. ER = emotion regulation; β = standardized coefficient; SE = Bootstrap standard error; CI = confidence interval. Covariates are omitted. † p b 0.10. ⁎ p b 0.05. ⁎⁎ p b 0.01. ⁎⁎⁎ p b 0.001.

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Table 5 Direct and indirect associations between child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness through emotion regulation and coping.

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desirability. The findings can be explained in light of the previous literature suggesting that continued exposure to chaos would be related to an increase in individuals' fatigue or tension (Evans et al., 1999). Teachers' increased fatigue or tension might be associated with an increase in the tendency to respond to children in a negative way. In addition, teachers who are overwhelmed by too much stimulation from the chaotic environment may not be able to control their negative emotions and transfer their negative emotions towards children. The results were consistent with the previous parenting literature showing that household chaos interfered with parents' sensitivity and positive regard, and increased intrusiveness and negative parenting behaviors (Vernon-Feagans et al., 2012). Furthermore, our findings showed that teachers' perception of child-care chaos is associated with their own emotion regulation and coping skills, which in turn, are associated with their supportive and non-supportive responsiveness to children's negative emotions and social interactions. First, teachers in chaotic environments were less likely to demonstrate positive emotional abilities, such as reappraisal emotion regulation and problem-focused coping strategies, and were more likely to use negative strategies, such as suppression emotional regulation. When teachers feel that they are in chaotic environment, which is beyond their control, it may arouse unpleasant emotions that hamper their ability to re-evaluate the situation, change what they are thinking about the situation, and generate behavioral strategies to solve the problems. Similarly, Chang (2013) found that elementary to high-school teachers' episodic unpleasant emotions decreased their reappraisal and coping abilities. Studies with parent samples have also found that chaotic household environments led to unhealthy emotional development of all family members including maternal self-regulation (e.g., Deater–Deckard et al., 2012). Likewise, chaotic environments in child-care may interfere with teachers' abilities to regulate their emotions and cope with stressors. In addition, if teachers feel isolated and overwhelmed in chaotic settings, they may suppress their emotions to maintain optimal functioning. Lazarus (2006) suggested that individuals tend to use suppression emotion regulation strategies when they perceive that they cannot change stressful environments. This finding suggests that early child-care teachers may need to be equipped with strategies that allow them to deal with child-care chaos, reduce the level of stress, and develop more positive emotion regulation strategies. Second, we found that reappraisal emotion regulation was significantly associated with teachers' supportive reactions to children: expressive encouragement, positively-focused reactions, and positive social guidance after controlling for child-care chaos and other covariates. Also, there were indirect associations between child-care chaos and all three types of teachers' positive reactions through their reappraisal emotion regulation. Teachers' unpleasant emotions from chaotic environments may interfere with teachers' emotional abilities to re-evaluate and change their emotional arousal and may contribute to teachers' difficulties in generating positive responsiveness with children (Swartz & McElwain, 2012). Third, after controlling for child-care chaos and covariates, problem-focused coping strategies were significantly associated with teachers' positively-focused reactions and positive social guidance; and the indirect associations between teachers' perception of child-care chaos and those two outcomes through problem-focused coping strategies were statistically significant. In the current study, positively-focused reactions were measured by teachers' tendency to help children solve problems and to re-direct children to help them feel better; and positive social guidance was measured by how teachers teach children to handle conflicts with peers. Considering how those two outcomes were measured, it is possible to explain that teachers who have problemfocused coping skills (e.g., taking actions) may be better at role modeling and guiding practical problem-solving skills for children. Finally, there were significant indirect associations between child-care chaos and teachers' non-supportive reactions (i.e., negative emotion reactions and negative social guidance) and expressive encouragement through teachers' suppression emotion regulations strategies. The associations between teachers' suppression and non-supportive reactions can be explained by teachers' stress or burnout. Chang (2013) argued that teachers' suppression emotion regulation is associated with their stress and burnout in school settings. In early childhood literature, it has been found that teachers' stress and burnout are related with teachers' caregiving behaviors and their relationships with children (e.g., Whitaker, Dearth-Wesley, & Gooze, 2015). In addition, although people who frequently utilize suppression strategies tend to avoid emotional expression and tend to keep their emotions to themselves (Gross & John, 2003), the negative feelings and thoughts might still be transferred to their teaching. We also found the negative associations between teachers' suppression emotion regulation and their expressive encouragement. Teachers using higher levels of suppression strategies might struggle with guiding and encouraging children's expressiveness in challenging situations because teachers themselves are less capable of expressing their own emotions. 5. Limitations The current study has several limitations. First, this correlational and cross-sectional study does not guarantee causal relationships between the study variables. Although the directions of our hypotheses were drawn from the previous literature that shows the empirical or theoretical associations between household chaos, maternal executive functioning, and parenting behaviors (e.g., Corapci & Wachs, 2002; Deater–Deckard et al., 2012; Vernon-Feagans et al., 2012), it is still possible that teachers' less supportive responsiveness or a lack of emotional abilities may increase the level of child-care chaos. In addition, there are still many unexplained variables in this study, such as state-level child care regulations, instructional and/or psychological support from child-care programs for teachers, child-care neighborhoods or poverty status of children, and the level of children's challenging behaviors. To reduce the bias from unexplained variables, we controlled for multiple program- or teacher-level characteristics. However, longitudinal studies are needed to clarify the directions between child-care chaos, teachers' emotional abilities, and responsiveness after controlling for unexplained variables. Second, because all variables were reported by the same respondents—teachers—the results should be interpreted with caution. The direct and indirect associations might be biased by shared-method variance. For example, teachers' perception of child-care chaos might differ by teachers' emotion regulation or

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coping skills. In addition, more objective observational data may give different results on the level of child-care chaos or teachers' responsiveness. Although we assumed that teachers' self-report could better measure their everyday interactions with children in natural child-care settings, teachers' own perceptions about their responsiveness and the actual performance in a classroom might not match. Future studies might utilize both self-reports and observations to understand how child-care chaos and teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills differently predict teacher-perceived responsiveness and their actual behaviors. In addition, recognizing the role of child-care chaos in teachers' responsiveness from the results of the current study, observational tools to measure child-care chaos might be developed, validated, and utilized in future studies to obtain an objective measure of the level of child-care chaos. For example, it might be possible to adapt the Home Observation of the Environment (Caldwell & Bradley, 1984) assessment that observes physical environments of children's home. However, we note that the current study is the first to utilize the cost-effective CHAOS-D scale (a child-care version of the CHAOS scale frequently used in the literature) in a large sample of preschool teachers; we found an adequate level of reliability (α = 0.81). Finally, although we conducted stratified random sampling that includes all states in the US to represent a national population of preschool teachers, the generalization of the current study is limited due to the low response rate. 6. Implications for research and practice Although there are limitations, this study provides significant implications for future research. First, using the exploratory results from this study, future studies may benefit from adding child outcomes. Considering the fact that there are approximately 1.1 million teachers working with young children in center-based settings (Child Care Aware of America, 2013), it is important to understand teachers' characteristics per se. However, including child outcomes, such as cognitive and social-emotional functioning, will provide an extended understanding of the importance of child-care chaos and teachers' emotional abilities in early childhood education. Second, future studies can explore possible moderators on the associations between child-care chaos and teachers' emotional abilities or responsiveness. For example, the associations between child-care chaos and teachers' emotional abilities or teachers' responsiveness might be differed by the level of poverty among children in child-care. Or more educated or experienced teachers may be better able to manage child-care chaos, which may make a difference in the associations between child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness. Third, other contextual factors can be considered as predictors of teachers' emotion regulation and copings skills or responsiveness. For example, child-care program directors' support or leadership may predict teachers' emotional health and responsiveness. In addition, teachers' sense of community, such as relationships with a director, co-workers, parents and children might be also associated with the level of teachers' emotion regulation or coping skills. Fourth, this study only included a sample of teachers in preschool-aged classrooms. Future studies could include teachers with younger children (infants or toddlers) or child-care providers in home-based care as child-care chaos in those child-care settings can be as important as for preschool settings. Finally, although we measured overall child-care chaos to better understand the environmental climate of child-care, multiple dimensions of child-care chaos, such as noise, crowding, and a lack of routines or organization, can be separately examined in future studies. This will provide a better understanding of the nature of child-care chaos and how each dimension of child-care chaos may differently impact teachers' emotional abilities and responsiveness. If different results are found between different dimensions of chaos, interventions can be tailored to address a specific aspect of child-care chaos. Results of this study also provide new implications for practice in early childhood education. First, the current study suggests that it is important to prepare teachers to handle chaotic environments using clear guidelines and rules. In addition, it is possible to provide education for teachers on how to efficiently organize their classrooms to prevent child-care chaos. The literature suggests that when individuals perceive environments as unmodifiable, they experience greater difficulty coping with stressors from those environments (Montgomery & Rupp, 2005). If teachers can be equipped with skills that help them manage chaotic environments, we expect that it will also improve their emotional abilities and responsiveness towards children in child-care classrooms. Second, interventions that address teachers' emotion regulation and coping skills need to be included as part of regular professional development. Although there are a few intervention programs (e.g., mindfulness training) that have been shown to have positive effects on teachers' psychological wellbeing and classroom practice (e.g., Gordon et al., 2013; Roeser et al., 2013), there is still a need to develop and incorporate intervention components that teach coping strategies, which are specific to childcare teachers' circumstances. Finally, policymakers and child-care directors or trainers may consider the degree of chaos as a component of child-care quality in efforts to improve overall quality. Child-care chaos has been understudied in the literature and has been rarely evaluated as part of overall child-care quality in practice. The current study suggests that child-care chaos is associated with teachers' own emotional abilities as well as their responsiveness towards children. Child-care programs may periodically and systemically evaluate the level of chaos to keep their environments more stable and organized for teachers' better emotional health and responsiveness towards children. 7. Conclusion We first explored the direct and indirect associations between child-care chaos and teachers' responsiveness through teachers' emotional regulation and coping skills. This study adds to the growing literature on environmental chaos and the adults who care for children both at home and in childcare and education settings. We suggest a new approach to improve the quality of teachers in early childhood education through intervening in child-care chaos, teachers' emotion regulation, and coping skills. In addition, we anticipate more research studies in the future that examine child-care chaos and teachers' emotional health in child-care settings with a wide range of outcomes.

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