Supporting emotional development through the power of reminiscing with children

Research shows that elaborative reminiscing, a supportive conversation style, can significantly boost children’s emotional skills and resilience, especially for those facing adversity, through nurturing dialogue that fosters emotional growth and connection.

A deceptively small question can shape a child’s development more than many adults realise. Research published in Child Development followed 248 children aged three to seven and their mothers over five years, and found that the way parents talk through past experiences with children can strengthen emotional skills later on. The study centred on “elaborative reminiscence”, a style of conversation that uses open questions, builds on what a child has already said and helps name events and feelings more fully.

The findings add to a broader body of work showing that reflective, supportive conversations do more than fill in gaps in memory. A study indexed on PubMed found that maternal elaborative reminiscing was linked to stronger receptive language in children, with maternal sensitivity shaping how much benefit children gained. Other research has connected autonomy-supportive and elaborative parent-child conversations with better memory-related functioning and improved emotion regulation in preschool children.

For children facing adversity, the stakes may be even higher. Earlier PubMed studies have suggested that elaborative reminiscing can help buffer some of the harmful effects of maltreatment on behaviour, physiology and self-regulation. A more recent longitudinal study involving families with child welfare contact found that improving maternal reminiscing supported children’s emotion regulation and executive function, particularly among children who had been maltreated.

That is the context in which Fundación Familias Primero says it has seen language gaps among the children it works with. The group has also developed Arte y Mesa, an activity that brings adults and children together to decorate a cardboard plate while sharing family stories and memories. Its premise is simple: conversation itself can become a tool for learning, connection and emotional growth.