Research suggests that children exposed to ‘background anger’, even when it is not directed toward the child, places children at risk for the development of social and emotional problems (Lemerise & Dodge, 1993). Davies and Cummings (1998, 1994) posit a mediational model of children's emotional security and marital conflict (see also Davies, Harold, Goeke‐Morey, & Cummings, 2002).
However...Gottman et al. (1997) also found that parents' awareness of children's emotions, parents' emotion coaching, positive parenting and inhibition of parental negative affect all act as a buffer between marital conflict and children's negative outcomes.