Two studies examined the influence of maternal discourse style and security of attachment on preschoolers' emotion understanding. Findings indicated that neither predicted 3-year-olds' emotion understanding. Secure attachment predicted higher emotion understanding among 5-year-olds, especially in the context of maternal use of elaborative discourse. Findings suggest that between 3 and 5 years, the influence of maternal discourse and attachment security are developmentally transformed as children's conceptions of psychological states rapidly change. (Author/KB)