Buffers of peer rejection among girls with and without ADHD: the role of popularity with adults and goal-directed solitary play

We investigated a risk-resilience model in 91 girls with ADHD and 58 age- and ethnicity-equated comparison girls, who participated in all-female naturalistic summer research camps. The hypothesized risk factor was peer rejection (assessed via sociometric nominations), with criterion measures including multiinformant composites of aggressive behavior and anxious/depressed symptoms. The two hypothesized protective factors were the girls' popularity with adult staff (assessed via staff ratings) and objective observations of goal-directed solitary play. Peer rejection was related to higher levels of aggressive behavior and depressed/anxious behavior, confirming its status as a risk factor. Next, for all girls, popularity with adults predicted lower levels of aggression and goal-directed solitary play predicted lower levels of anxiety/depression. Whereas popularity with adults was most protective among the peer-accepted subgroup, solitary play was most protective among the peer-rejected subgroup. Diagnostic status (ADHD versus comparison) moderated the findings such that engaging in meaningful solitary play was a stronger predictor of lower levels of anxious/depressed behavior in girls with ADHD than in comparison girls. We discuss the need for replication in prospective research and implications for research and intervention regarding the social functioning of peer-rejected children, particularly those with behavior disorders.     

The role of emotion knowledge in the links between shyness and children's socio‐emotional functioning at preschool

The present study investigated the potential protective role of components of emotion knowledge (i.e., emotion recognition, situation knowledge) in the links between young children's shyness and indices of socio‐emotional functioning. Participants were n = 163 children (82 boys and 81 girls) aged 23–77 months (M = 53.29, SD = 14.48), recruited from preschools in Italy. Parents provided ratings of child shyness and teachers rated children's socio‐emotional functioning at preschool (i.e., social competence, anxiety‐withdrawal, peer rejection). Children were also interviewed to assess their abilities to recognize facial emotional expressions and identify situations that affect emotions. Among the results, shyness was positively related to anxiety‐withdrawal and peer rejection. In addition, emotion recognition was found to significantly moderate the links between shyness and preschool socio‐emotional functioning, appearing to serve a buffering role. For example, at lower levels of emotion recognition, shyness was positively associated with both anxiety‐withdrawal and rejection by peers, but at higher levels of emotion recognition, these associations were attenuated. Results are discussed in terms of the protective role of emotion recognition in promoting shy children's positive socio‐emotional functioning within the classroom context.     

Finding connections between spirituality and play for early childhood education

ABSTRACT

In an attempt to provide holistic education and care, expand the view of young children’s development to include the spiritual, and make connections with the found benefits of play for all areas of development, this article looks at 33 surveyed U.S. early childhood educators’ perceptions on nurturing spirituality through open-ended and free play. Data collected from the open-ended questions of an online survey were analyzed looking at 22 mentions of play as a mean to support spirituality. Findings show that 45.5% of surveyed teachers mentioned play as a way intentionally used in the classroom to nurture children’s spirituality. It is posed that developmentally appropriate approaches to early childhood education would be enhanced by including spirituality in their understanding of the child, as well as intentionally nurturing spirituality in educational settings, by providing free, child-centered, child-directed play and opportunities for children to experience spiritual moments, defined as feeling wonder, awe, joy, and inner-peace.     

Trustworthiness,friendships and self‐control: factors that contribute to young children's school adjustment

The aim of present study was to examine the relationship between young children's peer‐reported trustworthiness and their school adjustment. Two hundred and eleven (103 male and 108 female) children in the United Kingdom (mean age = 6 years 2 months) took part in this study. Measures of peer‐reported trustworthiness, child‐rated school adjustment, and teacher‐rated school adjustment were administered twice across a one‐year period. Also, children's number of friendships, peer acceptance, and self‐control were assessed at Time 2. Multisample path analyses were conducted separately by sex. For both samples there were direct longitudinal paths between peer‐reported trustworthiness and changes in teacher‐rated school adjustment. For boys, the longitudinal path between peer‐reported trustworthiness and changes in child‐rated loneliness was mediated by peer acceptance, and peer‐reported trustworthiness mediated the relationship between self‐control and teacher‐rated school adjustment. Sex differences in peer‐reported trustworthiness also emerged: girls were rated as more trustworthy by their peers than were boys. The findings support the hypothesis that young children's trustworthiness contributes to school adjustment, which is due in part to peer acceptance. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Socio‐economic,socio‐political and socio‐emotional variables explaining school bullying: a country‐wide multilevel analysis

Why do some countries, regions and schools have more bullying than others? What socio‐economic, socio‐political and other larger contextual factors predict school bullying? These open questions inspired this study with 53.316 5th‐ and 9th‐grade students (5% of the national student population in these grades), from 1,000 schools in Colombia. Students completed a national test of citizenship competencies, which included questions about bullying and about families, neighborhoods and their own socio‐emotional competencies. We combined these data with community violence and socio‐economic conditions of all Colombian municipalities, which allowed us to conduct multilevel analyses to identify municipality‐ and school‐level variables predicting school bullying. Most variance was found at the school level. Higher levels of school bullying were related to more males in the schools, lower levels of empathy, more authoritarian and violent families, higher levels of community violence, better socio‐economic conditions, hostile attributional biases and more beliefs supporting aggression. These results might reflect student, classroom and school contributions because student‐level variables were aggregated at the school level. Although in small portions, violence from the decades‐old‐armed conflict among guerrillas, paramilitaries and governmental forces predicted school bullying at the municipal level for 5th graders. For 9th graders, inequality in land ownership predicted school bullying. Neither poverty, nor population density or homicide rates contributed to explaining bullying. These results may help us advance toward understanding how the larger context relates to school bullying, and what socio‐emotional competencies may help us prevent the negative effects of a violent and unequal environment. Aggr. Behav. 35:520–529, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Self‐Regulatory Growth Effects for Young Children Participating in a Combined Social and Emotional Learning and Mindfulness‐Based Intervention

The authors analyzed findings from a counselor‐delivered social and emotional learning and mindfulness‐based intervention with twenty‐three 3‐ and 4‐year‐olds from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Using a multilevel modeling approach to illustrate students' growth across multiple behavioral observations in a randomized controlled design, the authors found that the treatment group exhibited more self‐regulatory‐related behaviors on days when the intervention occurred. Qualitative analyses revealed that the students adopted kindness language consistent with the intervention. Implications for practice are suggested.     

Young children's beliefs about self‐disclosure of performance failure and success

Self‐disclosure of performance information involves the balancing of instrumental, learning benefits (e.g., obtaining help) against social costs (e.g., diminished reputation). Little is known about young children's beliefs about performance self‐disclosure. The present research investigates preschool‐ and early school‐age children's expectations of self‐disclosure in different contexts. In two experiments, 3‐ to 7‐year‐old children (total N = 252) heard vignettes about characters who succeeded or failed at solving a puzzle. Both experiments showed that children across all ages reasoned that people are more likely to self‐disclose positive than negative performances, and Experiment 2 showed that children across all ages reasoned that people are more likely to self‐disclose both positive and negative performances in a supportive than an unsupportive peer environment. Additionally, both experiments revealed changes with age – Younger children were less likely to expect people to withhold their performance information (of both failures and successes) than older children. These findings point to the preschool ages as a crucial beginning to children's developing recognition of people's reluctance to share performance information.     

Gender gaps in cognitive and social‐emotional skills in early primary grades: Evidence from rural Indonesia

This paper examines the magnitude and source of gender gaps in cognitive and social‐emotional skills in early primary grades in rural Indonesia. Relative to boys, girls score more than 0.17 SD higher in tests of language and mathematics (cognitive skills) and between 0.18 and 0.27 SD higher in measures of social competence and emotional maturity (social‐emotional skills). We use Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition to investigate the extent to which gender differences in early schooling and parenting practices explain these gender gaps in skills. For cognitive skills, differences in early schooling between boys and girls explain between 9% and 11% of the gender gap whereas differences in parenting practices explain merely 3%–5% of the gender gap. This decomposition result is driven largely by children living in villages with high‐quality preschools. In contrast, for social‐emotional skills, differences in parenting styles toward boys and girls explain between 13% and 17% of the gender gap, while differences in early schooling explain only 0%–6% of the gender gap.     

儿童早期同伴接纳与社会适应的关系：一项交叉滞后分析

采用间隔一年半的追踪设计对192名学前儿童的同伴接纳和社会适应之间的关系进行交叉滞后分析。结果发现：T1同伴接纳可以显著正向预测T2社会能力,显著负相预测T2外化问题行为,T1社会能力能够显著正向预测T2同伴接纳,T1内化问题和外化问题行为可以显著负向预测T2同伴接纳;T2同伴接纳可以显著正向预测T3社会能力,显著负相预测T3外化问题行为,T2社会能力能够显著正向预测T3同伴接纳。这些结果表明,同伴接纳和社会适应之间存在相互影响,并随着儿童年龄增长,存在一定程度的动态变化。     

Perceptions of parent‐child attachment,social self‐efficacy,and peer relationships in middle childhood

Relationships among attachment to each parent, children's social self‐efficacy, and the quality of peer relations (attachment to peers and perceptions of victimization) were explored with 67 fifth and sixth graders (31 female) attending a rural elementary school. Results of hierarchical multiple regression analyses revealed main effects for gender and attachment to mother relative to the attachment to peers variable, with girls and more securely attached children reporting higher quality attachment to peers. Main effects were also detected for gender and attachment to father relative to social self‐efficacy, with girls and more securely attached children exhibiting higher self‐efficacy. No main effects were observed relative to the peer victimization variable. None of the interaction effects involving gender and attachment to each parent relative to attachment to peers, peer victimization, and social self‐efficacy were significant. Finally, evidence for mediation of attachment to father on attachment to peers by children's social self‐efficacy was revealed. Implications of the results are discussed and ideas for future research are provided. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Rough‐and‐tumble play and the regulation of aggression: an observational study of father–child play dyads

Rough‐and‐tumble play (RTP) is a common form of play between fathers and children. It has been suggested that RTP can contribute to the development of selfregulation. This study addressed the hypothesis that the frequency of father–child RTP is related to the frequency of physically aggressive behavior in early childhood. This relationship was expected to be moderated by the dominance relationship between father and son during play. Eighty‐five children between the ages of 2 and 6 years were videotaped during a free‐play session with their fathers in their homes and questionnaire data was collected about father–child RTP frequency during the past year. The play dyads were rated for the degree to which the father dominated play interactions. A significant statistical interaction revealed that RTP frequency was associated with higher levels of physical aggression in children whose fathers were less dominant. These results indicate that RTP is indeed related to physical aggression, though this relationship is moderated by the degree to which the father is a dominant playmate. Aggr. Behav. 35:285–295, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Early pathways to bullying: A prospective longitudinal study examining the influences of theory of mind and social preference on bullying behaviour during the first 3 years of school

Research has focused on the role of theory of mind (ToM) for positive social behaviour, while the association between ToM and negative social behaviours is less well understood. This longitudinal study compares two mediation models examining the role of ToM and peer-rated social preference at ages 5 and 6 for bullying at age 7. Participants were 114 children (58 boys, M_age = 67 months) at entry to primary school (T1). At Time 2 (T2), 106 children and, at Time 3 (T3), 96 children remained. Teacher-rated externalizing problems and children’s language ability were controlled at T1. Poor ToM was found to indirectly predict later bullying via poor social preference, while for boys only, greater earlier ToM directly predicted greater bullying 2 years later. These results suggest that there are different pathways to bullying via ToM and social preference , which has implications for interventions to prevent the development of bullying behaviour.     

Young people's perceptions and experiences of leaving high school early: an exploration

Research suggests it is important for students to feel a sense of belonging to their school. Students who do not belong at school often attempt to satisfy this need through membership in antisocial groups, or they drop out from school altogether. The current study explored the perceptions and experiences of the school context held by young people who have left school early. Twelve young people aged 16–19 years were interviewed on their experiences of school and their wellbeing as a result of leaving school early. Constructionist grounded theory methodology formed the basis of the data analysis. The early leaving process was identified as having three phases; exclusion from school, the transition into workforce and the ‘now’ phase. The results identified factors in the school context that contributed to early student withdrawal. Furthermore, the research has implications for creating a ‘normative narrative’ (Rappaport, 2000 ) in relation to early school leavers. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.