Social Engagement, Social Acceptance and Emotional Regulation in Preschool Children

• In Event: 1-105 - Peer Influences on Self-regulation and School Adaptation at the Transition from Preschool to Primary School

Integrative Statement

The present study tested the relations between social engagement (SE), social acceptance (SA) and emotional regulation (ER) during the final preschool years. A total of 155 preschool children (77 girls) participated in this study. Children were recruited from classrooms in two private urban preschool centres in Lisbon, Portugal. All families were of European ethnicity. Written consent for children’s participation was obtained from school directors, teachers, and parents, as well as children assent, prior to data collection
Two observers collected interaction data in each classroom. Using the class roster, an observer watched a given child for a 15-sec. interval and recorded identifiers for all persons with whom the target interacted. Positive, neutral and negative codes for the initiator of the interaction episode were recorded for an average of 200 observation rounds. All children present were watched for one 15-sec. interval before any child was watched twice. Total rates of interaction were standardized within classrooms prior to further analysis and used as the indicator of SE. Mean ICC estimates were .75 for each classroom pair of observers. Children were asked to complete two picture sociometric tasks: (a) positive and negative nominations, (b) paired comparisons. Classroom SA scores were derived by taking the average of the nominations and paired-comparison standardized scores. Two distinct independent observers used the California Child Q-Sort (CCQ; Block & Block, 1969) to derive the ER indicator (Emotion Regulation Q-scale: Shields & Cicchetti, 1997). The Cronbach’s alpha for the scale was .71 and the scores were further standardized within classrooms.

Bivariate correlations revealed a significant positive association between the measures of ER at ages 4 and 5. The associations of SA at age 4 with these two measures and with SE at age 4 were significant and positive. There was no association between SE at age 4 and both measures of ER. Given this pattern of associations, moderation analyses were examined with SA as the predictor variable, SE as the moderator, and ER at age 5 as the criterion variable while controlling for ER at age 4 as a covariate. These multiple regression analyses used the PROCESS 3 macro (Hayes, 2017) for SPSS 25. Results revealed significant effects for social acceptance and the interaction term (see Table 1). As a follow-up of the significant interaction, simple slopes analyses were conducted for high, average and low values of social engagement (-1 SD, Mean, +1 SD). A significant conditional positive effect of social acceptance on emotion regulation at age 5 was found for the low value of social engagement, b =.31, t(149) = 2.67, p<.01, a positive tendency at the average value of the moderator, b =.16, t(149) = 1.93, p<.06, and no effect at the high value of the moderator, b =.01, t(149) = .12, p<.91(see Figure 1). These results provide useful information concerning the implications of being socially accepted and engaged during early childhood for the development of emotional regulation and suggest interesting avenues for further research on these topics.

Authors

• Tânia Sousa, William James Center for Research, ISPA-Instituto Universitário
  Presenting Author

• Antonio Santos, William James Center for Research, ISPA-Instituto Universitário
  Non-Presenting Author

• João R. Daniel, William James Center for Research - ISPA
  Non-Presenting Author

• David Sousa, William James Center for Research - ISPA
  Non-Presenting Author

• Catarina Perpétuo, ISPA - Instituto Universitário
  Non-Presenting Author

• Carla Fernandes, ISPA - Instituto Universitário
  Non-Presenting Author