Links Among Shyness, Play Behaviors, and Teacher-Child Relationship Quality in Italian Preschool Children

• In Event: New Insights into the Processes at Play in the Adjustment of Young “At Risk” Children

Abstract

Background. The temperamental trait of shyness is characterized by anxiety and fear in novel social contexts as well as embarrassment in situations of perceived social evaluation (Rubin, Coplan, & Bowker, 2009). Shy children may desire interactions with others, but they tend to display withdrawn behaviors because feelings of anxiety and fear (Asendorpf, 1990). For instance, shy children often show reticent play behaviors (or remaining unoccupied, watching peers without joining in) rather than interacting with others through social play (Choo & Xu, 2011; Ooi, Baldwin, Coplan, & Rose-Krasnor, 2018). Shy children who more frequently engage in reticent play behaviors may be perceived by teachers as less socially engaged and competent (Coplan, Gavinski-Molina, Lagace-Seguin, & Wichmann, 2001) and may develop relationships with teacher characterized by less warm and more dependency (Arbeau, Coplan, & Weeks, 2010).
Methods. The present study aimed to investigate if play behaviours (i.e., reticent and social play) might be mediators of the association between shyness and teacher-child relationship quality in young preschool children. We expected that shyness would be positively associated with reticent play behaviours and negatively related to social play behaviours. In addition, shyness would be negatively related to close relationships with teachers but positively associated with dependent teacher-child relationship. We also hypothesized to find a positive relation between children’s social play behavior and close teacher-child relationship and a positive association between children’s reticent play behaviors and dependent teacher-child relationship. Indirect links between shyness and teacher-child relationship quality, through social and reticent play behaviors, would be also expected.Participants were 212 Italian young children (110 boys), ranging in age from 30.59 to 76.48 months (M=58.32, SD=10.72). Parents evaluated children’s shyness, whereas teachers rated their relationships with each child of the class and children’s reticent and social play behaviors (Coplan & Rubin, 1998).
Results. Correlations among study variables revealed that shyness was negatively related to social play and closeness to teacher and positively related to reticent behaviors. A path analysis conducted with Mplus revealed that shyness led to less social play, which was associated with less close relationships with teachers. Shy children who showed reticent behaviors also developed more dependent relationships with teachers. Overall, the model, controlled for child gender and age, fit the data very well. The standardized indirect paths from shyness to close teacher-child relationship through social play behaviors and from shyness to dependent teacher-child relationship through reticent play were significant. The explained variance was the 17% and 25% for close and dependent teacher-child relationships, respectively.
Conclusion. Findings show the relevant role of play behaviors in determining the quality of teacher relationships of shy children. Supporting teachers in understanding shy children’s needs at school may improve a better knowledge of children’s temperamental characteristics and increase supportive and secure relationships between teachers and shy children

Authors

• Stefania Sette, Sapienza University of Rome
  Presenting Author

• Federica Zava, Department of Education, University of Roma Tre, Rome, Italy
  Non-Presenting Author

• Emma| Baumgartner
  Non-Presenting Author

• Fiorenzo Laghi, Sapienza Università di Roma
  Non-Presenting Author