Poster #86 - The Effect of Moral Emotions and Depression on a Child’s Centrality within the Classroom: A Social Network Analysis.

• In Event: Poster Session 02

Abstract

Respect provides a moral foundation for school children to interact with others and to learn.
How much respect children receive from their peers has been found to be linked to the child's gender (Cohen et al., 2006), showing respect (Audley et al., 2020), network position (Betts & Stiller, 2014), and other social behavior such as aggression (Neal, 2009). However, less research demonstrates an association between the respect received and emotions. The present study examines the association between children’s depression, moral emotions, and their position with their social network based on how much they are respected by peers.

The data are two years from a longitudinal project, collected from an urban elementary school (n = 91) in the United States. They were 8-11 years in age, 51% female, and 23% African American, 65% European American, and 11% Latinx American. During Time 1, children completed the Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale for Children. In addition, children rated on a 6-point scale how frequently they experienced five moral emotions including respect, pride, shame, guilt, and embarrassment. During both years, the students nominated those respected in the classroom.

We used social network analysis. Two centrality indicators were calculated for both years: local centrality and betweenness. A local centrality score for each child was calculated by summing the number of children who respected the child’s friends. Higher local centrality scores indicate being at the top of the respect hierarchy. Higher betweenness centrality scores indicated the number of times the child was the link between two students. Those with a higher betweenness centrality may be passing on the respect they have received to other students.

We performed two sets of regressions. In the first, the local centrality of respect during Time 2 was the outcome and local centrality during Time 1 served as the control. Depression and the five emotions served as predictors in separate regressions. The second set used the same predictors with betweenness centrality at T2 as the outcome, and betweenness at T1 as the control.

The results indicated that depression at T1 was a significant predictor of local (β = -.239, p = .018; R2 = .15, F(2, 91) = 6.81, p = .002) and betweenness (β = -.298, p = .004; R2 = .09, F(2, 91) = 4.28, p = .017) centrality at T2. This may mean that peers are less likely to look up to depressed peers as exemplars and that depressed peers are less likely to pass on the respect received. These results did not vary by gender.

The five emotions were predictive of local and betweenness centrality, but this varied by gender. Overall, feeling guilty, shameful, or embarrassed at T1 were negatively associated with betweenness centrality at T2 but only for boys (See Figure 1 as an example of one interaction). Overall, pride and feeling respectful at T1 were positively associated with local centrality at T2 but only for girls (See Figure 2 as an example of one interaction). These results will be interpreted considering the gendered experience of moral emotions.

Authors

• Charles Matthew Stapleton, University of Indianapolis
  Presenting Author

• Manasa Swaminathan

• Daria Williams

• Hui Zhang, University of Indianapolis

• Robert Cohen, University of Memphis