Positive Affect and the Socio-Emotional Development of Preschool Children

Funder

Organizational Unit

Publications

Network dynamics of affiliative ties in preschool peer groups

Publication . Daniel, João Rodrigo; Santos, Antonio José; Fernandes, Carla; Vaughn, Brian E.

This study investigated the network dynamics of affiliative ties in Portuguese preschool children, over three consecutive school years, using stochastic actor-based models. Our first goal was to test the extent to which different criteria to identify ties from observational data lead to different theoretical interpretations of model estimates. Contrary to past observational studies the data we use here takes into account the identities of children responsible for initiating social interactions. The second goal was to test the influence of two interaction effects involving reciprocity to analyze if reciprocity is constrained by the presence of transitive ties and if it constrains the creation and maintenance of new unreciprocated ties. Results showed that most effects were robust to changes in criteria to operationalize ties, supporting previous descriptions of preschool network dynamics. Also, contrary to recent findings in older samples, being embedded in a transitive triad did not make an unreciprocated dyad more likely to be maintained. Finally, results showed that the existence of reciprocal ties decreased preschool children’s tendency to create new ties.

2019Journal article

Restricted access

Affiliative sructures and social competence in portuguese preschool children

Publication . Daniel, João Rodrigo; Santos, António José; Peceguina, Maria Inês Duarte; Vaughn, Brian E.

The goal of this study was to determine whether peer social competence (SC), defined as the capacity to use behavioral, cognitive, and emotional resources in the service of achieving personal goals within preschool peer groups, was related to the type of affiliative subgroups to which children belonged. Two hundred forty Portuguese preschool children (152 seen in consecutive years of data collection) from middle-class families participated. Affiliative subgroup type was assessed from observed proximity data. Social competence was assessed using observational and sociometric measures. Children in more cohesive affiliative subgroups had higher levels of SC, whereas ungrouped children had the lowest SC scores. Follow-up analyses indicated that 2 of the measured SC domains (social engagement/motivation, profiles of behavior/personality attributes) were responsible for the overall difference in SC. Further, membership in a more cohesive subgroup in 1 year contributed to increases in scores for 2 of 3 SC domains (i.e., profiles of behavior/personality attributes and peer acceptance) in the following year. Results suggest that affiliative subgroups both reflect and support individual differences in peer SC during early childhood.

2015Journal article

Restricted access

Affiliative subgroups in preschool classrooms: Integrating constructs and methods from social ethology and sociometric traditions

Publication . Santos, António José; Daniel, João Rodrigo; Fernandes, Carla; Vaughn, Brian E.

Recent studies of school-age children and adolescents have used social network analyses to characterize selection and socialization aspects of peer groups. Fewer network studies have been reported for preschool classrooms and many of those have focused on structural descriptions of peer networks, and/or, on selection processes rather than on social functions of subgroup membership. In this study we started by identifying and describing different types of affiliative subgroups (HMP- high mutual proximity, LMP- low mutual proximity, and ungrouped children) in a sample of 240 Portuguese preschool children using nearest neighbor observations. Next, we used additional behavioral observations and sociometric data to show that HMP and LMP subgroups are functionally distinct: HMP subgroups appear to reflect friendship relations, whereas LMP subgroups appear to reflect common social goals, but without strong, within-subgroup dyadic ties. Finally, we examined the longitudinal implications of subgroup membership and show that children classified as HMP in consecutive years had more reciprocated friendships than did children whose subgroup classification changed from LMP or ungrouped to HMP. These results extend previous findings reported for North American peer groups.

2015Journal article

Open access

Co-evolution of friendships and antipathies: A longitudinal study of preschool peer groups

Publication . Daniel, João Rodrigo; Santos, António José; Antunes, Marta Justino Ferrúcio; Fernandes, Marília; Vaughn, Brian E.

We used stochastic actor-based models to test whether the developmental dynamics of friendships and antipathies in preschool peer groups (followed throughout three school years) were co-dependent. We combined choices from three sociometric tasks of 142 children to identify friendship and antipathy ties and used SIENA to model network dynamics. Our results show that different social processes drive the development of friendship and antipathy ties, and that they do not develop in association (i.e., friendship ties are not dependent on existing antipathies, and vice-versa). These results differ from those of older children (age range = 10-14) suggesting that the interplay of friendship and antipathy only plays a significant role in the peer group context in older children. We propose these differences to be likely related with preschool age children's inaccurate perceptions of their classmates' relationships, particularly of their antipathies, and/or with the absence of shared norms to deal with antipathetic relationships.

2016Journal article

Open access

Social engagement and adaptive functioning during early childhood: Identifying and distinguishing among subgroups differing with regard to social engagement

Publication . Vaughn, Brian E.; Santos, António José; Monteiro, Lígia Maria Santos; Shin, Nana; Daniel, João Rodrigo; Krzysik, Lisa; Pinto, Alexandra Maria Pereira Inácio Sequeira

This study tested the hypothesis that social engagement (SE) with peers is a fundamental aspect of social competence during early childhood. Relations between SE and a set of previously validated social competence indicators, as well as additional variables derived from observation and sociometric interviews were assessed using both variable-centered and person-centered approaches (N = 1453, 696 girls) in 4 samples (3 U.S.A., 1 Portuguese). Directly observed SE was positively associated with broad-band measures of socially competent behavior, peer acceptance, being a target of peers' attention, and also with broad-band personality dimensions. Using individual Q-items significantly associated with SE in 3 of our 4 samples, a hierarchical cluster analysis yielded a 5-cluster solution that grouped cases efficiently. Tests on relations between cluster membership and the set of social competence and other variables revealed significant main effects of cluster membership in the full sample and within each individual sample, separately. With the exception of tests for peer negative preference, children in the lowest SE cluster also had significantly lower overall social competence, personality functioning scores than did children in higher SE clusters.

2016-09Journal article

Restricted access