Affect in Toddlers: Relations to Gender, Family and Preschool Attendance
Poster Number
19
Format
Poster Presentation
Faculty Mentor Name
Jessica Grady
Faculty Mentor Department
Psychology
Abstract/Artist Statement
Peer interactions in early childhood are thought to be critical for helping young children learn important social skills and build social competence. Not all children interact well with peers, however. Previous research has demonstrated that peer interactions could be affected by child affect. For example, Schultz and colleagues (2008) presented 3- to 4-yearolds with pairs of photographs depicting various children smiling and expressionless and asked them to indicate which of the two children they would prefer to play with. Results revealed that children preferred to interact with playmates that were smiling, rather than expressionless. This article may suggest that positive affect is important for children’s positive relationships with peers. It has also been demonstrated that toddlers high in negative affect have poorer self-regulation (Raikes et al., 2007), and poorer self-regulation may negatively affect children’s interactions with peers. Combined, this past work suggests a child’s affect may have an impact on their interactions with peers and ultimately their development of social competence (Houck, 1999). In the present study, we are interested in correlates of children’s affect when interacting with new peers. We will examine child factors like child gender, sibling status, and preschool attendance that may influence the different types of affect children display when interacting with their peers. We observed child affect while toddlers participated in a 5-minute free-play session with two other same-aged peers. Participants were 93 toddlers between the ages of 21-27 months who were mainly Caucasian and who participated with their mothers in a larger study on temperament and parenting. We coded toddler affect as positive, anxious, anger, or neutral using video recordings of the play sessions. We plan to use correlation analyses to examine correlates of child’s affect, such as siblings, gender, history of preschool attendance and contact with mothers.
Location
DeRosa University Center, Ballroom
Start Date
25-4-2015 2:00 PM
End Date
25-4-2015 4:00 PM
Affect in Toddlers: Relations to Gender, Family and Preschool Attendance
DeRosa University Center, Ballroom
Peer interactions in early childhood are thought to be critical for helping young children learn important social skills and build social competence. Not all children interact well with peers, however. Previous research has demonstrated that peer interactions could be affected by child affect. For example, Schultz and colleagues (2008) presented 3- to 4-yearolds with pairs of photographs depicting various children smiling and expressionless and asked them to indicate which of the two children they would prefer to play with. Results revealed that children preferred to interact with playmates that were smiling, rather than expressionless. This article may suggest that positive affect is important for children’s positive relationships with peers. It has also been demonstrated that toddlers high in negative affect have poorer self-regulation (Raikes et al., 2007), and poorer self-regulation may negatively affect children’s interactions with peers. Combined, this past work suggests a child’s affect may have an impact on their interactions with peers and ultimately their development of social competence (Houck, 1999). In the present study, we are interested in correlates of children’s affect when interacting with new peers. We will examine child factors like child gender, sibling status, and preschool attendance that may influence the different types of affect children display when interacting with their peers. We observed child affect while toddlers participated in a 5-minute free-play session with two other same-aged peers. Participants were 93 toddlers between the ages of 21-27 months who were mainly Caucasian and who participated with their mothers in a larger study on temperament and parenting. We coded toddler affect as positive, anxious, anger, or neutral using video recordings of the play sessions. We plan to use correlation analyses to examine correlates of child’s affect, such as siblings, gender, history of preschool attendance and contact with mothers.