Caring, Sharing, Daring: Social-emotional development at age five

Caring, Sharing, Daring SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT AT AGE FIVE

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EARLY SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT MATTERS FOR CHILDREN’S WELL-BEING AND BROADER SKILL DEVELOPMENT Social-emotional skills are positively associated with children’s early cognitive development, especially emergent literacy and numeracy.

Curiosity and empathy have the strongest links to early cognitive development, whereas nondisruptive behaviour1 has the weakest association.

Girls have stronger social-emotional skills than boys.

Gender differences are strongest in empathy, followed by non-disruptive behaviour and sociability.

Differences based on socio-economic status are not as stark as gender differences. Nonetheless, children from advantaged families tend be more curious than their less advantaged peers, whereas only small differences in disruptive behaviour are evident between the two groups of children.

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Children’s behaviours at home can differ from their behaviours at their early childhood education setting or school.

This is most pronounced for children from immigrant backgrounds, where they appear less confident and trusting in their formal learning environment.

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Parents help children develop social-emotional skills through back-and-forth conversations about how children feel, regularly reading books with them, and games involving role-play.

Children who have previously attended Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) tend to be more confident in interacting with adults than other children.

Non-disruptive refers to the absence of disruptive behaviours, such as fighting with other children or preventing other children from doing their own activities.

For this study, information was collected on just under:

7 000

CHILDREN

in England, Estonia and the United States

The study collected information on a broad range of children’s skills, including:

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Emergent literacy

Self-regulation

Emergent numeracy

Social-emotional skills

The study includes a direct assessment of children’s cognitive and social-emotional development, in addition to information from parents and teachers, and the children themselves.

The International Early Learning and Child Well-being study (IELS) is designed to help: Governments

Education leaders

Teachers

Parents

give every child the strongest possible start in life.

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SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS ARE AN INTEGRAL PART OF CHILDREN’S OVERALL DEVELOPMENT This report outlines the information provided by teachers and parents on the following six skills and behaviours:

EMPATHY

SOCIABILITY

CONFIDENCE

CURIOSITY

TRUST

NON-DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOUR

SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS HELP CHILDREN INTERACT MORE EFFECTIVELY WITH OTHERS This includes: • • • • •

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Empathising with others’ perspectives Interacting well with others Making and sustaining friendships Resolving conflict Operating as a part of a group.2

Bush, G., P. Luu and M. Posner (2000), “Cognitive and emotional influences in anterior cingulate cortex”, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Vol. 4/6, pp. 215-222, https://doi.org/10.1016/s1364-6613(00)01483-2.

SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT SUPPORTS COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT The neural circuits involved in regulating emotions overlap with those associated with cognitive processing.3 More specifically, positive interactions with others enhance children’s language and self-regulation skills, creating a positive upward spiral.4 Social-emotional skills help children to:

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Persist in tasks

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Try new approaches

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Cope with setbacks5

EARLY SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS AFFECT LONG-TERM OUTCOMES A child’s emotional health is one of the strongest predictors of life satisfaction, well-being and mental health in adulthood – it is a better predictor than family resources or early cognitive ability.6 Early emotional well-being is also linked to: • Higher educational attainment • Higher income and socio-economic status in later life.7

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Bush, G., P. Luu and M. Posner (2000), “Cognitive and emotional influences in anterior cingulate cortex”, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, Vol. 4/6, pp. 215-222, https://doi.org/10.1016/s1364-6613(00)01483-2.

Shuey, E. and M. Kankaraš (2018), “The Power and Promise of Early Learning”, OECD Education Working Papers, No. 186, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://dx.doi.org/10.1787/f9b2e53f-en.

Schoon, I. et al. (2015), “The impact of early life skills on later outcomes”, Report for the OECD, University College London, https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10051902/, accessed on 1 April, 2021.

Flèche, S., W. Lekfuangfu and A. Clark (2019), “The long-lasting effects of family and childhood on adult well-being: Evidence from British cohort data”, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/J.JEBO.2018.09.018.

Rutter, M., J. Kim-Cohen and B. Maughan (2006), “Continuities and discontinuities in psychopathology between childhood and adult life”, Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, Vol. 47/3-4, pp. 276-295, http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2006.01614.x.

Buchanan, A., E. Flouri and J. Brinke (2002), “Emotional and behavioural problems in childhood and distress in adult life: Risk and protective factors”, Australian & New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry, Vol. 36/4, pp. 521-527, https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1440-1614.2002.01048.x.

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SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT IS LINKED TO COGNITIVE SKILLS CHILDREN WHO ARE CURIOUS AND SHOW EMPATHY TOWARDS OTHERS TEND TO HAVE STRONGER COGNITIVE SKILLS THAN OTHER CHILDREN

Empathy enables children to build relationships and collaborate with others, strengthening their ability to learn and their well-being.

Curiosity is essentially a disposition to learn, and has a positive relationship with levels of creativity.8

BEING SOCIABLE, CONFIDENT AND TRUSTING IS ALSO POSITIVELY RELATED TO COGNITIVE SKILLS

CONFIDENCE

TRUST

SOCIABILITY

These aspects of children’s social-emotional development relate most strongly to emergent literacy and numeracy skills, but also show positive relationships with other cognitive indicators such as mental flexibility and working memory.

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Arnone, M. P. (2003). “Using instructional design strategies to foster curiosity”, ERIC clearinghouse of information and technology, Syracuse, NY. No. ED 479842.

DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOUR IS MORE WEAKLY CORRELATED WITH COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT THAN OTHER ASPECTS OF SOCIALEMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT Although disruptive behaviour can negatively impact other children’s learning and wellbeing.9

RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN ASPECTS OF SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND COGNITIVE SKILLS Key Non-disruptive behaviour

Trust

Empathy

Confidence

Sociability

Curiosity

0.12

Emergent literacy

Memory skills

0.24

Children’s working memory skills at five years-of-age are linked most closely to their levels of curiosity and empathy

0.26 0.30 0.32

0.11 0.16 0.15 0.19 0.24 0.24

0.13

Numeracy skills

0.24

Emergent literacy has positive relationships with social-emotional development, especially curiosity and empathy

Bars depict the correlation between each social-emotional skill and the cognitive skill shown (in this figure, numeracy skills).

The longer the bar the stronger the relationship between the two.

0.24 0.24

Levels of curiosity also show the strongest relationship with children’s early numeracy skills

Mental flexibility skills Children’s mental flexibility is most strongly correlated with their levels of curiosity

0.25 0.29 0.34

0.10 0.16 0.17 0.19 0.22 0.24

Note: All correlations are statistically significant

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OECD (2020). PISA 2018 results (volume III) : What school life means for students’ lives, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/acd78851-en.

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TEACHERS RATE GIRLS AS MORE EMPATHETIC, SOCIABLE, TRUSTING AND LESS DISRUPTIVE THAN BOYS... BUT AS MORE SIMILAR IN TERMS OF CONFIDENCE AND CURIOSITY Differences between teachers’ ratings of aspects of the social-emotional development of girls and boys Key

0.15 0.19 0.26 0.31 0.32 0.49

Curiosity

Sociability

Confidence

Non-disruptive behaviour

Trust

Empathy

Bars indicate the size of the difference between girls and boys on the same social-emotional skill. The longer the bar the greater the difference between the two genders. All mean differences are statistically significant.

Standardised effect size10

Percentages of girls and boys reported by their teachers as ‘often/always’ displaying empathetic behaviours GIRLS BOYS The child understands others’ feelings, like when they are happy, sad or angry

EMPATHY

The child responds positively to others’ happiness

82%

69%

75%

The child is emotionally moved by the problems of people in books or stories

49%

The child tries to comfort others when they are upset The child is helpful to other children (e.g. if someone is hurt or upset) The child considers others’ feelings

63%

52%

73%

62%

33%

28%

55%

44%

10 Cohen’s d is the effect size used to indicate the standardised difference between two means. An effect size of .1 can be considered as small, .3 as medium, and .5 large. Cohen J. (1988). Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences. New York, NY: Routledge Academic.

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Percentages of girls and boys reported by their teachers as ‘often/always’ displaying sociable behaviours GIRLS BOYS The child says nice or friendly things to other children

SOCIABILITY

The child joins in with other children playing The child is friendly towards others

65%

49%

80%

74%

83%

77%

Percentages of girls and boys reported by their teachers as ‘often/always’ displaying curiosity GIRLS BOYS

CURIOSITY

The child is curious, likes to explore or try new things

64%

61%

The child is interested in many different things

66%

61%

The child likes to learn new things

73%

64% Gender gaps were smaller for curiosity, but still favoured girls.

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Girls like learning new things more than boys.

”

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DIFFERENCES BASED ON SOCIOECONOMIC STATUS ARE NOT AS STARK AS GENDER DIFFERENCES DIFFERENCES IN TEACHER RATINGS OF ASPECTS OF THE SOCIALEMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN FROM ADVANTAGED AND DISADVANTAGED BACKGROUNDS Children from advantaged backgrounds were rated by teachers as having stronger social-emotional development than children from disadvantaged backgrounds11 Key 0.10 0.15 0.20

Non-disruptive behaviour

Confidence

Sociability

Empathy

Trust

Curiosity

The longer the bar the greater the difference between advantaged and disadvantaged children. All differences are statistically significant.

0.19 0.23 0.28 Standardised effect size

Percentages of advantaged and disadvantaged children reported by their teachers as ‘often/always’ displaying curiosity ADVANTAGED DISADVANTAGED

CURIOSITY

The child is curious, likes to explore or try new things

71%

58%

The child is interested in many different things

71%

58%

The child likes to learn new things

77%

63%

11 Children in the top quartile of socio-economic status (SES) are described as ‘advantaged’ here, and children in the bottom SES quartile as ‘disadvantaged’.

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Percentages of advantaged and disadvantaged children reported by their teachers as displaying disruptive behaviours at least sometimes ADVANTAGED DISADVANTAGED The child gets upset when they do not get enough attention from the teacher

DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOUR

The child dislikes it when asked to play in a different way (e.g. frowns, stomps foot) The child prevents other children from doing their own activities The child teases other children

25% 36% 24% 18%

The child fights with other children

24%

27% 38% 28% 23% 28%

The largest differences between advantaged and disadvantaged children are in curiosity, while differences in disruptive behaviour between advantaged and disadvantaged children are small.

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Children from advantaged and disadvantaged backgrounds show similar levels of disruptive behaviour.

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CHILDREN’S BEHAVIOURS CAN VARY

BY CONTEXT PARENTS RATE CHILDREN’S SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS MORE FAVOURABLY THAN TEACHERS This is likely to reflect: • The different contexts of home versus the child’s early childhood centre or school • Teachers’ experiences with a greater number of children at this age.

When differences are seen in teacher ratings between different groups of children (e.g. between girls and boys or between advantaged and disadvantaged children), these also tend to be seen in parent reports (parents are much more likely to say girls are frequently empathetic than to say boys are, for example).

An exception is the case of children with and without an immigrant background.

Teachers tend to rate children with an immigrant background as having lower levels of confidence and trust than children without an immigrant background. However, such differences tend not to be seen in parents’ ratings, implying that lower levels of trust or confidence among children with immigrant backgrounds are confined to the school or ECEC environment.

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Parent vs teacher reports of children from immigrant and non-immigrant families ‘often/always’ displaying confidence PARENT REPORT TEACHER REPORT The child is confident around adults

74%

The child is confident around children

76%

51%

74%

Immigrant

62%

Non-immigrant

CONFIDENCE 54%

74%

Immigrant

66%

Non-immigrant

Parent vs teacher reports of children from immigrant and non-immigrant families ‘often/always’ displaying trust

TRUST

Openly approaches familiar adults when she/he needs help Approaches familiar adults for comfort when upset Greets unfamiliar children in a friendly way

PARENT REPORT TEACHER REPORT 81%

52%

79%

Immigrant

66% Non-immigrant

69% 71% 54% 61%

41% 52% 42% 50%

Immigrant Non-immigrant

Immigrant Non-immigrant

TEACHERS REPORT THAT CHILDREN WHO HAVE PREVIOUSLY ATTENDED ECEC TEND TO BE MORE CONFIDENT IN INTERACTING WITH ADULTS

56% of children

who previously attended ECEC

are ‘often/always’ confident around adults, compared to 46% of children who had not.

49% of children

who previously attended ECEC

‘often/always’ approach familiar adults for comfort when upset, compared to 42% of children who had not.

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PARENTS’ ACTIVITIES WITH THEIR CHILDREN ARE POSITIVELY LINKED TO EARLY SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT

These activities include:

Children whose parents frequently engage them in imaginative or pretend play have significantly higher than average levels of nondisruptive behaviour than children whose parents do so less frequently.

• Back-and-forth conversations with children about how they feel • Frequently reading books to their children • The extent to which parents are involved in the child’s ECEC centre or school.12

Disruptive behaviour at age five, by frequency of imaginative or pretend play with parents Often/always

DISRUPTIVE BEHAVIOUR

Sometimes

Never/rarely

PRETEND PLAY, TIMES PER WEEK

Dislikes it when asked to play in a different way (e.g. frowns, stamps foot)

1-2 (or less)

Prevents other children from doing what they wanted to do

1-2 (or less)

Gets upset when you don’t give him/her enough attention

1-2 (or less)

3-4 5-7

3-4 5-7

3-4 5-7 0%

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20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

OECD (2020), Early learning and child well-being: A Study of five-year-olds in England, Estonia and the United States, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/3990407f-en.

FOSTERING CHILDREN’S SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS THE SOCIAL-EMOTIONAL SKILLS CHILDREN NEED TO INTERACT WELL WITH OTHERS AND TO ACHIEVE WELL-BEING ARE LARGELY LEARNED This learning occurs initially in the child’s family and community environments in the first few years of life and then in formal education settings, such as in early childhood education and care.

In addition to parental activities there are a number of other environmental conditions that help children to develop these essential skills. These vary across the different types of social-emotional skills that children need to develop.

While curiosity is innate in newborns and toddlers, it is enhanced in the early years by positive early environments, but can be severely diminished in negative environments.

Children’s levels of curiosity are strengthened when they are, for example, encouraged to:

CURIOSITY

EMPATHY

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Ask questions and receive genuine answers (also building their confidence)

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Actively (and safely) explore their world

Empathy develops through a learning progression requiring secure early attachment with the child’s parent or primary caregiver, and a consistently warm, responsive, nurturing and affectionate parent-child relationship.

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Have choice and autonomy over the activities they engage in.13

As a next step, children learn to recognise, express and regulate their own emotions, which then allows them to recognise and respond appropriately to the emotions of others.14

Thus, the development of social-emotional skills is complex and deeply embedded in the early, day-to-day lived experiences of children.

While families and communities are key to healthy development of these skills, more formal early learning environments can also play a key role in fostering these skills.

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Arnone, M. P. (2003). “Using instructional design strategies to foster curiosity”, ERIC clearinghouse of information and technology, Syracuse, NY. No. ED 479842.

Spinrad, T.L. and D.E. Gal (2017), “Fostering prosocial behaviour in young children”, Current Opinion in Psychology 2018, Vol. 20, pp 40-44.

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FIND OUT MORE:

JOIN THE NEXT CYCLE OF THE STUDY

To learn more about the social-emotional development of five-year-olds:

The International Early Learning and Child Wellbeing Study will continue to help countries monitor and improve the early development and well-being of children.

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Read the summary report on the International Early Learning and Well-being Study (IELS): http://www. oecd.org/education/school/early-learning-and-childwell-being-study/early-learning-and-child-well-being3990407f-en.htm

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Watch the video presentation by Andreas Schleicher, Director of Education and Skills at the OECD, on the key findings of the IELS study, including key gender differences: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_g4p7FYRYk&feature=emb_title

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Read the full international report: Early Learning and Child Well-being – A study of five-year-olds in England, Estonia and the United States: http://www.oecd.org/ education/school/early-learning-and-child-well-beingstudy/early-learning-and-child-well-being-3990407f-en. htm

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Check out the OECD Early Learning and Child Wellbeing website at: www.oecd.org/education/school/ early-learning-and-child-well-being-study

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Learn more about the OECD’s wider work on child wellbeing via: http://www.oecd.org/social/family/childwell-being

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Send questions and comments to the OECD Early Learning and Child Well-being team: earlylearning@oecd.org

This work is published under the responsibility of the Secretary-General of the OECD. The opinions expressed and arguments employed herein do not necessarily reflect the official views of the member countries of the OECD. This document, as well as any data and map included herein, are without prejudice to the status of or sovereignty over any territory, to the delimitation of international frontiers and boundaries and to the name of any territory, city or area. © OECD 2021 The use of this work, whether digital or print, is governed by the Terms and Conditions to be found at http://www.oecd.org/termsandconditions.

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To join the next cycle of the study please contact the OECD Early Learning and Child Well-being team: earlylearning@oecdoecd.org.

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