Social Competence and its Relationship to Peer Preference in Preschoolers

Transcription

1 Social Competence and its Relationship to Peer Preference in Preschoolers Master s Thesis Presented to The Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Department of Psychology Joe Cunningham, Advisor In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for Master s Degree by Adrian M. Farrell August 2010 I

2 Copyright by Adriann M. Farrell 2010 II

3 ABSTRACT Social Competence and its Relationship to Peer Preference in Preschoolers A thesis presented to the Psychology Department Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Waltham, Massachusetts By Adriann M. Farrell The Social competence of 55 preschoolers between the ages of months was examined in relation to peer preference. Measurements included two decoding tasks, where children were asked to identify emotions in facial expressions and body movement, a measure of social problem solving, a sociometric measure, and a teacher rated measure of prosocial and antisocial behaviors. We found that children were similar to their preferred peers on several dimensions of social competence, but that social competence was not a good predictor of peer acceptance. The data presented here are a starting point for a future study in which we will test our hypotheses more rigorously. This proposal can be found in the present paper. III

4 Table of Contents Introduction...1 Method...7 Results...15 Discussion...19 References...24 Appendices...27 A. Informed Consent...27 B. Instruments/questionnaires...29 I. Peer Preference Record...29 II. Multisource Assessment of Childhood Social Competence...30 III. Challenging Situations Task protocol...31 IV

5 Table 1: Demographic characteristics List of Supporting Figures and Tables Table 2: Descriptive statistics for outcome measures Table 3: Participant social competence and favorite friend social competence a. MACSC prosocial b. MACSC antisocial c. CST prosocial d. CST aggressive e. Body movement f. Facial expressions Table 4: Participant peer acceptance and social competence models 1. MACSC prosocial 2. MACSC antisocial 3. CST prosocial 4. CST aggressive 5. Body movement 6. Facial expressions Table 5: Oblimin rotation results of PCA Figure 1: Screeplot for PCA V

6 Jamie s parents could not shake the suspicion that everyone was talking about them right before they arrived to pick up their child, and they could not understand why invitations to play dates were invariably met with a request to check a schedule or calendar that was never handy. Soon however, they began to suspect something was amiss when they realized the teacher s use of descriptors like assertive and demanding to describe Jamie were not necessarily spoken as praise. But it was not until a meeting at the school about an aggressive incident between Jamie and another child that the parents began to notice Jamie s lack of social skills. Jamie s parents may have never heard the phrase social competence, but it was impacting their lives, and could have important implications for their child s future. Social competence can generally be thought of as effectiveness in interaction (Schneider, 1985; Van Hasselt & Hersen, 1992), and has been characterized by the presence of prosocial behaviors and the absence of anti-social behaviors (Merrell & Gimpel, 1998). Researchers have focused on various definitions of social competence including: social skill, acceptance by peers, skill in forming relationships, ability to socially problem solve, success with social goals (Rose-Krasnor, 1997), emotional expressiveness, emotional understanding, and emotional and behavioral regulation (Denham, 2006). In the study to be proposed we rely on several of these definitions; social skills, acceptance by peers, social problem solving skills, understanding of emotions, and the presence of prosocial behavior and absence of antisocial behavior. The development of social competence is an important factor in children s current and future social functioning. Childhood social competence has implications for childhood social adjustment (Crick & Dodge, 1994), positive childhood development (Merrell & Gimpel, 1998), and adult adjustment (Bagwell, Newcomb, & Bukowski, 1998). Social competence 1

7 also has repercussions related to children s academic lives. Generally, social competence is related to school readiness (Denham, 2006). More specifically, children who have better social skills have been found to enjoy school more, get better grades, and achieve more in school than children who do not acquire these skills (Birch & Ladd, 1997). One important component of social competence is nonverbal communication, including the ability to decode emotional expressions. There is evidence that children as young as three and a half are relatively skilled at recognizing anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness and surprise in facial expressions (Boyatzis, Chazan, & Ting, 1993). Additionally, other studies find that children as young as five are able to recognize happiness, sadness, and fear in body movements, and children as young as eight are able to recognize anger as well (Boone & Cunningham, 1998). Many studies have linked decoding of emotion in facial expressions and body movement to greater emotional understanding. For example, socially competent children are better able to recognize emotions in facial expressions (Custrini & Feldman, 1989; Leppanen & Hietanen, 2001; Wocadlo & Rieger, 2006) which may lead to better understanding of situations involving other children and result in positive social interactions. The ability to decode emotion in facial expressions in particular has been linked to greater liking by the peer group. Furthermore, Walden and Field found that among preschoolers, the ability to correctly identify facial expressions was predictive of the degree to which children were liked by their peers (Walden & Field, 1990). In general, children who are more socially competent are better liked by their peers. Children who display positive emotions (Sroufe, et al., 1985), and children who are more prosocial (Denham, McKinley, Couchoud, & Holt, 1990) are better liked by the peer group. Similarly, children with high social competence are more likely to have reciprocated 2

8 friendships (Vaughn, et al., 2000). Others have found that children who had at least one reciprocated friendship were rated as more socially competent by teachers, were more liked by their peers (Linsey, 2002), and became well adjusted adults (Bagwell, et al., 1998). Social skill, as a component of social competence, has been found to be a good predictor of peer acceptance especially by opposite-sex peers (Mostow, Izard, Fine, & Trentacosta, 2002). Specifically regarding gender, there have been mixed findings related to decoding ability and peer acceptance. Several studies found that girls with decoding skills were more popular among their peers (Custrini & Feldman, 1989) and were rated as more socially competent by teachers (Leppanen & Hietanen, 2001), while other researchers found this benefit for both girls and boys (Walden & Field, 1990). The absence of emotional understanding can also have implications for young children. Children, especially boys, who lacked the ability to understand emotional expressions, were found to be more frequently aggressive in later years than children who were better able to understand emotional expression (Denham, et al., 2002). Furthermore, children who are aggressive, or have poor social problem solving skills (Rubin & Clark, 1983), and children who lack emotional decoding skills (Denham, et al., 1990) tend to be less liked by their peers. The formation of stable friendships is an important developmental step for young children (Parker, et al., 1995), and the absence of childhood friendships has been linked to psychological difficulties and aggression. An early meta-analysis concluded that low peer adjustment for young children was related to later criminality, an increased risk for dropping out of school, low peer acceptance and increased aggression (Parker & Asher, 1987). Additionally, peer rejection has been linked to later childhood aggressive behavior (Hymel, 3

9 Rubin, Rowden, & LeMare, 1990), and peer rejection at high levels has been associated with psychopathological symptoms in adulthood (Bagwell, et al., 1998). According to the similarity-attractiveness model, social psychologists posit that we choose to affiliate with others who are similar to ourselves. Does this theory hold true for preschool age children s friendships? According to some research, children tend to affiliate with others who are similar to themselves on some demographic dimension (Duck, 1975; Singleton & Asher, 1979; Strayer, Foot, Chapman, & Smith, 1980). Children and their preferred peers have also been found to be similar in aggression levels (Farver, 1996; Linsey, 2002), and peer acceptance (Linsey, 2002). Additionally, a study of seven year-olds concluded that newly acquainted children were behaviorally similar, particularly in the mental maturity level of play, to their preferred peers (Rubin, Lynch, Coplan, & Rose- Krasnor, 1994). While these researchers have found similarities between children and the peers they choose to affiliate with, others have seen a different pattern. One study found that children who were similar in social skill level were more likely to be friends at toddler age, but that social skill similarity was not as important for preschool friendships (Howes & Phillipsen, 1992). Another important component of social competence is the absence of antisocial behaviors, including aggression. There is some controversy surrounding the antecedents of observable gender differences in physical aggression with some arguing for social pressure, some arguing for biological factors and others arguing for a combination of these factors. It is beyond the scope of the present study to investigate the relative contribution of these antecedents, but our focus will be within a social cognitive theoretical framework (Bussey & Bandura, 1999). Researchers find that girls are socialized to be less aggressive and more 4

10 prosocial than boys and that this socialization comes from many sources including parents, teachers and peers (Keenan & Shaw, 1997). Included in socialization is the enforcement of gender rules, and it has been found that children s teachers are enforcers of gender appropriate behavior (Fagot, 1977). Most studies find that boys are more physically aggressive than girls (for a meta-analysis see Hyde, 1984), and that this difference does not begin to appear until sometime between two and four years of age (Keenan & Shaw, 1994; Prior, Smart, Sanson, & Oberklaid, 1993; Rose, Rose, & Feldman, 1989). Following from this research, we would expect to find gender differences in the present study. In a study of play types, Colwell and Lindsey found that preschool boys who play rough with same-sex peers are better liked by the peer group as a whole than those who do not play rough or those who play rough with opposite-sex peers, but that girls who play rough are not well liked regardless of the sex of the playmate (Colwell & Lindsey, 2005). Our research questions are related to the interaction between social competence and peer friendships. Specifically, our questions are: is there a correlation between children s social competence and the social competence of their preferred peers, are girls with aggressive friends rated as less socially competent by teachers than boys with aggressive peers, are highly socially competent children more accepted by their peers than their less socially competent classmates, and finally, which measure of social competence that we utilize is the most predictive of number of peer acceptance? (1) We anticipate there will be a positive correlation between children s social competence scores and their preferred peers social competence scores. (2) We expect that the preference of aggressive or antisocial peers will have more bearing on girls social competence scores than this preference will have on boys scores as measured by teacher ratings of social competence. Stated simply, it is 5

11 anticipated that girls who prefer more aggressive peers will be rated by teachers (as enforcers of gender appropriate behavior) as less socially competent than boys who prefer aggressive peers. (3) Additionally, we expect to find the greatest peer acceptance in children who are highly socially competent versus those children who score low on the social competence measures. (4) A final question of interest is whether the prosocial and antisocial sub-scales are truly two distinct components of the Multisource Assessment of Childhood Social Competence (MACSC). We plan to examine all 15 items on the MACSC if the statistical methods will permit us to do so. As our final question is exploratory, we do not have a prediction as to whether two distinct components exist in this measure. Several aspects of the proposed study will also be piloted within the design constraints of an ongoing study of social skills in the laboratory of Dr. Joseph Cunningham. Theory regarding social competence advocates for the use of multidimensional measures (Denham, 2006; Rose-Krasnor, 1997). Accordingly, the present study utilized a multidimensional approach, including both frequently used measures of social competence and less traditional measures. The uniqueness of this protocol is in the examination of emotion decoding skills of preschoolers in both facial expressions and body movement. Additionally, to our knowledge, there have been no previous studies that examine the relationship between preferred peer aggression levels and participant social competence scores. Finally, our research questions will allow us to gain a better understanding of the relationship between social competence and peer friendships. With this understanding, researchers, counselors and teachers may be able to modify ideas about the implementation of social skills training programs. 6

12 The current study represents our effort to explore several new hypotheses, as detailed above, within a previously established protocol. We plan to test these hypotheses as thoroughly as possible within the constraints of the existing design; however, certain limitations will prevent some hypotheses from being tested in the most ideal manner. Accordingly, the discussion includes a follow-up proposal which will address those limitations with modifications to the study design. These modifications will primarily consist of the addition of measures that will enable us to test these hypotheses more rigorously. Method Participants Participants were recruited from three preschool centers in the Boston Area, Lemberg Children s Center, Waltham, MA, Eliot-Pearson, Medford, MA and Tufts Educational Day Care Center in Somerville, MA. Study procedures were approved by both the Brandeis University and Tufts University IRBs. Parents were sent a copy of the consent form, which included several questions. Along with giving consent for her/his child to participate, parents were asked to indicate the child s age, race, ethnicity, home language, and the child s involvement with any of the following activities: dance, gymnastics, martial arts, and yoga. In order to be eligible for participation, children had to be at least 48 months old and speak English. Before any study procedures were begun, child assent was obtained by the investigator from each child. We recruited 55 children (27 female, 28 male) who were between 48 and 101 months old (M = SD = 11.68) whose parent or guardian granted her/his child permission to participate and whose children gave verbal assent. The schools 7

13 were compensated with $100 worth of books and toys for their willingness to participate in the study. A summary of participant characteristics can be found in Table 1. The majority of participants had previous experience with using a computer, N = 42 (76.36%), and about a quarter of the participating children spoke English and at least one additional language, N = 14 (25.45%) including: Chinese (n=5), Spanish (n=4), Hebrew (n=2), Russian and Hebrew (n=1), Arabic (n=1), Portuguese (n=1). Parents were asked to indicate all applicable racial categories to which their children belonged and the ethnic and racial make-up of the sample was: Hispanic = 5, White = 38, Asian = 13, Black/African American = 5, other race = 5 and American Indian = 2. The other races indicated by parents were, Indian (2), North African (Moroccan), Jewish, and mixed. Data on previous participation in activities was available for 53 of the 55 participants. Of these children 18 had previous experience with dance (33.96%), 20 with gymnastics (37.73%), 5 with martial arts (9.43%), and 15 with yoga (20.30%). Materials Measures included two decoding tasks, a measure of social problem solving skills, a peer acceptance measure, and a teacher rated measure of social skills. Emotion Decoding. The Expressive Body Movement Identification Task (Boone & Cunningham, 1998) and a facial expression identification task are measures of the emotional understanding component of our social competence definition, and were used to assess children s ability to decode and identify emotion in body movement and in facial expressions. The stimuli for the Expressive Body Movement Identification Task were created by two actors, one female and one male, who were asked to produce expressive body movements based on four target emotions (i.e., happy, sad, fearful, angry). The dance 8

14 performances were filmed, the dancers faces were blurred, and these clips were then digitized into a split-screen format using Macintosh Quadra AV and the Adobe Premiere Software package. The performances were organized into trial-by-trial pairings for the decoding task using a split-screen format which includes one dancer expressing one of the target emotions, and another dancer expressing a foil emotion. Twelve dance pairings were then imported into the behavioral science experimental design program PsyScope. This program randomized the order in which the participants viewed each segment pairing. Participants were asked to identify which dancer was expressing the target emotion. These clips were viewed by participants on a computer screen. Participants received one point for each time she/he correctly identified the target emotion which resulted in possible scores ranging from 0 to 12 for the Expressive Body Movement Identification Task. The stimuli for the facial expression identification task were selected from the NimStim Face Stimulus Set. Development of the MacBrain Face Stimulus Set was overseen by Nim Tottenham and supported by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Early Experience and Brain Development. The facial expression identification task was also presented to participants on a computer screen. On the first screen, children viewed a group of six faces, two faces expressing a single target emotion and four neutral faces. Participants were asked to designate any instances of the target emotion (i.e., happy, sad, angry, fearful) from among the six faces. Each set of six faces was displayed on a single Microsoft Power Point slide. There were eight slides in total, and half of these slides were comprised of exclusively female faces and half of exclusively male faces. These slides were saved as pictures and imported into PsyScope in order to randomize the sequence in which the slides were presented to participants. Participants received one 9

15 point for each time she/he correctly identified a target emotion and each correct rejection of a foil emotion which resulted in possible scores on the facial expression identification task ranging from 0 to 48. Social Skills. The Challenging Situations Task (CST) (Denham, Bouril, & Belouad, 1994) was used to assess social problem solving skills, another component of our social competence definition. The CST is a measure designed to test participant s problem solving skills in several hypothetical situations. The hypothetical situations include a peer knocking down the tower of blocks another child has built, a peer hitting another child on the playground, and a peer stealing a soccer ball from another child. The participants were asked to imagine how the child would feel in the given situation. Possible responses were: happy, sad, angry, okay. The participant was then asked to imagine what the child would do in the given situation. Possible responses included: a sad response, a prosocial response, an aggressive response, and an avoidant response. Then, the participant was asked how the peer would feel in response, and asked what the peer s reaction would be to the hypothetical reaction of the child. Finally, the participant was asked how the other child would feel as a result of the peer s response. The CST has been used without adverse reactions (Coy, Speltz, DeKlyen, & Jones, 2001; Denham, et al., 1994) and has been recommended by as a valid and reliable way to assess social problem solving in preschool age children (Denham, et al., 1994). Participants received four sub-scores on the CST including a prosocial score, an aggressive score, a crying score and an avoidant score which was calculated as the total number of times the child indicated each behavioral reaction to the hypothetical situations. On each subscale, possible scores range from zero to six. For the purpose of this paper, we will focus on only the prosocial and aggressive sub-scores. 10

16 Peer Acceptance. The peer preferences record was used to assess peer acceptance. The investigator asked each child to verbally indicate her/his top three friends to play with and to indicate of these three, which is their absolute favorite friend. Participants were asked to indicate only children in her/his class. This information was recorded on the peer preferences record. Participants were give one point each time a participating child in the class indicated her/him as a friend and two points for being listed as a favorite friend by a participating classmate. This number was then divided by the number of participating children in each classroom to compensate for the varying numbers from each class (class participation ranged from five children to 11 children). Teacher Assessment. Finally, teachers completed the Multisource Assessment of Childhood Social Competence (MACSC) (Junttila, Voeten, Kaukiainen, & Vauras, 2006) for each child who participated in the study. The MACSC was created to measure children s overall social competence as rated by teachers, parents and peers. According to the authors, this 15-item measure contains two subscales that evaluate levels of prosocial (8 questions) and antisocial behaviors (7 questions). The prosocial subscale contains questions related to cooperation (5 questions) and empathy (3 questions), and the antisocial subscale contains questions related to impulsivity (3 questions) and disruptiveness (4 questions). Each item was rated by teachers on a scale of one to four, 1 = never, 2 = rarely, 3 = frequently, 4 = very frequently. Possible scores on the prosocial subscale range from 8 to 32 and from 7 to 28 on the antisocial subscale. Higher scores on both subscales indicate greater levels of prosocial or antisocial behavior. This measure has been found to be a reliable and valid measure of social competence (Junttila, et al., 2006). 11

17 Design and Procedure One of two female investigators (one undergraduate and one graduate student) ran each participant through the study protocol. Data were collected during the spring semester of Once parental consent was obtained, two sessions were scheduled with each participant (sessions were not scheduled on the same day). Participants were randomly assigned to either one of two orders each consisting of two sessions. Children in order A completed the Expressive Body Movement Identification Task followed by the facial expression identification task in session one, and the CST followed by the peer preferences record in session two. Children in Order B completed the CST followed by the peer preferences record in session one, and the Expressive Body Movement Identification Task followed by the facial expression identification task in session two. Before initiation of any study procedures, child assent was obtained by the investigator. Children were taken to a quiet space, separate from their peers, to complete the study procedures. Before beginning the computer session (session 1 in order A, and session 2 in order B) participants were given an opportunity to familiarize themselves with the computer and learn how to use and click the mouse. The majority of children indicated that they had used a computer before (76.36%). Those children who indicated that they have never used a computer were given extra time in order to feel comfortable. Before both the body movement and facial expression tasks, there was a brief practice session where participants practiced clicking on all the apples they could find on the screen. Then participants began the study procedures in either order A or order B. They were given a short 3-4 minute break between the decoding sessions (body movement and facial expression tasks) and also given a short break halfway through the Expressive Body Movement 12

18 Identification Task (after dance clip 6). Participants had the option of coloring or playing with blocks during these short breaks. After the completion of each session, participants were thanked. No debriefing procedures were used. Given the age of the participants, debriefing was not deemed necessary by the investigators because the purpose of the study was fully disclosed to the parents and teachers. Analytic Plan. Hypothesis one stated that children will be similar to their preferred peers on social competence scores. We were particularly interested in comparing participant s scores on the MACSC and CST to that of their preferred peers, but examined scores on the decoding tasks as secondary measures. We used multiple regression to test this hypothesis. Our outcome variable was the social competence score of the participant, and the predictors were; social competence of the preferred peer and participant gender. We were also interested in whether controlling for the dyad being same sex versus mixed sex would contribute to the model. In order to test this hypothesis several preferred peer social competence scores were calculated for each child (one for each social competence measure) using her/his favorite friend s social competence scores. If a child named their favorite friend, and this friend was a nonparticipating child, then she/he was excluded from this particular analysis (n=15 excluded). Models were run for the prosocial and antisocial subscales of the MACSC, the prosocial and aggressive sub-scores on the CST and for both decoding tasks. A stepwise model building method was used in which participant social competence was regressed on favorite friend social competence. Sex of participant was added as a control variable, and if sex significantly contributed to the model, then the interaction between favorite friend social competence and sex of participant was added to the model. The same method was used to 13

19 add, as a control, whether or not the favorite friend and the participant were of the same sex or a mixed sex dyad. Hypothesis two states that there would be a two-way interaction effect of participant gender and the preferred peer's aggression on participant social competence. For hypothesis two we will only use data from participant s same-sex friendships. This hypothesis has a 2x2 factorial design with gender as a between-subjects variable, preferred peer s aggression as a within-subjects variable, and participant social competence as the dependent variable. We plan to use a median split on participants favorite friends CST scores in order to dichotomize favorite friends into high and low aggression groups. Analysis of variance will be used to test this hypothesis. Hypothesis three stated that high social competence will be related to greater peer acceptance. To test hypothesis three we used multiple regression. Our outcome variable was peer acceptance and the predictor was participant social competence score with participant gender serving as a control variable. Six models were built to test this hypothesis, including one for each outcome measure. The model building procedure followed that of hypothesis one. For hypothesis four, we are curious about whether distinct components of the MACSC exist (prosocial vs. antisocial) as is supported by previous research. To test this hypothesis we conducted an exploratory factor analysis. We looked at the 15 items of the MACSC to see which, if any clumped together. These results may prove helpful in determining how to use this measure for social competence testing in the future. 14

20 Results Table 2 presents descriptive statistics regarding the outcome measures. Included are the sub-scores (prosocial and antisocial) for the MACSC, prosocial and aggressive scores on the CST, peer acceptance, and scores on the two decoding tasks (faces and dances). Unless otherwise noted, the differences between girls and boys were non-significant. The average on the prosocial subscale for the MACSC was (SD = 4.84) out of a possible 32, and the mean score for the girls (26.56, SD = 4.53) was found to be slightly higher than that of boys (24.00, SD = 4.87). This difference was significant, t(53) = 2.01, p =.049. The average on the antisocial subscale for the MACSC was (SD = 4.93) out of a possible 28, and the mean score for the girls (11.98, SD = 4.76) was found to be slightly lower than that of boys (13.57) with slightly less variability (SD = 5.04). The average prosocial score for the CST was 2.75 (SD = 2.10), with girls scoring slightly higher (M = 3.19, SD = 2.15) than boys (M = 2.32, SD = 1.93). Mean scores on the CST aggressive scale were in the lower range at M = 1.04 (SD =.1.35). Boys tended to score higher than girls on the aggressive scale with mean scores at 1.57 (SD = 1.60) and.48 respectively (SD =.70). This difference was significant, t(53) = -3.26, p =.002. Overall peer acceptance was.33 (SD =.28). Girls and boys average scores were M =.34, SD =.30 and M =.32, SD =.25 respectively. Finally, children performed well on both decoding tasks. The average score on the facial decoding task was (SD = 6.50) out of a possible 48, and the average score on the body movement task was 9.13 (SD = 1.89) out of a possible 12. On both of these tasks, boys scores were slightly greater than girls (see Table 2 for complete results by gender). Examination of the histograms for the outcome measures revealed that several were skewed. Both the facial expression scores and the aggressive subscale of the CST were 15

21 found to have a skewness statistic greater than one. In order to keep them on a similar scale, both of the emotional decoding scores (facial expressions and body movement) were transformed using a reflected and inverse transformation where the new scores equaled 1 / (K - old variable) with K equaling the largest possible value plus one. Similarly, both aggressive and prosocial subscales of the CST were transformed using a natural log transformation. All of the subsequent analysis was performed using the transformed variables (with the exception of the exploratory factor analysis). With regard to hypothesis one, we found that four of the six models, MACSC prosocial (table 3a), MACSC antisocial (table 3b), CST aggressive (table 3d) and the body movement decoding task (table 3e) were significant. In other words, we were able to predict participant social competence with favorite friend social competence using these four measures and several different combinations of control variables including participant sex, the interaction of favorite friend social competence and participant sex, same sex dyad, and the interaction of favorite friend social competence and same sex dyad. The final and bestfitted models are shown in bold. The best fitted model used the prosocial sub-scale of the MACSC (table 3a). For the testing of this model, one outlier was removed. The key question variable was favorite friends prosocial score on the MASCSC and control variables included participant sex, same sex dyad. Significant interactions in this model were favorite friend score/participant sex and favorite friend score/same sex dyad. This model was significant, t(33) = 3.33, p =.002, and explained 49 percent of the variability in participant social competence as measured by the prosocial sub-scale. 16

22 The second model utilized the antisocial sub-scale of the MACSC (table 3b). This model was also significantly predictive of participant social competence, t(36) = -2.37, p =.02. The model controlled for participant sex and same sex dyad, and it predicted 17 percent of the variability in participant social competence. Model three tested the predictability of participant prosocial behavior by favorite friend prosocial behaviors as measured by the prosocial sub-scale of the CST (table 3c). This model was not significant and remained non-significant when the control variables, participant sex and same sex dyad, were added to the model. Additionally, the interactions of these control variables with the main question variable (favorite friend social competence) did not contribute to the model. The next model found to be significant utilized participant and favorite friend social competence scores on the aggressive sub-scale of the CST (table 3d). The key question variable was favorite friends aggressive score on the CST and control variable was participant sex. The interaction of favorite friends aggression and sex of participant did not significantly contribute to the model. This model was significant at t(37) = 2.39, p =.02, and explained 14 percent of the variability in participant social competence on this particular measure. Participant social competence, as measured by the expressive body movement task, was predicted by favorite friend body movement scores (table 3e). This model was significant at t(37) = 2.71, p =.01 and predicted 17 percent of the variability in participant score. The addition of control variables and interactions did not significantly contribute to the model. 17

23 Finally, favorite friend scores on the facial expression identification task did not predict participant scores on this measure (table 3f). Furthermore, the addition of control variables only minimally increased the R 2 for this particular model. We were unable to test hypothesis two with the present dataset due to the low occurrence of aggressive responses on the CST from both boys and girls. When a median split was performed on the CST aggressive sub-scale, the median score was zero. Using the seventy fifth percentile and above was also considered, but even these participants tended to score low on aggressive responses. Additionally, this method would shrink the sample for the aggressive female group considerably (females = 27, females with favorite friend participating = 19, top seventy-fifth percentile on CST aggression, n = 5). While hypothesis two is not tested here, the discussion provides a solution to examining this hypothesis empirically in the future. The testing of hypothesis three required that models be built do determine whether social competence could reliably predict peer acceptance. These models all included participant sex as a control variable (see table 4 for a summary). None of our social competence measures were found to predict peer acceptance: 1) prosocial sub-scale of MACSC, t(52) =.03 p =.97, 2) antisocial sub-scale of MACSC, t(52) = -.27 p =.79, 3) prosocial sub-scale of CST, t(52) = -.23 p =.82, 4) prosocial aggressive scale of CST, t(52) = -.39 p =.70, 5) expressive body movement, t(52) = -.29 p =.77, 6) facial expressions, t(52) = -.48 p =.64. To test hypothesis four, the 15 items of the MACSC were subjected to principal component analysis (PCA). Prior to performing the PCA the suitability of the data for factor analysis was assessed. Review of the correlation matrix revealed that most of the 18

24 coefficients were above.3. The Kaiser-Meyer-Oklin value was.87 which exceeds the recommended value of.6. The Bartlett s Test of Sphericity was statistically significant (<.001) which also supports the factorability of the correlation matrix. Principal component analysis showed the presence of two components with eigenvalues exceeding 1, explaining 61.20%, and 12.95% of the variance respectively. At the same time, a review of the screeplot (figure 1) revealed a clear break after the first component but it was decided to retain the two components for further analysis. To aid in the interpretation of these two components, Oblimin rotation was performed. The rotation solution showed both components with a few strong loadings but with several variables loading on both components. The two component solution explained a total of 73.78% of the variance, with component one contributing 46.26% and component two contributing 27.52%. See table 5 for complete results. Discussion The data collected support our previous prediction that participants would be similar to her/his friends on social competence scores. Interestingly, this hypothesis was not supported by all six of our social competence measures. The data only partially replicates previous findings on prosocial similarities between friends (Linsey, 2002; Rubin, et al., 1994) but fully supports previous studies on antisocial/aggressive similarities (Farver, 1996; Linsey, 2002). Hypothesis one was supported by teacher ratings of prosocial and antisocial behavior, the aggressive sub-scale of the CST, and the body movement decoding task. This is the first study, to our knowledge, that has looked at the relationship between nonverbal decoding, as a measure of social competence, similarity among friends, so it is important to note that one of our decoding tasks supports our hypothesis that children are similar to their friends. It is 19

25 possible that there is something special about the prosocial sub-scale of the CST and the facial expression decoding task that would result in friends differing on these measures, but this seems less likely because the other prosocial and decoding measures used in the study supported the relationship. Rather, it seems more likely that with greater numbers of participants, this hypothesis would be fully supported by the range of social competence measures that were used. There were also some children who we were forced to exclude from the testing of this hypothesis because her/his favorite friend did not participate in the study. With greater numbers of participants, there would also be an opportunity to add to the models additional demographic characteristics as control variables, including participant age, ethnicity/race and knowledge of other languages. As has been found in previous research (Duck, 1975; Singleton & Asher, 1979; Strayer, et al., 1980) it is possible that children are affiliating with others based on some demographic characteristics as opposed to affiliating because of similarities in social skill. While hypothesis one was supported, the data do not support our third hypothesis that social competence would reliably predict peer acceptance. This finding is surprising given that previous researchers have found support for the relationship between social competence and peer acceptance (Custrini & Feldman, 1989; Denham, et al., 1990; Leppanen & Hietanen, 2001; Linsey, 2002; Mostow, et al., 2002; Rubin & Clark, 1983; Vaughn, et al., 2000; Walden & Field, 1990). It is possible that with a greater number of participants this relationship would have been supported by the study, but it is more likely that the constraints of the study design played a large role in our findings. The major weakness in the study design testing this hypothesis was in the method of measuring peer acceptance. The present study used an open ended nominations method of assessing peer acceptance. Each child was 20

26 asked to verbally report three friends she/he liked in the classroom and were also asked who of these three was her/his favorite friend. Participants were then given one point for each time they were named a friend and two points for being named as a favorite friend. This score was then divided by the number of participating children in the classroom The main problem with this method is that not all children in each classroom participated, so it is possible that with the input of the entire class, these peer acceptance scores would have been much different. The final question that we evaluated was related to whether there were two distinct components of the MACSC. The results of our factor analysis do not convince us that there are two distinct components. From our data, it appears that the MACSC may not be as strong when used as two separate subscales but we draw this conclusion tentatively because our data had two weaknesses. The first of which was a small sample size. It is typically recommended that a sample size of at least 150 is achieved before using factor analysis, but our sample size was only 55. Additionally, if sample sizes are below 150 it is recommended that correlation coefficients are around.8. Our data were also lacking this aspect of the recommendations. Future Directions There are several protocol changes that would improve our evaluation of these hypotheses. First, we would aim to recruit entire classrooms for participation. This would improve our evaluation of the relationship between participant and preferred peer social competence scores. Unfortunately, due to the design constraints, we were unable to evaluate hypothesis two. Accordingly we would propose several changes to the protocol to accommodate for the testing of this question. 21

27 The most important change to the protocol would be the addition of an observational method of assessing participant aggression. The problem with using the CST aggression subscale as a measure of aggression is that children are taught that hitting others and being aggressive is bad, so it is possible that when interviewing a child, she/he will be unlikely to report to an investigator that she/he would behave in a way that she/he has been told is not appropriate. What we found was that the majority of children had no aggressive responses on the CST. In order to address this issue, we would add the Play Observation Scale (POS) to the protocol. The POS would give us a behavioral measure of aggression that we believe will be more reliable than the CST. The POS has been used in previous studies with young children and has been found to be valid and reliable (Hymel, et al., 1990; Rubin, et al., 1994). We also propose to add a sociometric measure that has been supported by previous research (Linsey, 2002; Vaughn, et al., 2000). Briefly, participants will be shown photographs of all the children in their classroom. The investigator will ask the participant to identifiy three children that she/he likes to play with and three children the participants does not like to play with. This will serve as the evaluation of reciprocated friendships. Participants will then be asked to sort all the photographs of their classmates into three bins. Each bin will be labeled with a face. The first bin will have a smile and children will be instructed to place the photos of the classmates that they like to play with into this bin. There will also be a bin labeled with a neutral expression and one with a sad expression. Children will be asked to put into these binds the photographs of children they sometimes like to play with and do not like to play with respectively. The addition of this measure would aid in the evaluation of the first three hypotheses, and this measure would address the problems with the Peer Preferences Record that have been previously discussed. 22

28 Implications Examining our research questions within a protocol with the above modifications will allow us to gain a better understanding of the relationship between social competence and peer friendships. With this understanding, researchers, counselors and teachers may be able to modify ideas about the implementation of social skills training programs. Additionally, we may find that teacher ratings are biased estimates of children social competence because they are influenced by the aggression of children s friends. 23

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