Behavioral observation of prosocial behavior and social initiative is related to preschoolers' psychopathological symptoms.

Laura Huber,Maria Plötner,Julian Schmitz,Helena R. Slobodskaya

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0225274

Abstract

Current research on preschool-age psychopathology suggests specific impairments in the two domains of social competence–prosocial behavior and social initiative–in children with externalizing and internalizing symptoms. While behavioral observation methods have been largely neglected in the past, they may extend the predominating questionnaire-based assessment as they allow for a precise and objective assessment of children’s social behavior. In this study, we aimed to investigate whether prosocial behavior and social initiative measured in a limited resource task are related to externalizing and internalizing symptoms in a preschool-age community sample (N = 117, M = 4.67 years, SD = 2.75 months, females = 57). Externalizing and internalizing symptoms were rated by teachers (n = 109) and parents (n = 77) using the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire and by children using the Berkeley Puppet Interview (n = 97). Reduced prosocial actions were related to children’s higher ratings of externalizing symptoms, while reduced social initiative actions were related to parents’ higher ratings of internalizing symptoms. Prosocial behavior in the behavioral task was a marginally significant positive predictor of internalizing symptoms from children’s perspective. These results highlight the value of behavioral observation measures and contribute to our understanding of interpersonal deficits already related to psychopathology at preschool age.

Highlights

Acquiring social competence is seen as a major developmental task and a central component of healthy functioning as early as preschool age [1, 2] and it can be defined as the ability to appropriately balance one’s own needs in conjunction with those of others [3, 4]
We aimed to investigate whether prosocial behavior and social initiative measured in a standardized behavioral observation task are related to externalizing and internalizing symptoms in preschoolers
The behavioral observation measure of prosocial behavior was not significantly associated with the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and Berkeley Puppet Interview (BPI) ratings of prosocial behavior

Summary

Introduction

Acquiring social competence is seen as a major developmental task and a central component of healthy functioning as early as preschool age [1, 2] and it can be defined as the ability to appropriately balance one’s own needs in conjunction with those of others [3, 4]. Recent research has demonstrated that social competence has positive effects on a variety of domains in children’s lives, such as academic achievement, quality of peer relations, conflict management skills, and life satisfaction [2, 5,6,7]. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript

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