Shy Children Research Articles

The Influence of Shyness on Language Assessment.

The goal of this study is to examine how shyness affects a child's performance on language assessments that vary in sociability. We hypothesized that accuracy on language tasks would be driven by shyness such that shyer children would perform better on nonsociable tasks compared to sociable tasks. The procedures followed a quasi-experimental design. One hundred twenty-two participants, ages 17-42 months and varying in their temperament, each underwent a series of three language tasks. The order of tasks was randomized, and each task varied in the social interaction required: a looking task, a pointing task, and a production task. Data were collected via Zoom, and parents reported their child's shyness level via the Early Child Behavior Questionnaire. Shyness was compared with participants' accuracy across the three tests while controlling for age and vocabulary percentile. There were significant differences in children's performance across the tasks, with respect to shyness. Shyer children performed worse on the production task compared to less shy children. All children did well on the pointing task regardless of shyness level, but performance was more nuanced on the looking task such that shyer children were at times more accurate but also less likely to respond in general. As shown by these results, shyer and less shy children respond differentially to methods of language assessment that vary in sociability. It is important for clinicians to acknowledge shyness when choosing an appropriate assessment of children's language. Future direction includes assessing performance on standardized assessments. https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.23845521.

Developmental patterns of children's shyness: Relations with physiological, emotional, and regulatory responses to being treated unfairly.

The dysregulation of social fear has been widely studied in children's shyness, but we know little about how shy children regulate during unfair treatment. We first characterized developmental patterns of children's shyness (N = 304, ngirls = 153; 74% White, 26% Other) across 2 (Mage = 2.07), 3 (Mage = 3.08), 4 (Mage = 4.08), and 6 (Mage = 6.58) years of age. Data collection occurred from 2007 to 2014. At age 6, the high stable group had higher cardiac vagal withdrawal and lower expressed sadness and approach-related regulatory strategy than the low stable group when being treated unfairly. Although shy children may be more physiologically impacted by being treated unfairly, they may mask their sadness to signal appeasement.

Temperamental shyness and children's communicative behaviours in a goal-oriented task: A dyadic perspective

Communicative abilities play a crucial role in children's social success and, for shyer children, protect against socio-emotional maladjustment. Despite communication being highly reciprocal, research on the dyadic influences of children's shyness on their own and their partner's communicative behaviours is limited. Addressing this gap, children (Mage = 10.07 years; N = 338) were paired with a same-sex and same-age, unfamiliar peer and completed two puzzle tasks wherein one child (“instructor”) could only see the puzzle, while the other child (“listener”) could only move the pieces. Children's communicative behaviours were observed, with children switching roles between trials. Shyer instructors verbalized fewer instructions and received less encouragement from listeners during puzzle one. During puzzle two, shyer instructors verbalized fewer instructions and received more responses from listeners, while shyer listeners verbalized less encouragement. Findings provide insight into how temperamental shyness influences interactions within a structured communicative setting.

Emotion dynamics among preadolescents getting to know each other: Dyadic associations with shyness.

The way children express and respond to emotions when they first meet is crucial to friendship initiation. But for highly shy children, these exchanges are particularly challenging. Existing research is based on individual and total frequency measures of emotion that do not reflect the transactional and dynamic nature of emotions in real-life peer interactions. We examined how shyness and dyadic similarity in shyness influence children's moment-to-moment dyadic emotion sequences with a new peer. Thirty age- and gender-matched dyads (Mage = 10.13 years, 75.8% White) were observed during an unstructured "getting to know you" task. Children's shyness was assessed through parent- and child-report. Using grid-sequence analysis (Brinberg et al., 2017) we identified three dyadic emotion clusters: Flexible and Shared Positive Affect (60%), Flexible and Shared Neutral Affect (35%), and Stable and Shared Negative Affect (17%). Children in the Stable and Shared Negative Affect cluster were rated higher in shyness relative to children in the Flexible and Shared Positive Affect cluster. Further, children more similar in shyness to their dyadic partner displayed more stable negative and neutral affect expressions than children who differed in shyness from their partner. Together, these findings suggest that shyness is related to less positive and less flexible emotion expressions when meeting a new peer, holding critical implications for friendship initiation among children varying in shyness. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Children's shyness, emotional intelligence, and internalizing behaviors

Although previous studies have shown that shyness is a risk factor for internalizing behaviors, not all shy children are affected to the same extent, suggesting possible moderating factors. Emotional intelligence (EI) may be one factor that is protective against internalizing problems for some shy children. EI is a socio-cognitive skill that helps individuals understand and use their emotions, and the emotions of others, to achieve goals. Here we examined whether EI moderated the relation between children's shyness and internalizing behaviors. Participants were 115 school-aged children (Mage = 8.84 years, SD = 0.44 years, 49 girls). Parents completed online questionnaires about the child's shyness, EI, and internalizing behaviors. We found that EI moderated the relation between shyness and internalizing behaviors. Specifically, shyness was positively related to internalizing behaviors for children with low EI, but unrelated to internalizing behaviors for children with high EI. These findings suggest that EI may play a protective role against internalizing behaviors for some shy children in middle childhood.

Latent profiles of children's shyness: Behavioral, affective, and physiological components.

Shyness can manifest on behavioral, affective, and physiological levels, but little is known about how these components cluster. We coded behavioral expressions of avoidance/inhibition, collected self-reported nervousness, and measured cardiac vagal withdrawal in 152 children (Mage =7.82 years, 73 girls, 82% White) to a speech task in 2018-2021. A latent profile analysis using these behavioral, affective, and physiological indicators revealed four profiles: average reactive (43%), lower affective reactive (20%), higher affective reactive (26%), and consistently higher reactive (11%). Membership in the higher reactive profile predicted higher parent-reported temperamental shyness across 2 years. Findings provide empirical support for the long-theorized idea that shyness might exist as an emotional state but also represents a distinct temperamental quality for some children.

Children's shyness and physiological arousal to a peer's social stress.

Previous work has shown that children's shyness is related to personal anxiety during social stress, but we know little about how shyness is related to anxiety during a peer's social stress. Children (Mage =10.22 years, SD=0.81, N=62) were paired with an unfamiliar peer and engaged in a speech task while electrocardiography was recorded. We modeled changes in children's heart rate, a physiological correlate of anxiety, while they observed their peer prepare and deliver a speech. Results revealed that the observing child's shyness related to increases in their heart rate during their peer's preparation period, but modulation of this arousal was sensitive to the presenting peer's anxious behavior while delivering their speech. Specifically, if the presenting child displayed high levels of anxious behavior, the observing child's shyness was related to further increases in heart rate, but if the presenting child displayed low levels of anxious behavior, the observing child's shyness was related to decreases in heart rate from the preparation period. Shy children may experience physiological arousal to a peer's social stress but can regulate this arousal based on social cues from the peer, which may be due to heightened social threat detection and/or empathic anxiety.

Traumatic Experience in the Novel "The Perks of Being a Wallflower

This research investigates an experience of past trauma experienced by the main character in the novel The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky's. Charlie as the heroine, a 17-year-old boy, has just entered high school. . He is the youngest of a family of three, two boys, one girl He is a very quiet and shy child who makes him have no friends. Her strangeness made friends at her school bully her. The researchers' goal is to investigate the main symptoms of trauma and describe the trauma experiences in this novel. The researcher's method is descriptive qualitative. Supporting data sources include the novel The Perks of Being a Wallflower, online journals, theses and articles. The author refers to individual psychological theories that are used to analyze data. From the results of the author's analysis, that there are trauma experiences in the past that require him to find people to tell stories about the problems he is facing

The role of early social play behaviors and language skills for shy children's later internalizing difficulties in school.

Research has demonstrated links from early childhood shyness to socioemotional problems later in life. This longitudinal study explored the role of early social play behaviors and language skills in the associations between childhood shyness and later internalizing and language difficulties in school. Participants were N = 7,447 children (50.1% girls) from the Norwegian Mother, Father, and Child Cohort Study (MoBa). Latent direct, indirect, and interaction path analyses were performed within a structural equation framework. Results showed that mother-rated childhood shyness from age 18 months to age five years was associated with mother-rated internalizing difficulties and language problems at age eight years. Lower levels of teacher-reported social play behaviors and poorer language skills in preschool increased the risk of later anxiety problems among shy children, whereas higher levels of language competencies and social play behaviors buffered against later anxiety problems. The study identifies some of the early risk and protective factors that may influence shy children's socio-emotional functioning and adjustment.

Homage to a Picture Bride

Homage to a Picture Bride Garrett Hongo (bio) When years were long with labor in the sugarfields,I sought a wife, at last, choosing her from a photograph.She was but fifteen, a shy child of a bridewrapped in faded kimono, as I likewise was wrapped in wind,a man of thirty, weathered by work in the green seasof cane, my savings finally enough to take my wedding vows. Before then, it was to the coming world that I made vowsto wrest a new life from the earth and leave the fieldsso I might cast my eyes without sorrow from mountains to the sea,never again to falsify who I was in a photographas though I were a clerk or a saddler, sheltered from the constant winds,the image I'd sent, a deception to my young bride. She was young but daily growing, my new bride.We stood on the pier and took our vows,and I led her to the North Shore, its mountains torn by winds,below them the rippling green fieldsof cane stretching all the way to the sea,a landscape no one would care to photograph. [End Page 328] Before we left, someone took a photograph—this laborer and downcast picture bridehalf his age at their dockside ceremony of vows—staged before a background of slate-gray seasand the small curls of waves tossed by winds,impassive faces resigned to a hard life in the canefields. We were destined never to leave the fields—my wife gave birth to a son we did not photographas, before he could cry, he was taken by the windthat came betrothed as his own promised bride,journeying from the Afterworld over storm-tossed seas,our mortal dreams of a better life all but disavowed. She herself died within a year of our vowsand so finally escaped the sugarfields,a ghost in flight, ha-alele-hana, over the dread seasthat never would be captured in a photograph,so that, ever after, only resolve would be my brideand my mourning cloak a coat of harsh winds. Only the wind knows my sorrows now, whatever vowsmy bride and I made are forever lost in the sugarfields,this photograph the one moment we lived apart from life's cold seas. [End Page 329] Garrett Hongo Garrett Hongo was born in Volcano, Hawai'i, and grew up in Los Angeles. His latest books are The Perfect Sound: a Memoir in Stereo and a forthcoming collection, The Ocean of Clouds: Poems. He is the recipient of the 2022 Aiken Taylor Award in Modern American Poetry, and he teaches at the University of Oregon in Eugene. Copyright © 2023 The University of the South

Examining the influence of shyness on children's helping and comforting behaviour.

Shy children, who tend to feel anxious around others and withdraw from social interactions, are found to be less prosocial than their not-shy peers in some studies, though not in others. To examine the contexts in which shy children may be more or less likely to engage in prosocial behaviour, we compared children's willingness and ability to intervene during in-person tasks that differed in social engagement demands and complexity, factors that have been conflated in past research. We presented 42, 3.5- to 4.5-year-old children with prosocial problems that varied, in a 2 x 2 within-subjects design, by the type of intervention required (i.e., simple helping or complex comforting) and the source of the problem (i.e., social: within the experimenter's personal space; or object: a target object distanced from her). Most of the children acted prosocially, with little prompting, in the two helping tasks and in the object-centered comforting task. In contrast, fewer than half of the children acted prosocially in the social-centered comforting task. Shyer children were not less likely to intervene in any of the four tasks, but they were slower to intervene in the object-centred comforting task, in which the experimenter was upset about a broken toy. Thus, providing social-centered comfort to a recently-introduced adult is challenging for young children, regardless of shyness, though shy children do show hesitancy with object-centered comforting. Further, these findings provide insights into the methodological challenges of disentangling children's prosocial motivation and understanding, and we propose solutions to these challenges for future research.

Prenatal exposure to air pollution and childhood internalizing problems: roles of shyness and anterior cingulate cortex activity.

Prenatal exposure to air pollution increases the risk for psychiatric disorders characterized by internalizing problems. In this study, we examined the roles of shyness and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) activity in the association between prenatal exposure to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH) and children's internalizing problems at 7-9 years old. Participants include 53 children (31 girls, 22 boys). Personal air monitoring was conducted over 48 continuous hours during the third trimester of pregnancy to measure 8 PAHs. Mothers reported children's shyness (Emotionality Activity Sociability Temperament Survey) at age 5 and internalizing problems (Child Behavior Checklist) at ages 7-9. ACC activity was measured by fMRI during the Simon Spatial Incompatibility task at ages 7-9. Shyness mediated the association between prenatal PAH exposure and internalizing problems. Higher prenatal PAH exposure predicted increased shyness, which in turn predicted greater internalizing problems. Moreover, left ACC activity during the Simon task moderated the association between prenatal PAH exposure and internalizing problems. Prenatal PAH exposure predicted increased risk for internalizing problems only when children showed heightened left ACC activity during the resolution of cognitive conflict. Our study innovatively synthesizes the fields of developmental psychology and environmental health science to offer new insights into the risk factors for anxiety disorders. Facilitating the development of healthy reactive and regulatory processes may improve the developmental outcomes for children highly exposed to air pollution.

Developmental changes in the structure of shyness and internalizing symptoms from early to middle childhood: A network analysis.

Shyness is a temperamental trait that shares considerable conceptual overlap with aspects of internalizing problems, creating difficulties in operationalizing and assessing these two constructs and their association. This study addresses these issues by employing network analyses. Participants were, white, N=555 children (Mage =52.45 months, SD=15.96, 55% girls) followed longitudinally over 4 years (2016-2010) in Norway. Teachers rated child shyness and assessed children's internalizing symptoms. Results suggest that two behavioral shyness traits were the most central aspects of shyness. The centrality of these aspects was robust across age. The most influential symptom connecting internalizing symptoms with shyness was "unhappy." Shyness became more differentiated with development, and associations between anxiety-related symptoms and shyness increased as children entered formal schooling.

Shyness subtypes and associations with social anxiety: A comparison study of Canadian and Chinese children.

Previous research has shown that there are distinct types of children's shyness within eastern and western cultures, with different origins, developmental courses, and outcomes. However, the measures used to examine children's shyness in eastern contexts have been developed almost exclusively in the North American context. Whether shyness subtypes and their predictive associations are conserved between western and eastern cultures on a children's shyness measure developed in an eastern context is an empirical question. Here we examined (a) whether two subtypes from the Chinese Shyness Scale (i.e., anxious and regulated) were identified in a western context, and (b) whether cultural context moderated the relation between the two subtypes of shy behavior and a widely used western characterized social anxiety measure. The participants were children aged 3-5 years from China (Mage=4.46 years, SD=0.64, n=182, 53.8% boys) and Canada (Mage=3.99 years, SD=0.82, n=201, 42.3% boys). The results indicated that the two shyness subtypes and the one-factor social anxiety construct were identified in both cultures. Subsequently, latent moderation structural equation modelling revealed that anxious shyness was significantly and positively related to social anxiety in children from both countries, but more strongly in Canada. Conversely, regulated shyness was significantly and positively related to social anxiety in Canadian children, but not in Chinese children. Findings are discussed regarding possible cultural explanations for why the relations between two Chinese shyness subtypes and social anxiety are different in Chinese and Canadian contexts and their implications to understanding cross-cultural differences in developmental shyness. RESEARCH HIGHLIGHTS: Two subtypes of shyness (anxious and regulated shyness) reported in China were identified in both China and Canada Country/culture moderated the relation between shyness subtypes and social anxiety Anxious shyness was positively related to social anxiety in both countries Regulated shyness was positively related to social anxiety in Canadian children, but not in Chinese children.

On becoming socially anxious: Toddlers' attention bias to fearful faces.

Early attention bias to threat-related negative emotions may lead children to overestimate dangers in social situations. This study examined its emergence and how it might develop in tandem with a known predictor namely temperamental shyness for toddlers' fear of strangers in 168 Chinese toddlers. Measurable individual differences in such attention bias to fearful faces were found and remained stable from age 12 to 18 months. When shown photos of paired happy versus fearful or happy versus angry faces, toddlers initially gazed more and had longer initial fixation and total fixation at fearful faces compared with happy faces consistently. However, they initially gazed more at happy faces compared with angry faces consistently and had a longer total fixation at angry faces only at 18 months. Stranger anxiety at 12 months predicted attention bias to fearful faces at 18 months. Temperamentally shyer 12-month-olds went on to show stronger attention bias to fearful faces at 18 months, and their fear of strangers also increased more from 12 to 18 months. Together with prior research suggesting attention bias to angry or fearful faces foretelling social anxiety, the present findings point to likely positive feedback loops among attention bias to fearful faces, temperamental shyness, and stranger anxiety in early childhood. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).

Peranan Guru dalam Mengatasi Anak Pemalu di RA Darussalam Pangandaran

Shy children are one of the attitudes that often occur in every school. Shame in children is a negative emotion that can have a negative impact on children's social and emotional development. One of the developments that can be hampered is lack of self-confidence, not wanting to hang out with friends and being a quiet person. In the research that we conducted at RA Darussalam, there were some shy children. The research was conducted at RA Darussalam in August 2022. The method used was the conversational method. This study aims to describe the role of teachers in shy children. The results of the observations show that there are shy children in grades A and B. What we can do as practical teachers in dealing with shy children are; 1) Approach the child to talk to. 2) Look at him when he talks and get the child to look at us. 3) Ask him what he likes 4) Ask him what he wants at the time.

Narrando experiências de estágio em Educação Física na Educação Infantil: a timidez e agressividade em foco

O presente estudo tem como objetivo analisar vivências pedagógicas realizadas no Estágio Curricular Supervisionado em Educação Física na Educação Infantil, da Universidade Federal do Tocantins, na cidade de Tocantinópolis (TO). Trata-se de um relato de experiência, de natureza descritiva e com abordagem qualitativa, no qual utilizou-se o diário de campo como instrumento de registros de informações. O aporte teórico-metodológico que pavimentou a pesquisa está ancorado na Sociologia da Infância. A análise dos registros empíricos está organizada em duas etapas: 1- caracterização geral da experiência de estágio em uma pré-escola do município; 2- notas sobre as vivências observadas, com enfoque na timidez e agressividade das crianças. As vivências realizadas se mostraram efetivas, com a adesão e a participação das crianças ao longo do estágio, inclusive, as que se mostraram resistentes na etapa inicial de imersão no campo. Conclui-se que tal experiência possibilitou ao estagiário a aquisição de novos conhecimentos sobre as infâncias, sobretudo, em relação a timidez e agressividade das crianças. Palavras-chave: estágio, educação física, educação infantil. Narrating internship experiences in Physical Education in Early Childhood Education: shyness and aggressiveness in focus ABSTRACT. This study aims to analyze the pedagogical experiences carried out in the Supervised Curricular Internship in Physical Education in Early Childhood Education, at the Federal University of Tocantins, in the city of Tocantinópolis (TO). This is an experience report, descriptive in nature and with a qualitative approach, in which the field diary was used as an instrument for recording information. The theoretical-methodological contribution that paved the research is anchored in the Sociology of Childhood. The analysis of the empirical records is organized in two stages: 1- general characterization of the internship experience in a preschool in the city; 2- notes on the observed experiences, focusing on shyness and aggressiveness of children. The experiences carried out proved to be effective, with the adherence and participation of the children throughout the internship, including those who were resistant in the initial stage of immersion in the field. It is concluded that this experience enabled the intern to acquire new knowledge about childhood, especially in relation to shyness and aggressiveness in children. Keywords: internship, physical education, child education. Narrar experiencias de prácticas en Educación Física en Educación Infantil: timidez y agresividad en el foco RESUMEN. Este estudio tiene como objetivo analizar experiencias pedagógicas realizadas en el Internado Curricular Supervisado en Educación Física en Educación Infantil, en la Universidad Federal de Tocantins, en la ciudad de Tocantinópolis (TO). Se trata de un relato de experiencia, de carácter descriptivo y con enfoque cualitativo, en el que se utilizó como instrumento de registro de información el diario de campo. El aporte teórico-metodológico que pavimentó la investigación está anclado en la Sociología de la Infancia. El análisis de los registros empíricos se organiza en dos etapas: 1- caracterización general de la experiencia de pasantía en un preescolar del municipio; 2- apuntes sobre las experiencias observadas, centrándose en la timidez y agresividad de los niños. Las experiencias realizadas demostraron ser efectivas, contando con la adherencia y participación de los niños a lo largo de la pasantía, incluso de aquellos que se resistieron en la etapa inicial de inmersión en el campo. Se concluye que esta experiencia permitió al pasante adquirir nuevos conocimientos sobre la infancia, especialmente en relación a la timidez y agresividad en los niños. Palabras clave: pasantía, educación física, educación infantil.

Age-related differences in behavioral problems betweenshy adults and shy children.

Although both concurrent and longitudinal relations between shyness and behavioral problems are well-established in childhood, there is relatively less work exploring these associations in emerging adulthood. In addition, age-related differences in the strength of these relations in child and adult samples have not been fully explored within the same study. We collected measures of shyness, internalizing and externalizing behaviors, and social problems in a sample of 94 typically developing 6-year-old children (50 female; Mage = 78.3months, SD = 3.1months) and 775 undergraduate students (633 female, Mage = 18.2years, SD = 0.9years) from parent-reported and self-reported questionnaires, respectively. Shyness interacted with age in predicting internalizing behaviors and social problems, but not externalizing behaviors. Specifically, shyness was concurrently and positively related to internalizing and social problems in young adulthood, but this relation was not found in childhood. Findings are discussed in terms of developmental consequences of shyness across the lifespan and limitations of relying on ratings from different informants when examining age-related differences.

Shyness and Socio-Emotional Adjustment in Early Childhood in Mainland China: Exploring the Roles of Maternal Parenting Practices and Beliefs about Shyness

Shyness and Socio-Emotional Adjustment in Early Childhood in Mainland China: Exploring the Roles of Maternal Parenting Practices and Beliefs about Shyness

유아기 기질의 종단적 프로파일과 학령 초기 학교 적응

This study identifies patterns of change in temperament among infants aged 2 to 4 years old, and investigates the relationships between such patterns and school adjustments in the first grade of elementary school. Five distinct latent classes for patterns of change in children’s temperament emerged through latent profile analysis using three-year data from the Panel Study on Korean Children (N = 1,869): a) inactive & shy child (13.5%), b) decreasing activity & mild child (44.0%), c) highly emotional & unsociable child (13.4%), d) decreasing emotionality & highly sociable child (14.7%), and e) emotional & sociable child (14.4%). Significant associations with the five profiles of temperament were found for both gender and birth order of the children. Only the inactive & shy child class had more girls than boys; 47.1% of the children in the highly emotional & unsociable child class were the second child, while all other classes had more first children. Each child in the inactive & shy child class had a higher level of adjustment to school life than those in the highly emotional & unsociable child and the decreasing emotionality & highly sociable child classes when the children were seven years old. As for academic achievement, children in the decreasing activity & mild child class, in the decreasing emotionality & highly sociable child, and in the emotional & sociable child class exhibited more adjustments than those in the highly emotional & unsociable child class. Among the sub-domains of school adjustment, peer adjustment and teacher adjustment for the first grade of elementary school did not have significant associations with longitudinal profiles of temperament. The findings indicate that temperament through early childhood predicts adjustment to school life and academic achievement at an early school age.