Rix, Katie, Maras, Pamela and Monks, Claire ORCID: 0000-0003-2638-181X (2014) Exploring children’s explanations for their own peer-directed behaviour at school between the ages of four and seven years old. In: The 23rd Biennial Meeting of the International Society for the Study of Behavioural Development (ISSBD) Conference, 8-12 July, 2014, Shanghai, China.

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Abstract

Aggression, pro-sociality and withdrawn behaviour are all behaviours shown by young children at school. Research has illustrated that the frequencies of some of these behaviours, as reported by children themselves, as well as teaching staff and peers, alter over time. Linked to this and the numerous correlates of these behaviours, is the importance of understanding why children behave in these ways and whether this forms a similar pattern. This presentation will consider the results of a UK based, three phase, fifteen month longitudinal study conducted from April 2012 to July 2013 with two groups of children across five schools. The first group consisted of 141 children at the end of in their reception year, aged four and five, at phase 1, followed through to ages five and six at the end of year 1. The second was 142 children at the end of Year 1, ages five and six, followed through to ages six and seven at the end of Year 2. Children were asked to report on the frequency of their own behaviour, on a three point scale of lots, sometimes and never, before being asked to provide an explanation for displaying and/or not displaying this behaviour towards their peers at school. Responses were coded to consider themes, as well as agents (those responsible for the child’s behaviour and explanation), targets (those affected by the child’s behaviour and explanation) and whether children or more concerned by the cause or consequence of their actions. Analysis has demonstrated unique findings related to children’s explanations, with children seeing themselves as being more responsible for certain behaviours such as sharing, but other children more responsible for their behaviours such as passive withdrawal. This presentation considers these responses across four categories of peer-directed behaviour: aggression, ringleader behaviour, pro-sociality and withdrawn behaviour and discusses the findings related to the cohort as a whole (n=285) and the changes that occur over the fifteen month period for these children, as well as providing comparisons for the two age cohorts. Finally, the presentation will examine whether the trends within each analysis (cross-sectional and longitudinal) are synonymous with the other.

Item Type:	Conference or Conference Paper (Paper)
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Early school, Aggression, Withdrawn behaviour, Prosocial behaviour
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group:	Faculty of Education, Health & Human Sciences > Applied Psychology Research Group
Related URLs:	Organisation
Last Modified:	21 Nov 2017 10:35
URI:	http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/13606

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