Children’s Social-Emotional Development

Social-emotional development focuses on the child’s expression of, experience with, and management of emotions, as well as the child’s ability to interact with others, including the child’s social [Page 315]behavior and relationships with peers. There is growing recognition that children’s socio-emotional development has consequences not only for children’s long-term adjustment and mental health but also for children’s success in school. Therefore, factors that relate to children’s acquisition of social and emotional skills, including both environmental and biological influences, are an important research topic. Gender, of course, is one factor that has been explored by researchers as an important variable that influences children’s socio-emotional development. Overall, the findings regarding gender and children’s socio-emotional development are mixed; whereas there are clear gender differences in some domains (e.g., ...