What do children with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties think about themselves in early childhood?

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to discover what kind of perceptions young children in need of social, emotional, and behavioural support have about themselves. The interest was especially in social and emotional self-perceptions. For this study, ten children attending Finnish early childhood education and care were interviewed in spring 2016 and the material was analysed by using thematic analysis. Several developmental characteristics, typical for children aged 4–7 years, were found in the analysis such as general positivity of self-perceptions. However, the children’s perceptions also included atypical and negative features which manifested in various ways. Based on these features, four self-perception types were formed to describe the levels of positivity and negativity as well as the different features typical for each child and for each self-perception type. The results and possible explanations of the findings are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Social
• emotional
• and behavioural difficulties (SEBD)
• early childhood education and care (ECEC)
• self-concept
• self-perceptions

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. In this study, we use the concept of social, emotional, and behavioural difficulties as in Finland the concept of socio-emotional difficulties is used to refer emotional and behavioural difficulties.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

M. H. Heinonen

Marianna Heinonen is a project researcher at the University of Turku, Finland. She graduated from the University of Turku with master degree in Education in 2017 and started as a doctoral student in 2018. She is currently working in a research project that concerns the development of social and emotional competencies in toddlerhood. Her doctoral thesis focuses on the self-perceptions of children with SEBD and the perceptions of ECEC professionals concerning the children with SEBD.

P. M. E. Pihlaja

Päivi Pihlaja PhD, special teacher, is an adjunct professor (docent) and a senior researcher at the University of Turku, Finland. Her research interests are related both to early childhood education and special education. Currently, she is leading a research project in which inclusive education and co-teaching are being studied. She is also leading research, e.g. EduSteps –longitudinal study, which is part of a large multidisciplinary study (https://sites.utu.fi/hyvan-kasvun-avaimet/). One study that has started is Toddler-study (https://sites.utu.fi/toddlerstudy/). In this study social-emotional competence and difficulties are in focus. She has supervised doctoral students and has been teaching at the University of Turku in special education studies and in special teacher education.