Children's representations of relationships with mothers, teachers, and friends, and associations with social competence

Abstract

This study describes the use of story stems in order to determine children's representations of relationships with mothers, teachers, and friends, and how these representations are related to mother- and teacher-rated social competence. Thirty preschool-aged children were administered the story stem tasks featuring three different interactional partners, which were then coded for quality of the portrayed relationship. Mothers and teachers were also asked to rate children's social competence. Findings suggest that children generally have similar, but not identical, working models of their relationships with mothers and teachers which are related to internal working models of their relationships with friends. Furthermore, elements of children's narratives about teachers and friends were related to teacher's ratings of children's social competence. Findings from this study demonstrate the dynamic and interactive nature of children's representations of relationships with their mothers, teachers, and friends.

Keywords:

• attachment
• narratives
• peer relationships
• representations
• teacher–child relationships
• social competence

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Carollee Howes, Alison Bailey, Sandra Graham, and John Schumann for their assistance in critiquing this manuscript, as well as the families who participated in this research.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Funding

This research was supported in part by the FPR-UCLA Center for Culture, Brain, and Development Dissertation Year Fellowship.

Notes on contributor

Jennifer A. Vu is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Studies at the University of Delaware. Her research areas include young children's social– emotional development and affiliative relationships.