Social Skills of Kindergartners Predict Future Success
The July 2015 American Journal of Public Health published a 20-year longitudinal study that looked at the impact of the social skills of kindergarteners on their future success and well-being.
Study Conclusion
"Early social and emotional skill development is linked to adolescent and adult wellbeing."
“This research study shows us that young children with more developed social competence skills are more likely to live healthier, successful lives as adults through the education and jobs they attain and their overall quality of life. Building on existing research that shows links between social-emotional development and outcomes in adulthood, this study helps make a stronger case for recognizing children’s social competence as an essential building block in any Culture of Health.”
As parents are the single most significant factor
in the social competencies that their children develop,
effective parenting skills are critical to the
health and well-being of individual children,
the adults they will become, and our society as a whole.
In this study, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation:
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The teachers used a five - point scale (from "not at all" to "very well"), to assess the following five social competencies of 753 individual students:
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Resolves peer problems
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Listens to others
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Shares materials
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Cooperates
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Is helpful
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The survey population was a random sampling of kindergartners from Durham, NC; Nashville, TN; Seattle, WA; and a group of towns in central Pennslyvania
For further detail on this study: http://www.rwjf.org/en/library/research/2015/07/how-children-s-social-competence-impacts-their-well-being-in-adu.html