Children's enacted interpersonal strategies: their relations to social behavior and negative emotionality

Abstract

Examined were the relations of children's responses to hypothetical social problem situations with use of an enactive (puppet) procedure to (a) children's general social behavior at school, (b) behavior in potential social conflict situations (i.e., when angered and reactions to interpersonal problems as rated by adults), and (c) temperamental characteristics (i.e., emotional intensity and negative affect) that previously have been related to children's social competence. Children's enacted friendliness and aggression (primarily for boys) were consistently correlated with behavior in problem contexts; they were not significantly correlated with their general social behavior. Girls' enacted assertiveness was associated with high levels of social interaction and negative modes of coping with problems