Observed Shyness-Related Behavioral Responses to a Self-Presentation Speech Task: A Study Comparing Chinese and Canadian Children.

Past research suggests that expressions of shyness are associated with several distinct behaviors that may differ between Eastern and Western cultures. However, this evidence has largely been derived from subjective ratings, such self-, teacher-, and parent-report measures. In this study, we examined between-country differences on measures of directly observed shyness-related behaviors during a speech task in children.

Siblings at home: Moderating influence of sibling presence and composition on the relation between problem behaviors and Theory of Mind in early childhood.

Despite the prevalence of internalizing and externalizing difficulties in children, the impact of these problem behaviors on the development of important social cognitive skills, such as Theory of Mind (ToM), is not well-understood. Indeed, many studies that have explored relations between problem behaviors and ToM report inconsistent findings. A possible reason for these disparities may be a lack of accounting for social protective factors within the home, such as the presence and number of siblings.

Age-related differences in behavioral problems between shy adults and shy children.

Although both concurrent and longitudinal relations between shyness and behavioral problems are well-established in childhood, there is relatively less work exploring these associations in emerging adulthood. In addition, age-related differences in the strength of these relations in child and adult samples have not been fully explored within the same study. We collected measures of shyness, internalizing and externalizing behaviors, and social problems in a sample of 94 typically developing 6-year-old children (50 female; M = 78.

Observed shyness leads to more automatic imitation in early childhood.

The authors investigated children's automatic imitation in the context of observed shyness by adapting the widely used automatic imitation task (AIT). AIT performance in 6-year-old children (N = 38; 22 female; 71% White) and young adults (17-22 years; N = 122; 99 female; 32% White) was first examined as a proof of concept and to assess age-related differences in responses to the task (Experiment 1). Although error rate measures of automatic imitation were comparable between children and adults, children displayed less reaction time interference than adults.

Helping as prosocial practice: Longitudinal relations among children's shyness, helping behavior, and empathic response.

Although shyness has been found to be a concurrent constraint on young children's empathy and instrumental helping, there is limited evidence to suggest that this temperamental profile has longitudinal effects on prosocial behaviors. Here, we examined the concurrent and longitudinal relations between children's shyness and prosocial behaviors, as well as the intervening impact of instrumental helping behavior on later empathic response in typically developing children (N = 86; 45 female). Shyness was coded from direct observations and reported by parents at Time 1 (M = 54.

Differences in Established Joint Attention in Hearing-Hearing and Hearing-Deaf Mother-Child Dyads: Associations With Social Competence, Settings, and Tasks.

The authors examined relations among observed joint attention, maternal report of child's social competence, setting (home vs. laboratory), task (unstructured vs. semi-structured), and dyad type [hearing mother-hearing child (n = 55, M  = 25.

Getting to the heart of childhood empathy: Relations with shyness and respiratory sinus arrhythmia.

Although prior studies have found that shyness and empathy are inversely related and that well-regulated children tend to express empathic behaviors more often, little work has assessed combinations of these factors in predicting affective and cognitive empathy in early childhood. The authors examined relations among shyness, resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and observed affective and cognitive empathy in a sample of 130 typically developing children (M  = 63.5 months, SD = 12.

Preschoolers' Social Cognitive Development in the Age of Screen Time Ubiquity.

Is screen time exposure a double-edged sword for children's social cognitive development among today's children? We conducted a short-term prospective longitudinal study of 57 typically developing children ( = 54.7 months, standard deviation = 2.5 months; 27 female) to examine the association between quantity of screen time exposure during the preschool years (Time 1; age 4) and social cognitive outcomes 1 year later (Time 2; age 5), coinciding with the time of formal school entry.

Shyness, aggression, and empathy in children of shy mothers: Moderating influence of children's psychophysiological self-regulation.

Maternal psychological factors are known to play a critical role in children's socioemotional development, particularly in pro- and anti-social behaviors. Although shyness is a ubiquitous phenomenon and associated with social anxiety, relatively few have examined the relation between maternal shyness and children's socioemotional development. We explored the moderating influence of children's resting respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) and RSA change on the relation between maternal shyness and children's shyness, empathy, and aggression in 129 (62 males) typically developing 4- (n = 81) and 6- (n = 48) year-olds.