1.2 From Emotions and Feelings to Socio-emotional Skills

Social emotional competence refers to the ability to use social and emotional skills and knowledge to be resourceful, adapt to, respect, and work well with others, and take personal and collective responsibility. Furthermore, Social-Emotional competence involves an individual's ability to express, receive and manage emotions as well as their effectiveness in forming and maintaining relationships, and in general interactions.

Denham (2019) describes emotional competence into these core aspects:

o  emotional expressiveness: refers to specific emotions shown, with varying purposefulness, by children (e.g., happiness, sadness, anger, fear, and empathy/love), and the overall rate of such expressiveness, across emotions

e.g., positive affect is important in the initiation and regulation of social exchanges; sharing positive affect may facilitate the formation of friendships, and render one more likable

o  understanding of emotions: refers to children’s knowledge about the emotions of themselves and others, including comprehension of basic emotions, their expressions, situations, causes, and consequences; and discernment of display rule usage, mixed emotions, and more complex emotions (e.g., guilt and shame)

e.g., if a preschooler sees one peer bickering with another, and correctly deduces that the peer suddenly experiences sadness or fear rather than intensified anger, she may comfort her friend rather than retreat or enter the fray

o  regulation of emotion and behavior: when its experience is too much or too little for themselves, or when its expression is too much or too little to fit with others’ expectations, by using physical, cognitive, and/or behavioral strategies to dampen or amplify internal emotional experience and/or external emotional expression.

e.g., play with peers is replete with conflict, this developmental focus demands emotion regulation; initiating, maintaining, and negotiating play, and earning acceptance, all require preschoolers to “keep the lid on”

Since it is in the continuous interaction between individual and context that the child learns to regulate better their emotions and relate in a competent way (Denham, 2006), the mentioned emotional skills contribute to social competence (Denham, 1998; Saarni, 1999). Numerous research studies show that a relationship with a consistent, caring adult who actively promotes the development of these dimensions is essential for healthy social-emotional outcomes in young children. In general, positive emotion in the family is associated with children’s own positive emotions, with the converse true for negative emotion or lack of emotion (Denham, 2019). For example, family positive expressiveness also promotes emotion knowledge, perhaps because positive feelings render children more open to learning and problem solving (Denham, 2019).