Functioning of social skills from middle childhood to early adolescence in Hungary

Abstract

The aim of this cross-sectional study was to describe the social skills that crucially affect
\nchildren's social behaviour in the school. Our objective was to gather information about
\nthe functioning of social skills from middle childhood to early adolescence. The sample
\nconsisted of 7-, 9- and 11-year-old Hungarian students (N=1398). Based on Stephens’s
\n(1992) list of social skills, a 54-item Likert-type questionnaire (teacher-, parent- and selfreport
\nversions) was developed especially for this purpose. The child and the adult
\nversions share the same structure and scale items. The results show no spontaneous
\ndevelopment at the level of social skills between the ages of 7 and 11. There was a
\nmoderate correlation between the three evaluators’ judgements concerning the level of
\nchildren’s social skills. All three respondent groups indicated that girls’ social skills
\nwere slightly more developed than boys’. Teachers, however, perceived this difference
\nto be twice as large as the other two raters. To sum up our results indicate that for a large
\npercentage of participants, the acquisition of social skills has not been completed at 11
\nyears old. This finding indicates that more attention should be paid to fostering social
\nskills early at school.