Cao, Xinyi; (2024) Callous-Unemotional (CU) Traits, Disruptive Behaviour, and Teacher-Child Interaction in Chinese Preschool Children. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

Preview

Text Cao_thesis.pdf - Other Download (2MB) | Preview

Abstract

Conduct problems (CP) are common in early childhood and can exert a significant negative impact on children, their peers, and teachers. While abundant evidence indicates that children with CP can be subtyped based on the presence of high callous-unemotional (CU) traits, characterized by low empathy, remorse, guilt, and a lack of concern about performance, most research on CU traits in the school context has been conducted with older children and adolescents in Western countries. Therefore, the current thesis aimed to explore the links between CU traits and school environmental factors in the Chinese preschool context. This thesis comprises three studies. The first study is a qualitative study on teachers’ perceptions of differences between children with CP who have high versus low levels of CU traits, particularly in response to teacher rewards, discipline, instructional methods, and the quality of teacher-child and teacher-caregiver relationships. Teachers perceived children with high CU traits as having more severe CP, poorer quality relationships with teachers and caregivers, and being less responsive to discipline. In the second study, teacher-child interactions regarding teacher use of and child responses to rewards, discipline, and instructional methods were observed during classroom activities. The findings indicated that CU traits were not related to children’s responses to discipline, nor did CU traits moderate the relationship between instructional methods and children’s academic engagement. However, higher CU traits predicted a greater frequency of one-to-one teacher-child interaction. The final study validated a newly developed questionnaire assessing children’s responses to common classroom rewards used by teachers. This study found that teachers observed no significant difference in children’s responses to different types of rewards. The measure demonstrated good reliability and validity. The findings of this thesis may aid in the development of school-based interventions aimed at promoting engagement and prosocial behaviour in children with CU traits.

Download activity - last month

Export as CSVXMLJSON

Download activity - last 12 months

Export as JSONCSVXML

Downloads by country - last 12 months

Export as XMLCSVJSON

Archive Staff Only

View Item