The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship among empathy, social support, social competence of children. The subjects were 331 fourth and sixth grade students in elementary schools in Busan and Gyeongsangnam-do. The Empathy Scale develo...
The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship among empathy, social support, social competence of children. The subjects were 331 fourth and sixth grade students in elementary schools in Busan and Gyeongsangnam-do. The Empathy Scale developed by Shin(1994) was used to assess empathy. The Social Support Scale developed by Han(1996) was used to assess social support. The Social Competence Scale developed by Park(1998) was used to assess social competence. Data were analyzed by Cronbach's alpha, frequencies, percentiles, means, standard deviations, two-way ANOVAs, Pearson's correlations and stepwise multiple regression analysis. In testing all hypotheses, .05 was used as a significant level.
The major findings were as follows:
1. There were significant gender and grade differences in children's empathy. The results indicated that girls showed greater empathy than boys did and the sixth graders showed greater empathy than the fourth graders did.
2. There were significant gender differences in children's social support from friends and teachers. In addition, there was a significant grade difference in children's social support from family.
3. There was no significant gender or grade difference in children's social competence. However, significant interaction effect was found in children's social competence on leadership; boys showed significantly higher scores at grade 6, but girls showed significantly lower scores at grade 6.
4. Children's social competence was related to children's empathy and social support. There were significant positive associations among children's empathy, social support and social competence. Specifically, children with greater empathy showed higher outgoing behavior, interpersonal adjustment, social participation, leadership and popularity. In addition, children with greater social support from friends, family and teachers showed higher outgoing behavior, interpersonal adjustment, social participation, leadership and popularity.
5. Children's empathy and social support from friends, family and teacher predicted social competence.