This exploratory study examined whether temperament, home
environment, and family stress impact the amount of prosocial behavior
displayed by pre-school age low-income children and examined how much
of an impact each factor has. Each factor was explored in depth along sub-scale
dimensions including, (1) self-regulatory temperament, negative
reactive temperament, and positive reactive temperament, (2) physical
environment, emotional environment, and learning environment, and (3)
family stress due to financial difficulties, interpersonal tension, and child
problems. This study applied a combination microsystem, mesosystem,
exosystem, and macrosystem person-process-context model to explore the
role these factors played.
Subjects were 35 low-income pre-school age children who were
enrolled in the Oregon Head Start Pre-kindergarten Program at Oregon
State University. The Children's Behavior Questionnaire: Short Form, the
Early Childhood Home Inventory, the Family Events Checklist, and the
Modified Prosocial Behavior Questionnaire were used to obtain information
about the relationship between the factors and prosocial behavior.
Results indicated that the physical aspects of the home environment
tended to positively contribute to the production of prosocial behavior and
that family stress due to financial difficulties tended to negatively contribute
to the production of prosocial behavior by low-income pre-school age
children. This study did not establish that temperament was significantly
related to prosocial behavior.
These results have implications for those who are responsible for
shaping children's behavior, such as teachers, parents, and home visitors by
providing specific areas of focus for impacting behavior. These findings
also support programs such as the Oregon Head Start Pre-kindergarten
Program because it provides a venue through which impacts can be made. / Graduation date: 2000
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:ORGSU/oai:ir.library.oregonstate.edu:1957/33193 |
| Date | 15 September 1999 |
| Creators | Vale, Elizabeth |
| Contributors | Sugawara, Alan I., Burt, Linda |
| Source Sets | Oregon State University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis/Dissertation |
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