Emotional development is essential for children, as it enhances their social interactions and cognitive functions and affects their self-expression. The purpose of the article by Alwaely et al. is to explore how degrees of emotional adaptation can be predicted via one’s family structure, peer relations, age, and sex (Alwaely et al., 2020). The paper also allows people to comprehend how emotional intelligence can be perceived, measured, and affected positively in early childhood. The subject is essential for early childhood educators due to its contribution to pattern recognition of various types of behavior and their associated issues among children (Santrock et al., 2021). Therefore, exploring this topic allows future professionals to comprehend how their actions can help children become more emotionally intelligent in their life.
The article utilizes a wide variety of sources for its background evidence while binding them to the study of early childhood social capabilities. The authors use the Emotional Matching Task to investigate the subject and combine its results with children’s family status, age, and sex (Alwaely et al., 2020). This article relates to one of the core concepts in Child Life Competencies guidelines – the necessity for an assessment of developmental needs – by articulating critical aspects of one’s relationships that must be prioritized during analysis (Association of Child Life Professionals, 2019). Moreover, this article connects with the competence of providing play opportunities in a child’s cognitive and emotional development by revealing how educators can assess the quality of their students’ social interactions during such activities. In addition to this association, the authors explore aspects that correlate with Vygotsky’s theory of cognitive development, which also recognizes language development as a major contribution to one’s healthy maturation (Santrock et al., 2021). Overall, the authors’ methods are correct for the task they set, as it enables them to examine children’s social activities and compare them with underlying causes for the observed outcomes.
The paper develops a strong case in favor of children’s mental assessment through their relationships. The article links social interactions with both peers and relatives to a child’s emotional development, providing a set of positive and negative factors affecting this characteristic (Alwaely et al., 2020). The authors advance their field of study by highlighting the correlation of a multitude of factors involved in early childhood education. It might be necessary to perform further research on the subject of blended families’ impact on their children’s emotional development since the analyzed paper takes into account only nuclear families and single parents. Moreover, studies may contribute to this article’s findings by highlighting the progression of one’s social relationships over time and the value of each factor outlined by Alwaely et al. In addition to the article’s conclusions, it is possible to perceive that single-parent families require additional support for their children’s psychological needs in order to compensate for the gap between outcomes.
In conclusion, the article by Alwaely et al. gives valuable insight into factors affecting a child’s emotional development. Now I comprehend the necessity to assess child-parent relationships for healthcare professionals, as they can perceive deficiencies in children’s social interactions. The idea of observations of one’s peer-peer interaction experiences in different situations that can reveal one’s ability to adapt to others’ behaviors and attitudes is especially valuable for my future work. Early childhood educators must be able to recognize patterns in their students’ communication that suggest the direction of their future development, including issues and deficiencies.
References
Alwaely, S. A., Yousif, N. B., & Mikhaylov, A. (2020). Emotional development in preschoolers and socialization. Early Child Development and Care, 191(16), 2484–2493. Web.
Association of Child Life Professionals. (2019). Child Life Competencies. Web.
Santrock, J. W., Deater-Deckard, K. D., & Lansford, J. E. (2021). Child development: An introduction (15th ed.). ‎McGraw Hill.