Leiden University Student Repository

Floor, Milou Cornelia Maria (2013)

De relatie tussen taalvaardigheden en sociale cognitie bij kinderen van 4 tot en met 8 jaar

Master thesis | Education and Child Studies (MSc)

This study was designed to examine the relationship between language skills and social cognition of children aged four to eight years. Language skills and social cognition are two abilities that are important for the development of social skills (Beauchamp & Anderson, 2010). Besides this relationship we looked if the variables gender and educational level of the parent affect the language skills and social cognition of children. Until today only a few similar studies were done. In this study were 372 kids, of which 172 girls and 200 boys between the age of 4-8 years. To measure the productive language skills the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale or Intelligence-III-NL (WPPSI-III-NL) Vocabulary and Developmental Neuropsychological Assessment-II-NL (NEPSY-II-NL) Word Fluency Test are used. To measure the receptive language skills the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF) Understanding Sentences is used. The CELF pragmatics list measures language in everyday life....Show moreThis study was designed to examine the relationship between language skills and social cognition of children aged four to eight years. Language skills and social cognition are two abilities that are important for the development of social skills (Beauchamp & Anderson, 2010). Besides this relationship we looked if the variables gender and educational level of the parent affect the language skills and social cognition of children. Until today only a few similar studies were done. In this study were 372 kids, of which 172 girls and 200 boys between the age of 4-8 years. To measure the productive language skills the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale or Intelligence-III-NL (WPPSI-III-NL) Vocabulary and Developmental Neuropsychological Assessment-II-NL (NEPSY-II-NL) Word Fluency Test are used. To measure the receptive language skills the Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF) Understanding Sentences is used. The CELF pragmatics list measures language in everyday life. Social cognition is measured by means of a cognitive task, the Social Cognitive Skills Test, and a questionnaire, the Social Responsiveness Scale. The results of this study show a weak to moderately strong positive correlation between language skills and social cognition. Also girls showed higher scores in understanding sentences than boys. Finally, in social cognition we only found a positive relationship between the educational level of the partner and the social cognition in everyday life. There was no relationship found between language skills and the educational level of the parents.Show less

Social cognition

language

social skills

Author

Floor, Milou Cornelia Maria

Faculty

Faculty of Social & Behavioural Sciences

Specialisation

Clinical child and adolescent studies

Supervisors

Dekker, Marielle C.

ECTS Credits

20

Language

nl