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DC Field | Value | Language |
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dc.contributor.advisor | Schmidt, Louis | - |
dc.contributor.author | MacGowan, Taigan | - |
dc.date.accessioned | 2021-09-30T03:08:02Z | - |
dc.date.available | 2021-09-30T03:08:02Z | - |
dc.date.issued | 2021 | - |
dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/11375/26933 | - |
dc.description.abstract | Shyness is an anxious preoccupation with the self in real or imagined social situations, and can be expressed situationally and temperamentally. Although state and trait shyness have been previously examined in the context of social cognitive outcomes such as Theory of Mind (ToM) and prosocial processes in early childhood, relatively little work has considered 1) the role of self-regulatory capacity in these relations, and 2) the longitudinal and transactional relations between shyness and prosocial behaviors. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 of this dissertation include empirical investigations that aim to address these gaps in the literature. In Chapter 2, I contextualized the previously reported positive relation between expressions of positive shyness and ToM by revealing that this relation may only exist in children with relatively high physiological self-regulatory capacity, as measured by baseline respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA). Similarly, in Chapter 3, I demonstrated that only children with high temperamental shyness and low baseline RSA appear to experience the performance deficits that lead to relatively lower cognitive empathic response. Finally, in Chapter 4, I reported a longitudinal relation between early shyness and later affective empathic response. This study also detected a mediating influence of instrumental helping on this longitudinal relation. Collectively, these studies extend and further contextualize relations between individual differences in shyness and developing social cognitive outcomes in early childhood. This dissertation also considers and explores heterogeneity in types of shyness, expressions of state shyness, and prosocial behaviors; highlighting that not all shy children experience similar outcomes and not all children express shyness in the same way. | en_US |
dc.language.iso | en | en_US |
dc.title | SHYNESS AND SOCIAL COGNITIVE PROCESSES IN EARLY CHILDHOOD: BIOLOGY, HETEROGENEITY, AND DEVELOPMENT | en_US |
dc.type | Thesis | en_US |
dc.contributor.department | Psychology | en_US |
dc.description.degreetype | Dissertation | en_US |
dc.description.degree | Doctor of Science (PhD) | en_US |
dc.description.layabstract | Shyness is an anxious preoccupation with the self in real or imagined social situations, and can be expressed situationally and temperamentally. Individual differences in children’s state and trait shyness have been previously examined in the context of self-other understanding and prosocial behaviors, such as helping and empathy. However, we know relatively little about how shyness affects these behaviors over time or at different levels of children’s self-regulation. This dissertation provides evidence that more adaptive expressions of shyness can be beneficial for children’s self-other understanding in the context of high self-regulation. However, children’s understanding of others’ negative emotions can be constrained by temperamental shyness in the context of low self-regulation. Finally, early temperamental shyness can have long-term, rather than concurrent, effects on later empathic functioning. Collectively, this dissertation contextualizes relations between individual differences in shyness and developing social outcomes in early childhood. | en_US |
Appears in Collections: | Open Access Dissertations and Theses |
Files in This Item:
File | Description | Size | Format | |
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MacGowan_Taigan_L_2021Aug_PhDPsychology.pdf | 1.21 MB | Adobe PDF | View/Open |
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