Paths to Safer Schools: Effectiveness of the Roots of Empathy Program in Promoting Emotional Underst

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Paths to Safer Schools Effectiveness of the
Roots of Empathy Program in Promoting Emotional
Understanding and Reducing Aggression Among
Primary Grade Children

• Kimberly A. Schonert-Reichl, Veronica Smith, Anat
  Zaidman-Zait, Helen Novak, Denise Buote
• University of British Columbia

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Evaluation Hypotheses and Research Questions

• ROE Goal One To foster childrens emotional
  competence particularly their empathy,
  emotional understanding, and understanding of
  human relationships.
• Evaluation Hypothesis When compared to children
  in a comparison group, children in the ROE
  program will experience significant positive
  changes in their ability to explain emotions,
  generate strategies for dealing with emotions in
  others, and emotion knowledge.
• ROE Goal Two To promote the development of
  more caring (i.e., prosocial) and less aggressive
  (i.e., antisocial) behaviours.
• Evaluation Hypothesis Children in the ROE
  program, compared to comparison children, will
  show positive changes in behaviour (i.e., more
  prosocial behaviour, less antisocial/aggressive
  behaviour).

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Participants

• 137 children primary grade children participated
• ROE Program, n 76 (45 boys, 31 girls)
• Comparison Group, n 61 (37 boys, 24 girls)
• Children were drawn from 5 ROE Program classrooms
  and 5 comparison classrooms
• Mean age 6.93 years
• 60 ESL (majority Chinese)
• Comparison classrooms were matched with the
  program classrooms as close as possible with
  respect to grade, gender, and race/ethnicity
  composition. No significant differences were
  found on any of these variables.

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Evaluation Measures

• Capacity for Empathic Involvement
• Crying Baby (Yau, 1999 Zahn-Waxler et al, 1993)
• Elicits emotion language (why do babies cry?)
  and emotion strategy knowledge (what can you do
  to help a crying baby?).
• Emotion Understanding
• Conflicting Emotions Task (Brown Dunn, 1996)
• Assesses childrens understanding of ambivalent
  emotions in others (Bike story, Movie story).
• Socio-perspective coordination
• The Relationship Questionnaire Interpersonal
  Understanding subscale (Schultz Selman, 2000).
• Social Behaviours
• Modified version of the Child Behaviour Scale
  (Ladd Profilet,1996) Teacher ratings.
• Aggressive Behaviours (conduct problems,
  proactive, reactive, and relational aggression)
• Prosocial Behaviours
• Asocial Behaviours
• Hyperactivity/distractible
• Anxious/fearful

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Procedures

• Parental permission was obtained for all
  participants (overall participation rate, 70).
• All child measures were individually administered
  to children at pre-test and post-test in sessions
  of approximately 45 minutes in a quiet room in
  their school.
• Teachers completed the modified version of the
  Child Behavior Scale at pre-test and post-test.