AGGRESSIVE BEHAVIORVolume 38, pages 150–165 (2012)

Feeling and Thinking of Others: Affective and CognitiveEmpathy and Emotion Comprehension inProsocial/Hostile PreschoolersCarmen Belacchi1∗ and Eleonora Farina2

1University of Urbino, Human Sciences, Urbino, Italy2University of Milano Bicocca, Human Sciences for Education, Milan, Italy

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This study aims at investigating the affective and cognitive components of empathy in relation to both emotion comprehensionand prosocial/hostile behaviors in preschoolers. A total of 219 children (54% boys; aged between 3 and 6: mean age 4.10) and20 teachers (two for each class: group A and group B) took part in this research. Pupils’ empathy and hostile/prosocial roleswere assessed by teacher reports [Belacchi and Farina, 2010] and children’s emotion comprehension by a nonverbal test [Test ofEmotion Comprehension: Pons and Harris, 2000; adapted by Albanese and Molina; 2008]. As expected, the results showed asignificant influence of gender, with girls being more empathic than boys, according to all of the teachers’ perception. Contraryto our expectations, no systematic age influence emerged. Regarding the relations of children’s emotion comprehension with bothempathy measures and their prosocial/hostile attitudes, we have found: (1) a low significant relation with the total empathy measure,according to all the teachers, but with the cognitive empathy only according to teachers B; (2) a robust negative relationship ofboth affective and cognitive empathy with Hostile roles and with Outsider role, contrary to a positive correlation of only affectiveempathy with Prosocial roles. No relationships emerged between empathy measures and Victim role. Aggr. Behav. 38:150–165, 2012.C© 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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Keywords: affective and cognitive empathy; emotion comprehension; prosocial and hostile behavior; preschool age

INTRODUCTION

Empathy has been defined as a multidimensionalconstruct, including both affective and cognitive com-ponents. The first regards the experiencing of otherpeople’s emotions [Mehrabian and Epstein, 1972],whereas the second deals with the ability to un-derstand others’ perspective on emotional situations[Hogan, 1969]. Both components are essential to re-spond adequately to the emotional-expressive behav-ior of others. Empathy is regarded as a basic apti-tude for the development of emotional competence,in particular, for the promotion of social bonds, de-spite some differences in stressing the importance ofits cognitive or affective aspects [Saarni, 1999]. Chil-dren’s empathic behavior, in both its affective andcognitive components, emerges and develops duringpreschool years [Eisenberg et al., 1990; Radke-Yarrowet al., 1983] and has its precursors in children’s at-tentiveness to emotional-expressive cues and in the“emotion contagion” effect, detected in early infancy[Fischer et al., 1990]. Strayer [1987] described the de-velopment of empathy from a less-than-conscious re-

sponsiveness to other persons’ emotional-expressivebehavior during early infancy to the emergence of cor-rect self-other boundaries in school years. It has beenempirically proved that, by 18 months of age, tod-dlers begin to make simple, but appropriate, attemptsto comfort another person in distress [Dunn, 1988;Zahn-Waxler and Radke-Yarrow, 1982]. By the endof the second year of age, most toddlers comprehendthe causes of others’ distress, and begin to enact moresophisticated interventions to placate—or torment—them [de Rosnay et al., 2008; Dunn and Munn, 1985;Zahn-Waxler et al., 1992]. Actually, this developmen-tal pattern is confirmed by the mental state talk, theparticular form of speech characterized by terms re-ferring to mental states. From 24 months of age, chil-dren spontaneously refer to psychological states in

∗Correspondence to: Carmen Belacchi, Department of Human Sci-ences, Via Saffi, 15, University of Urbino, Urbino 61029, Italy. E-mail:carmen.belacchi@ uniurb.it

Received 5 May 2011; Accepted 1 November 2011

Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com).DOI: 10.1002/ab.21415

C© 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Empathy and Emotion Comprehension in Preschoolers 151

order to explain people’s behavior [Dunn and Brown,1993; Wellman, 2002]. Independently of categoriesof inner state talk (emotional or cognitive), longi-tudinal studies indicate that children initially referparticularly to their own internal world and, onlystarting from 5 to 6 years old, they are also able torefer to others’ mental states [Brown and Dunn, 1996;Hughes and Dunn, 1998]. This latter ability seems tobe crucial for the development of a theory of mind[Hughes et al., 2007].

Several empirical evidences acknowledged a strongrelationship between high levels of empathy andprosocial behavior and between lack of empathy andaggressive and antisocial behavior particularly in pri-mary school children and in adolescents. Very fewstudies have investigated what happen in preschoolage.

The main aim of the present study is to explorethe affective and cognitive components of empathy inpreschoolers with respect both to their emotion com-prehension and to their tendency to assume prosocialand hostile behaviors.

EMPATHY AND PROSOCIAL/HOSTILE BEHAVIOR

Prosocial behavior includes all the acts aimingat promoting others’ well-being, such as assistance,comfort, cooperation, while hostile behaviors areaimed at offending or attack others [Mussen andEisenberg-Berg, 1977; Tani, 1991]. In particular, in theliterature on bullying in which participants can showdifferent behaviors, we define as prosocial all kinds ofaltruistic behaviors, that is, any conducts aimed at ma-terially or psychologically helping victims; whereas,hostile behaviors all kinds of direct or indirect ag-gression aimed at harming weaker peers [Olweus,1993].

The relationship between empathy and prosocialbehavior has been traditionally studied both in theframework of cognitive development and in relation-ship to moral thinking.

From a cognitive point of view, the awareness ofaspects featuring emotional experiences is crucial inorder to promote empathic responses to emotionalevents. Strayer [1989], in her analysis of empathic be-havior from infancy to late adolescence, proved thatindividuals’ abilities to mentally represent emotion-eliciting events or people’s internal states have a cru-cial impact on their empathic responses. This is alsoproved by the research on children’s empathy in rela-tion to prosocial behavior [e.g., Belacchi, 2008; Eisen-berg, 1992; Eisenberg and Fabes, 1998; Hoffman,2000; Kurtines and Gewirtz, 1991].

Studies by Cialdini et al., [1997] with adolescentssupported the idea that empathy facilitates the projec-tion of self into the other distressed person, resultingin a sort of self-interested prosocial behavior. On theother hand, other studies prove that empathy elicitsgenuine altruistic behavior, promoting active supportfor the victim, in different developmental phases (inuniversity students: Batson et al., 1997; in adolescents:Gini et al., 2007, 2008; in primary school children:Belacchi, 2008]. From a developmental point of view,Saarni [1999] tried to reconcile these two visions, as-suming that the self-other merging finds its originsin the early attachment relationship [Zahn-Waxler,1991] and is crucial for an early sense of empathy andcaring. With age, the concern for others’ well-beingbecomes more autonomous and the projection intoothers’ feelings and beliefs is not necessary.

Hoffman [1982, 2000] studying the link between em-pathy and early moral development, found that a situ-ation of moral injustice may elicit—in the observer—asense of personal responsibility, which could turn intoa feeling of guilt over inaction. Therefore, empathy isviewed as a precondition for the development of jus-tice belief systems, moral judgment, and altruistic be-havior [Eisenberg, 1986; Eisenberg et al., 1983]. Somerecent findings evidenced that preschoolers are alsoable to conform their behavior to what is commonlysocially approved, and this may be influenced by thechildren’s ability to understand others’ beliefs andemotions [Lane et al., 2010]. Individuals who com-prehend another’s negative emotional reaction (e.g.,distress) to their aggressive or antisocial behavior, maybe inhibited and less inclined to continue with this be-havior or act in an antisocial or aggressive way in thefuture [Feshbach, 1975]. This assumption could leadto correlate scarce empathic abilities with antisocialbehavior. Individuals with low empathy generally failto respond in the alleviation of distress and discom-fort in others [Hare, 1999; Jolliffe and Farrington,2006]. Various studies—not surprisingly—suggestedthat low empathy may be the main cause of bully-ing [e.g., Olweus, 1991; Rigby, 1996], although thereis controversy about bullies’ social competences. Thiscould be due to the different kinds of aggressive in-dividuals taken into consideration: general aggres-sors [Crick and Dodge, 1999] or more strategic andskilled aggressors, the “ringleaders” [Sutton et al.,1999]. On the other hand, these results reflect differ-ent interpretations of bullying behaviors: in the firstcase [e.g., Crick and Dodge, 1994, 1999], these arestrictly linked to poor social information processingand social problem-solving abilities; in the second,particularly in ringleader ones, they are expressionsof normal ability to understand others’ mental states

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152 Belacchi and Farina

(beliefs, intentions, desires, emotions), which is usedfor personal advantage [Andreou, 2004, 2006; Suttonand Keogh, 2000; Sutton et al., 1999]. In other words,bullies may be able in cognitive perspective taking,but not in sharing emotions with the victims, beingcharacterized by what Sutton et al. [1999] defined as“theory of nasty minds.” Therefore, in line with thislast view and contrary to conventional stereotypes, itseems that victims, not bullies, are poor mind read-ers. Particularly, victims of relational bullying fail inpredicting and facing bullies’ manipulations [Woodset al., 2009].

Another interesting interpretation of aggressive be-havior focuses on the different choices for strategies ofresource control in the peer group in an evolutionaryperspective: some individuals prefer coercive strate-gies (coercive controllers), others prosocial strategies(prosocial controllers), another subgroup of individu-als is defined as bi-strategic in that they employ bothkinds of strategies [Hawley, 2002; 2003]. Teachersgenerally identify both coercive controllers and bi-strategic controllers as aggressive, also in preschoolyears, even if the latter group was at the same timemorally mature and popular among peers [Haw-ley, 2003]. Notwithstanding the amount of research,the link between bullying behavior and empathic re-sponsiveness remains unclear. Endresen and Olweus[2001], for example, found a negative weak relationbetween empathy and bullying (r = −.15), both mea-sured with self-report instruments, in a sample ofNorwegian pre-adolescents. This kind of methodol-ogy might have the limitation of provoking biasesconcerning social desirability. Warden and Mackin-non [2003] using peer nomination in relation withempathic responsiveness in children aged 9–10 years,found a difference between prosocial children and bul-lies concerning empathy (in favor of the former), butthis difference was due more to gender (girls are moreempathic than boys, more frequently nominated asbullies). Gini et al. [2005] in a group of adolescents,found a negative relation between empathy (in partic-ular its affective component) and pro-bullying roles,whereas a weaker positive relationship with prosocialroles; no link with the role of victim. Another study[Gini et al., 2007], confirmed those results, but onlyfor male adolescent participants.

Recently, Belacchi [2008] proposed a new, moresymmetrical, model for participants’ roles in bullying,adding two roles to the six ones (Bully, Assistant, Re-inforcer, Defender, Outsider, Victim) included in theParticipant Roles Questionnaire (PRQ) by Salmivalliet al. [1996]: Mediator (someone who actively triesto reconciliate the Bully with the Victim) and Con-soler (someone who tries to mitigate the effects of the

bullying, comforting the Victim). This new model—which disentangle also the Outsider role, indirectlysupporting the bully—encloses a latent structure ar-ticulated in four macro-roles: Hostile Roles (Bully,Assistant, and Reinforcer), Prosocial Roles (Defender,Consoler, and Mediator), Victim, and Outsider. In thesame study, Belacchi [2008] investigated the relation-ships between prosocial/hostile roles and EmpathicResponsiveness in primary school children, confirm-ing that high levels of empathy (as a global measure ofaffective and cognitive components) were directly as-sociated with altruistic behavior and inversely relatedto hostile behavior. Moreover, with regard to the rela-tionship between the tendency to assume socially de-sirable and prosocial/hostile behaviors among peers,the negative influence of the desire to please others onhostile behavior has been shown, whereas there wasno influence of this factor on prosocial behavior.

The results of studies on the relationships betweenempathy and antisocial behavior in general, are notin complete agreement. Three meta-analyses tried tosummarize the main findings on this issue. Millerand Eisenberg [1988], reviewing 43 studies using di-verse methods to measure empathy (purely in its af-fective terms) and antisocial behavior, found a gen-eral low significant negative correlation (r = −.18)between aggressive behavior and empathy measures.In particular, the results of research with preschool-ers are inconsistent: studies using picture/story mea-sures of empathy revealed quite the same proportionof nonsignificant, negative, and also positive rela-tionships with aggressive behavior. The more recentmeta-analysis by Jolliffe and Farrington [2004] in-cluding 35 studies on the link between criminalbehavior and empathy (in both its affective and cog-nitive dimensions), confirmed the negative relation-ship between offending and empathy, stronger for thecognitive one. This link completely disappeared aftercontrolling for intelligence and socioeconomic sta-tus. Such evidences seem to be in contrast with boththe above-mentioned studies about the high mind-reading abilities of bullies [e.g., Sutton et al., 1999]and those of a study by Jolliffe and Farrington [2006]on adolescents using self-report questionnaires forbullying and empathy. The results highlighted a sig-nificant negative relationship of bullying with onlyaffective empathy. Finally, Lovett and Sheffield [2007]evidenced a general inconsistency of the literature onthe relationships between affective empathy and ag-gressive behavior. In particular, they noticed that aclear negative association could be found only in olderchildren and adolescents: the few studies with youngchildren, using behavioral measures or questionnairesfor empathy, showed really inconsistent results.

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Empathy and Emotion Comprehension in Preschoolers 153

Summarizing, it is clear that the research on em-pathy and prosocial/hostile behavior calls for furtherempirical investigation at different ages, particularlyin preschool years, up to now little examined, usingappropriate methods.

THE ROLE OF EMOTION COMPREHENSION

Emotion understanding is a core component ofa general sociocognitive comprehension, which al-lows children to catch others’ perspectives, compris-ing their desires, beliefs, intentions, and emotions [DeRosnay and Hughes, 2006]. Those abilities proved tobe fundamental to an adequate responsiveness dur-ing interactions, in particular having to face others’distress [Stewart and Marvin, 1984]. Emotion under-standing is a very complex construct dealing with thecomprehension of the nature, causes, consequences,and possibilities to regulate emotions. By bringingtogether a substantial body of research, Pons et al.[2004] classified at least nine different components ofchildren’s emotion understanding. These componentsare increasingly complex and develop with age: theyhave been grouped into three hierarchically organizedlevels, on the basis of the research conducted on agroup of English children using the Test of EmotionComprehension—TEC [Pons and Harris, 2000]. Theunderstanding of different external features of emo-tion (facial expressions, situational causes, reminders)emerges at around 4–5 years of age; the understandingof various mental aspects of emotion (impact of de-sires and beliefs, ability to hide emotions) appears ataround 6–7 years. Finally, the understanding of cogni-tive reflection upon emotions (mixed and moral emo-tions, mental control of emotion) emerges at around8–9 years. Emotion recognition, since early infancy, isa prerequisite for empathy: the identification of emo-tional cues allows children to respond empathicallyor not to a certain situation [Dunn, 1988; Harris,1989]. With the increasing cognitive ability to com-prehend the different causes of emotions (situationaland, lately, mental causes, such as desired or beliefs),children become able to act empathically in responseto situational stimuli even without coherent facial ex-pressions [Battistelli, 1992; Miller, 1985]. More ad-vanced forms of empathy take into account of the im-plications of both the situation itself and the personalcharacteristics of others on their emotional reactions[Feshbach, 1987]: this imply a clear distinction be-tween one’s own and others’ emotions. The compre-hension of others’ emotion is indeed linked to proso-cial behavior: several studies proved the existence ofa positive relationship between children’s emotionalunderstanding, their prosocial behavior and also their

acceptance and popularity with peers [Denham et al.,2002; Izard et al., 2001; Pons et al., 2002; Villanuevaet al., 2000]. On the other hand, poor emotion under-standing is one of the main deficits associated withserious psychiatric disorders, including autism andschizophrenia [e.g., Baron-Cohen, 2002; Brune, 2005;Trentacosta and Fine, 2010]. The comprehension ofdifferent aspects of emotional experience is therefore acentral ability for empathic responsiveness and proso-cial behavior.

The possible relationships between the attributionof prosocial vs. hostile role and emotion understand-ing has been recently investigated in three groups ofpreschoolers (3, 4, and 5 years old) by Belacchi andFarina [2010], using the TEC for evaluating children’semotion comprehension and a teacher report ver-sion of the Participant 8 Role Questionnaire [Belacchi,2008] to detect children’s empathic dispositions andprosocial/hostile behaviors. The tendency to assumeprosocial roles, significantly higher in girls rather thanin boys, turned out to be associated with a good levelof emotion comprehension, as a global measure. Allthe Prosocial roles were positively correlated with Ex-ternal dimension of emotion understanding, confirm-ing a general good management of situational andobservable features of emotions at this age [Albaneseand Molina, 2008; Pons et al., 2004]. From this pointof view, it is interesting to note that the only sig-nificant positive correlations regarding Mental andReflective dimension of emotion understanding, re-garded two Prosocial roles: Defender and Mediator.This could be interpreted as a confirmation of thepositive relationship between the management of bet-ter cognitive abilities to comprehend others’ feelingsand the assumption of prosocial behaviors. On thecontrary, the Hostile roles have no significant correla-tions with the measures of emotion comprehension,except for a weak relation with External component,according only with a subgroup of teachers. A generalnegative association with emotion comprehension hasbeen found for the roles of Victim and Outsider. It ispossible that, in preschool children, these roles arenot well differentiated from each other, yet [Monkset al., 2005]. Probably, young victims and outsidershave in common a similar poor assertive behavioralpattern, which favors their tendency either to be mal-treated by peers or to keep away from difficult socialsituations.

THE ROLE OF SOCIAL DESIRABILITY

According to social desirability attitude, we meanthe disposition of individuals to behave in line withsocial conventional rules. This tendency to conformist

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behavior increases in function of age [Lane et al.,2010], but is not necessary linked to the developmentof moral reasoning, whereas moral judgments andconventional social-oriented behaviors could be re-lated to each other starting from the preschool age.According to Turiel [1983], also young children areable to make the distinction between moral rules andconventional rules: the former refers to ethic anduniversal principles prescribing not to harm otherpeople; the latter refers to arbitrary and changeableconventions that define the belonging to a culturalgroup. Some developmental studies show that indi-viduals start distinguishing moral and conventionaltransgression in their judgment from the age of 39months [Smetana, 1981; Smetana and Braeges, 1990]and across cultures [Song et al., 1987]. In particu-lar, moral transgressions are judged to be less rule-contingent than conventional transgressions; individ-uals are less likely to state that moral—rather thanconventional—transgressions are permissible in theabsence of prohibiting rules [Turiel et al., 1987]. Onlymoral transgressions are associated with the distressof others, and this association remains intact whetherthere is a rule prohibiting action or not. This positionpredicts that individuals who show reduced distressof other processing, should show a reduced moral-conventional distinction [Blair, 1997; Blair et al.,1997].

Therefore, social desirability measures could allowus to distinguish between a genuine tendency towardmoral engagement and an orientation toward socialapproval and conventional rules.

AIMS OF THE STUDY

The present study involves the same participantsof the cross-sectional study with children between 3and 6 years of age by Belacchi and Farina [2010] onthe relationships between children’s emotion compre-hension and their tendency to assume prosocial andhostile behaviors, according to teachers’ reports (seeabove).

In the present contribution, two new variables havebeen considered: empathy and social desirability. Themain aim is to investigate all the relationships among:cognitive and affective empathy; children’s emotioncomprehension; their tendency to assume prosocialand/or hostile roles with peers; social desirability.More specifically the current work analyze the effectsof age, gender, and two different groups of teacher’sperceptions on the above-mentioned variables and ontheir interrelationships.

Concerning empathy, we expected that, accordingto the literature, both kinds of empathy increase with

age and are higher in girls than in boys. In particular,we hypothesized the existence of a significant positivelink of all empathy measures with both emotion com-prehension and prosocial roles and a negative linkwith both hostile roles and the outsider role.

Regarding social desirability and its relationshipswith empathy measures and with emotion compre-hension, a general positive link was expected; regard-ing its relationships with hostile/prosocial roles, weexpected a negative correlation with the former andnonsignificant links with the latter, confirming whathas been found with pre-adolescents [Belacchi, 2008]and adolescents [Belacchi et al., 2009]. The confir-mation of this hypothesis would be also in line withthe above-mentioned evidence of lower presence ofmoral-conventional distinction in individuals with adevelopmental disorder, characterized by emotionaldysfunctions, impulsivity and poor behavioral con-trol [Blair, 2007].

METHOD

Participants

The participants were 219 children (113 boys and93 girls; age range: 39–78 months, M = 4.10; SD =10 months) and 20 teachers (two for each class, nom-inally identified as teachers A and teachers B; all fe-males; age range = 25–48 years). Subjects with oneor more missing data were excluded from the sample.Therefore, the analyses have been carried out on 188participants (102 boys and 86 girls). Children, like inBelacchi and Farina’s study [2010], were subdividedinto three age groups, that corresponded to the threekindergarten class groups: young (N = 56; M = 45.87months; SD = 3.54), medium (N = 63; M = 58.22months; SD = 4.12), and old (N = 69; M = 70.71months; SD = 3.70). This subdivision is also consis-tent with the normative age groups of TEC.

Children and teachers came from working- ormiddle-class backgrounds and were drawn from threepublic nursery schools in the center of Italy. All par-ticipants had Italian as their first language; no chil-dren presented cognitive, sensory-motor, or linguisticimpairments; parents’ informed agreement was ob-tained for all the children attending these nurseryschools.

Instruments

We used both teacher ratings on empathy, socialdesirability and participants roles in bullying, and adirect assessment of children’s emotion comprehen-sion.

Teachers were asked to fill in a questionnaire, struc-tured in three sections, as follows:

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Empathy and Emotion Comprehension in Preschoolers 155

(1) Empathic Responsiveness Scale, a modified ver-sion of the Interpersonal Reactivity Index (IRI)[Davis, 1980]. From the four subscales includedin IRI, we excluded Fantasy Empathy and Per-sonal Distress subscales, selecting Perspective Tak-ing (PT) and Empathic Concern (EC) subscales,which, respectively, assess cognitive ability to as-sume others’ point of view and affective reactionsto others’ distress. Such subscales are the mostconsistent with the definition of empathy we referto [Burkard and Knox, 2004; Gini et al., 2007].Considering the age of our subjects, we eliminatedthe less suitable items for preschoolers (e.g., “Ibelieve that – in any situation – two opposite as-pects do exist, therefore I try to take in consider-ation both of them” (PT) and “Before criticizinganyone, I try to figure out what I would feel ifwere in his/her shoes” (EC); therefore, each sub-scale is composed of four items. We also modifiedthe sentences in order to be “other-report” (seeAppendix).

(2) Social Desirability Scale, adapted from Man-ganelli et al. [2000]. It is composed of six items(see Appendix) chosen from the original nine.The items that were not appropriate to describepreschoolers’ attitude have been eliminated (e.g.,“I never got annoyed when someone expressedsome ideas which are different from mine”) andthe sentences re-written in order to be “other-report.” We used this instrument not simplyas a way of controlling for social compliancebut as a design independent variable express-ing children’s tendency to satisfy others’ expecta-tions, according to conventional rules [Belacchi,2008].

(3) Participant 8 Roles Questionnaire: teacher-reportversion [see Belacchi and Farina, 2010]. It is com-posed of 24 items, three for each role. Consid-ering the latent structure of this questionnaire,(described above) we grouped these roles in: Pro-social roles, Hostile roles, Victim, and Outsider.

Children’s emotion comprehension was measured byadministering them the TEC [Pons and Harris, 2000]in its Italian standardized version [Albanese andMolina, 2008]. The TEC consists of an A4 book (maleand female versions) presenting a series of cartoonscenarios placed on the top of each page; the bottompart of the same page shows four possible emotionaloutcomes depicted by facial expressions. While show-ing a cartoon scenario, the researcher tells the childa story. After hearing the story, the child is asked toattribute an emotion (happy, sad, angry, scared, orjust alright) to the main character by pointing to one

of the four depicted emotional outcomes (nonverbalresponses).

Coding System

Teachers had to indicate how frequently they ob-served specific behaviors and attitudes in the chil-dren of their class, using a 5-point Likert scale (never,rarely, sometimes, often, always). The answers to allthe items of the questionnaire were coded as follows:Never = 1 point; Always = 5 points. Some items,formulated in negative terms, have been recoded in-verting the scores (i.e. Never = 5; Always = 1). Inparticular, items which needed recoding were n◦ 2, 4,and 5 in the Social Desirability Scale and items n◦ 2, 5,and 6 in the Empathic Responsiveness Scale. The av-erage scores (range 0–5) have been calculated for eachof the different scales and subscales. The reliabilityanalyses for Empathic Responsiveness Scale and So-cial Desirability Scale will be reported forward, in the“results” section.

Regarding the TEC, a detailed coding descriptioncan be found in Belacchi and Farina [2010]. Theranges of TEC different measures are the following:Emotion global score (0–9); External (0–3); Mental(0–3), Reflective (0–3).

Procedure

Children were administered the TEC individuallyin a quiet room in their school. We went severaltimes to the nursery school in order to administer theinstrument to all the children. Each session lasteda maximum of 20 min. Teachers filled in the ques-tionnaire on their own, after receiving detailed in-structions and clarifications by the researcher. Inparticular, teachers received a short explanation ofthe conventional meaning of bullying episodes amongpeers [Genta et al., 1996; Whitney and Smith, 1993].The teachers returned the completed questionnairewithin 15 days.

RESULTS

Reliability of Empathy and Social DesirabilityScales

Preliminary reliability analyses on Empathy and So-cial desirability scales have been conducted separatelyfor each group of teachers (A and B). Concerning theEmpathy Scale, we carried out analyses on the itemsof both the global scale (N = 8) and of the two sub-scales: EC (N = 4) and PT (N = 4). Cronbach’s α

indices revealed a good reliability for the global scale(Teachers A = .78, Teachers B = .85) and a satis-factory one for both EC (Teachers A = .65, Teach-ers B = .78) and PT (Teachers A = .61, Teachers

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156 Belacchi and Farina

TABLE I. Teachers A and Teachers B’s Average Scores (Standard Deviations) regarding Empathy (Total and Subcomponents) by Age

Teachers A Teachers B

Age groups Age groups

Empathy measures Young Medium Old P η2p Young Medium Old P η2

p

Empathy total 3.16(.51)

3.15(.65)

3.15(.51)

.691 .004 3.12(.66)

3.07(.73)

3.21(.99)

.089 .026

Empatic concern (EC) 3.45 3.43 3.30 .633 .005 3.44 3.36 3.46 .316 .013(.57) (.55) (.64) (.58) (.74) (.82)

Perspective taking (PT) 2.86 2.87 2.86 .832 .002 2.80 2.79 2.97 .035 .036(.54) (.57) (.67) (.65) (.59) (.81)

B = .74). These indices are in line with the ones ob-tained by Albiero et al. [2006] for the Italian validationof the instrument.

Finally, Cronbach’s α on Social Desiderability scaleitems is also valid: Teachers A = .76; Teachers B =.81.

Descriptive Statistics

Empathy. First, we verified the inter-teacheragreement with partial correlations (corrected forchildren’s age) between teachers’ attributions of em-pathy. Correlations were all positive: total Empathy(r = .680; P < .001), EC (r = .633, P < .001), PT (r =.603, P < .001). Both teacher groups judged EC andPT as highly interrelated (r = .639, P < .001; r = .657,P < .001, respectively, Group A and Group B).

Moreover, Teachers A and B agreed to considertheir children significantly more able in EmpathicConcern than in Perspective Taking (t pairwise test:Teachers A: EC = 3.44 (.63) vs. PT = 2.87 (.60), t(187) = 14.966, P < .001; Teachers B: EC = 3.42 (.73)vs. PT 2.86 (.69), t (187) = 13.012, P < .001).

We also conducted a multivariate ANOVA on theaverage scores for Empathy, with Gender and Ageas independent variables. Age did not show any sig-nificant influence on the empathy measures, for ei-ther teacher, except for teacher B, who attributed a

significantly higher competence in Perspective Tak-ing to older children than to the other age groups[F (2,187) = 3.407 P < .035; η2

p = .04; post-hocWaller–Duncan test: P < .05]. These latter did notdiffer from each other (see Table I).

Concerning the effects of gender, both teachers as-signed higher average scores on empathy to girls thanto boys [Teachers A: F(1,187) = 24,987 P < .001;η2

p = .121]; Teachers B [F(1,187) = 17,904 P < .001;η2

p = .09] (see Table II). No interactions between ageand gender emerged.

Social desirability. The teacher inter-agreementon social desirability attributions is very good (r =.790, P < .001). As for empathy, we conducted amultivariate ANOVA on the average scores of socialdesirability, with Sex and Age as independent vari-ables. A significant age effect emerged [Teacher A:F(2,187) = 4.084 P < .018; η2

p = .043; Teacher B:F(2,187) = 3.342 P < .038; η2

p = .035]. In particu-lar, social desirability decreases with Age [TeachersA: young: 3.97 (.57); middle: 3.70 (.53); old: 3.64 (.74):F(2,187) = 4.084 P < .018; η2

p = .043; Teachers B:young: 3.92 (.59); middle: 3.62 (.57); old: 3.64 (.79):(F(2,187) = 3.342 P < .038; η2

p = .035)]; a post-hocanalysis (Waller–Duncan test) revealed a significantdecrease (P < .05) from young children to the middleand old ones, which do not differ from each other.

TABLE II. Teachers A and Teachers B’s Average Scores (Standard Deviations) regarding Empathy (Total and Subcomponents)by Sex

Teachers A Teachers B

Sex Sex

Empathy measures M F P η2p M F P η2

p

Empathy total 2.98(.54)

3.36(.50)

.001 .121 2.97(.65)

3.34(.59)

.001 .090

Empatic concern (EC) 3.23 3.69 .001 .137 3.25 3.63 .001 .066(.60) (.58) (.75) (.65)

Perspective taking (PT) 2.73 3.03 .001 .07 2.70 3.04 .001 .074(.61) (.55) (.69) (.66)

Aggr. Behav.

Empathy and Emotion Comprehension in Preschoolers 157

Girls are considered more oriented toward desirablebehavior than boys [Teachers A: boys: 3.57; girls: 3.98:F(1,187) = 19.631 P < .001; η2

p = .097; Teachers B:boys: 3.59; girls: 3.87: F (1,187) = 7.501 P < .007;η2

p = .040]. No significant interactions emerged be-tween age and sex.

The Relation between Empathy and SocialDesirability

Correlational analyses (corrected for age) showedlarger positive relationships between attributions ofempathy and social desirability according to both thegroups of teachers: Teachers A (r = . 634; P < .001);Teachers B (r = .662; P < .001): the more a childis perceived as “empathic”, the more he/she will beconsidered as behaving according to social standards.

Analyzing separately the relation between social de-sirability and the affective (empathic concern) and cog-nitive (perspective taking) components of empathy,partial correlations (corrected for age) showed highpositive significant correlations, both for Teachers A(EC: r = .548, P < .001; PT: r = .602, P < .001)and for Teachers B (EC: r = .555, P < .001; PT: r =.656, P < .001). The correlation of social desirabilitywas larger with perspective taking than with empathicconcern for both teachers.

Empathy, Social Desirability, and EmotionUnderstanding

Correlational analyses (corrected for age) betweenthe scores on TEC (total and sub-dimensions) andthe ones on Empathic Responsiveness Scale, accord-ing to both teacher groups (see Table III) were con-ducted. Results show low agreement between teachersA and B: both teacher groups’ evaluations on empa-thy and TEC positively correlate with low indices forthe global measures. Only Teachers B’ evaluations re-vealed a significant correlation of global empathy withMental sub-dimension (P < .05).

Regarding the affective and cognitive dimensionsof empathy, Teachers B considered both of them asrelated to global emotion (P < .05), whereas Teach-

ers A did not point out any significant relations withthe subcomponents of children’s emotion comprehen-sion; moreover perspective-taking ability was shownto be linked to the more complex components of emo-tion understanding (Mental, P < .05 and Reflective,P < .05).

Further correlational analyses (controlling for age)have been conducted between empathic concern, per-spective -taking and each of the nine components ofemotion understanding. The only correlational indexthat remains significant, even if low and exclusively forTeachers B, is between perspective taking and com-ponent VII, or ability to hide emotions (r = .156, P <

.05).Furthermore, different multiple regression analy-

ses (Stepwise Method, weighted for age) were per-formed with global empathy, empathic concern, andperspective taking (as perceived by the two groups ofteachers) as dependent variable and as independentvariables the three sub-dimensions of children’s emo-tion comprehension. Significant predictive small ef-fects emerged only for Teachers B’s ratings: global em-pathy is directly predicted by Mental sub-dimension(R2 = .023, β = .152, t = 2.094, P < .038), whereasperspective taking is directly predicted by the Reflec-tive one (R2 = .036, β = .190; t = 2.632, P < .009).None of the emotion comprehension sub-dimensionsholds a significant predictive effect on empathicconcern.

Further multiple regression analyses (Stepwisemethod, weighted for age) have been run in orderto explore the predictive power of the nine compo-nents of emotion comprehension on Teachers B’s at-tributions of Global Empathy, Empathic Concern,and Perspective Taking. The results highlighted thatthe only component that holds a significant effect—according to Teachers B—is VII (hiding emotions) onPerspective Taking (β = .179, t = 2.485, P < .05).

No significant relation emerged between socialdesirability—according to teacher reports—and chil-dren’s emotion comprehension (both as a global mea-sure and as single dimensions).

TABLE III. Partial Correlations (Corrected for Age) between Teachers A and Teachers B’s Attributions of Empathy Measures andEmotion Comprehension Measures

Total Empathy Empathic Concern (EC) Perspective Taking (PT)

TEC Teach. A Teach. B Teach. A Teach. B Teach. A Teach. B

External .089 .093 .063 .109 .099 .058Mental .110 .148∗ .117 .116 .081 .154∗Reflective .093 .133 .067 .093 .103 .152∗Emotion .142∗ .180∗ .119 .154∗ .138 .175∗

∗Correlation is significant at the 0.05 level (two-tailed).

Aggr. Behav.

158 Belacchi and Farina

Concerning the relationships between empathymeasures and social desirability, significant positivecorrelations emerged according to both the teachergroups. More precisely, according to Teachers A, chil-dren showing higher tendency to social desirability,also have higher levels of total empathy (r = 628; P <

.001), empathic concern (r = .545; P < .001), and per-spective taking (r = .593; P < .001).

Similar correlation indices have been found also forTeachers B (r = .650, P < .001; r = .548, P < .001;r = .636, P < .001, respectively).

Empathy, Social Desirability,and Prosocial/Hostile Roles

In order to verify the relationships between the em-pathy measures and prosocial/hostile roles, correla-tional analysis was conducted (Pearson’s r). Consid-ering the global empathy score, teachers A and B’sattributions agreed highly with each other. In partic-ular, for both groups of teachers empathy is signifi-cantly, positively correlated with Prosocial roles, bothas a macro-group and as single roles (P < .001), butnegatively with Hostile roles, both as a macro-groupand as single roles (P < .001) and with the Outsider(P < .001). The Victim role did not show any sig-nificant correlation with empathy, even if a negativeassociation emerged (see Table IV).

Considering empathic concern and perspective tak-ing, the correlational pattern is similar to the previ-ous one, but it becomes more specific. In particular,observing Prosocial roles, the correlation indices arehigher with affective empathy than with the cognitiveone, especially for Teachers B (EC: r = .614 vs. PT:r = .383).

In order to investigate these relationships moredeeply, a series of multiple regressions (StepwiseMethod, weighted for age) has been conducted. Foreach group of teachers, empathic concern and perspec-tive taking were entered as independent variables; thedependent variable was, time-to-time, one of the fourmacro-roles: Prosocial Roles, Hostile Roles, Victim,and Outsider (the significant results are reported in

Table V). For both Teachers A and B, Prosocial Rolesare positively predicted only by the affective compo-nent of empathy, but not by the cognitive one. Thereis a general agreement between the two groups ofteachers also regarding Hostile Roles: both the com-ponents of empathy hold a predictive but negativeeffect on them. Similarly to what happens for Hostileroles, the Outsider role is also negatively predicted byboth the affective and cognitive components of em-pathy (the latter only for Teachers B). The role ofVictim is not predicted by any measure of ascribedempathy (this analysis is therefore not included inTable V).

Regarding the relationship between social desir-ability and teachers’ attributions of prosocial/hostileroles (both macro and specific roles), no significantrelationships emerged with Prosocial roles, whereas avery strong negative relationship with Hostile Rolescame out, as well as a similar but less strong rela-tionship with the Victim role. Only the B Teachers’perceived a negative link with the role of Outsider (seeTable VI).

DISCUSSION

The current study revealed the multifaceted re-lationships between preschool children’s empathiccompetences (as attributed by teachers) and boththeir emotion comprehension and tendency to as-sume prosocial or hostile roles with their peers.First of all, descriptive analyses on teachers’ attribu-tions of empathy and social desirability highlighteda predictable framework, according to the literature[Eisenberg, 1986; Warden and Mackinnon, 2003]:girls are perceived as more empathic and moreconcerned about their social desirability than boys.In studies using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index[Davis, 1980], girls usually obtain higher scores thanboys concerning both the affective and cognitive di-mensions of empathy [Gini et al., 2007]. This is also ageneral trend, which has been identified with otherresearch methods and instruments. [Eisenberg andFabes, 1998]. Our results confirm this tendency even in

TABLE IV. Partial Correlations (Corrected for Age) between Empathy (Total and Subcomponents) and Macro-roles given by TeachersA and Teachers B

Total Empathy Empathic Concern (EC) Perspective Taking (PT)

Participant roles Teach. A Teach. B Teach. A Teach. B Teach. A Teach. B

Hostile roles −.534∗ −.544∗ −.501∗ −.486∗ −.467∗ −.515∗Prosocial roles .551∗ .551∗ .576∗ .614∗ .420∗ .383∗Victim −.118 −.091 −.011 −.038 −.134 −.131Outsider −.320∗ −.515∗ −.344∗ −.498∗ −.233∗ −.439∗

∗Correlation is significant at the 0.001 level (two-tailed).

Aggr. Behav.

Empathy and Emotion Comprehension in Preschoolers 159

TABLE V. Multiple Regression Analyses (Weighted for Age): Significant Coefficients of Empathic Measures on Macro-roles (Proso-cial, Hostile, and Outsider) Attributed by Teachers A and Teachers B

Prosocial roles

Independent variables R R2 �R2 B β t P value

Teach. A Empathic concern .539 .290 .286 .686 .539 8.719 .001Perspective taking 1.323 n.s.

Teach. B Empathic concern .583 .340 .337 .639 .583 9.798 .001Perspective taking .458 n.s.

Hostile roles

Teach. A Empathic concern .587 .345 .341 −.390 −.439 −5.816 .001Perspective taking .614 .376 .370 −.217 −.232 −3.076 .001

Teach. B Empathic concern .590 .348 .345 −.291 −.357 −4.843 .001Perspective taking .649 .422 .415 −.305 −.357 −4.836 .001

Outsider

Teach. A Empathic concern .341 .117 .112 −.343 −.341 −4.955 .001Perspective taking −.341 n.s.

Teach. B Empathic concern .492 .242 .238 −.339 −.344 −4.158 .001Perspective taking .520 .271 .263 −.233 −.225 −2.722 .007

TABLE VI. Partial Correlations (Corrected for Age) between Social Desirability given by Teachers A and Teachers B and Macro-roles

Social desirability

Participant roles Teachers A Teachers B

Hostile roles −.816∗ −.758∗Prosocial roles .098 .126Victim −.407∗ −.400∗Outsider .004 −.230∗∗

∗Correlation is significant at the 0.001 level (two-tailed). ∗∗Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (two-tailed).

preschoolers, when the scores are attributed by teach-ers, and they are also in line with different studies onempathy with preschoolers using diverse methodolo-gies, that is, self-report measures, emotional reactionsto empathy-inducing films, and comprehension andsharing response to video vignettes of children inemotionally evocative scenarios [Howe et al., 2008;Valiente et al., 2004]. Furthermore, empathy seems arather stable trait in our preschoolers, nonetheless thecross-sectional nature of our data does not allow us togeneralize this outcome: a longitudinal study wouldprovide more confident results. This outcome is par-tially in contrast with the literature, in which a generalincrease of empathic abilities with age is found [see e.g.Hoffman, 2000; Valiente et al., 2004] even though in awider age range: more evident differences in empathymay have emerged if both preschool and school agechildren had been considered.

Regarding the affective and cognitive componentsof empathy, the children showed a higher ability inbeing affectively connected to other peers. This maybe interpreted in the light of the above-mentionedstudies on children’s language development, which is

first related to desires and emotions and, only later,becomes more cognitive [Dunn and Brown, 1993;Wellman, 2002].

Concerning social desirability, even if it is not in-tensely studied in preschoolers, the effects of gendercould be interpreted in the light of the research onnormative beliefs and moral judgment. Some inter-esting evidences about normative belief highlightedsignificant preference for beliefs, which accept aggres-sion by older children and boys [Guerra et al., 1995;Huesmann and Guerra, 1997]. This could be inter-preted as a reduced need for social approval by malesand old children. This result could also be in line withsome evidence in bullying studies, which indicates thatmale bullies tend to use moral disengagement morefrequently than female bullies [Bacchini et al., 1998;Menesini et al., 1999]. On the other hand, the decreasewith age in perceived inclination of children to behavein a social accepted way may be in contrast with someresults of other studies, which showed a general in-crease in giving social desirable answers during child-hood [e.g., Carpendale and Chandler, 1996]. A possi-ble explanation may be ascribed to the methodology:

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160 Belacchi and Farina

in our study, social desirability was assessed by teacherreports and not directly measured on children answersor behaviors. Teachers’ perceptions may more clearlyidentify some behaviors in older children attesting, onthe one hand, an increased self-concept and differen-tiation, which both—plausibly—grow with age, and,on the other hand, a greater familiarization with theteacher figures. Both of them may lead to an increasein more spontaneous behaviors in children, who couldbe more difficult to manage in the class.

Regarding the main aim of our study, we wanted toexamine the relationships of empathy with emotioncomprehension as well as with children’s ascribed ten-dency to assume different roles in peer interactions.The clear, even if weak, direct association only be-tween global empathy and global emotion compre-hension, according to both teacher groups, point outa sufficient teachers’ ability to detect significant as-pects of their pupils’ socioemotional abilities. Themost complex dimensions of emotion comprehen-sion revealed a significant predictive power on em-pathy measures according to Teachers B (this differ-ence between the two groups of teachers will be laterdiscussed): Mental sub-dimension on global empathyand Reflective sub-dimension on perspective taking.Interestingly, among the nine components of emo-tion understanding, the abilities of perspective -takingare predicted only by the comprehension of the possi-bility of dissimulating an emotion (component VII).In this case, too, the result refers only to TeachersB. This could indicate that children who display highabilities of understanding others’ perspectives are alsogood at identifying people’s real feelings, even whenthey are in contrast with their expressive outcomes. Inother words, abilities of perspective taking are associ-ated with greater mind-reading skills, which enablechildren to comprehend hidden emotions, confirm-ing what has been found in other studies [e.g. Har-ris et al., 1986]. Furthermore, this component mayalso be considered as one with the highest cogni-tive implication, as shown in studies on psycholog-ical lexicon, which noted the importance of under-standing and talking about others’—rather than one’sown—internal states to promote prosociality [Hugheset al., 2007; Wellman, 2002]. Also in a recent study byMorra et al. [2010] with children between 5 and 11years of age, the component VII proved to be one ofthose which is more connected with working memoryability.

Concerning the link between empathy and proso-cial/hostile roles we found a higher inter-teacheragreement. Such agreement may derive from the kindof measures used, in both teacher groups’ reports.Prosocial roles were shown to be positively influenced

by affective empathy; whereas Hostile roles were neg-atively influenced by both affective and cognitive em-pathy. Whereas the implication of affective empathyin prosocial behavior is consistent with literature ev-idence [Dautenhahn et al., 2007; Eisenberg, 1992;Eisenberg and Fabes, 1998], our results on Hostileroles do not support the existence of a positive link,in preschoolers, between bullying and good abilitiesof perspective taking, as claimed by Sutton and col-leagues [Sutton et al., 1999] and Jolliffe and Farring-ton [2004, 2006] and call for further investigation.The Outsider showed negative correlations with em-pathy measures, confirming its similarity to Hostileroles, whereas the Victim had no significant correla-tions with empathy, but only a weak negative asso-ciation. A possible explanation of this last outcomecould lie in the age of the subjects: the most partof the research on aggressive behaviors and mental-ization has been conducted among children in theirschool years. In this period, theory of mind abilitiesand tendency to assume distinct roles in peer inter-actions generally begin to assume a certain stability.From this point of view, our data characterized theperiod from 3 to 6 years of age as a more dynamicone, with children’s first acquisitions of perspective-taking abilities and the beginning of inclinations toassume attitudes and behaviors connected with dif-ferent macro-roles, even if they are not stable andwell differentiated yet [Belacchi and Farina, 2010;Monks et al., 2005]. In particular, the absence of cor-relation between empathy and the Victim role can beinterpreted, in our preschool subjects, referring firstto the specific ambiguity of this role, which presentsanalogies both with Prosocial and Hostile roles. Fur-thermore, in literature there are contrasting evidenceson the relationships between empathy and the victimrole: Gini et al. [2005] did not find significant associa-tions in adolescents, whereas Belacchi [2008] detecteda significant—even if weak—positive correlation inprimary school children. Finally, in preschoolers theVictim is one of the less stable role [Kochenderfer andLadd, 1996; Monks et al., 2003]. A further aim of ourstudy regarded the investigation of social desirabilityascribed attitudes and their relationships to the othermeasures of social-emotional development: empathy,emotion comprehension, and prosocial/hostile rolesin peer interactions.

The results confirmed—as we hypothesized follow-ing what has been found in older children [Belacchi,2008; Belacchi et al., 2009]—the significant negativelink of the ascribed tendency to behave according tosocial norms and expectations with hostile roles andthe victim role, but no significant links with proso-cial roles. Therefore, prosociality seems to derive from

Aggr. Behav.

Empathy and Emotion Comprehension in Preschoolers 161

a genuine internal willingness to help others (dis-closed by affective empathy disposition), rather thanto please other people’s expectations, (disclosed by so-cial desirability measure). This is in line with moral-conventional distinction sensitivity, which starts toemerge in typical young children [Turiel et al. 1987],but is less present in individual with emotional andbehavioral disorder, such as the psychopathic individ-uals [Blair, 1995]. This lack of social desirability atti-tude as well as that of affective and cognitive empathyin hostile roles could be interpreted not only in thetraditional frame of attachment models [Dunn, 1993;Hodges and Tizard, 1989; Thompson, 1998] but alsoin the light of the neuroscience approach, suggestingthat neuronal system (in particular, the Amigdala andVentro-medial Pre-frontal Cortex) may be cruciallyinvolved in moral development [Blair et al., 2001,2004; Moll et al., 2002] and in care-based morality[Blair, 2007], enabling individuals to learn the goodand the bad of objects and situations [Everitt et al.,2003].

As regards to the correlations between empathy, so-cial desirability, and prosociality, it is true that themore a child is perceived as empathic (both cogni-tively and affectively), the more he/she is supposed tobehave prosocially and according to social standards.Our data, showing that not social desirability but onlythe affective component of empathy predicts proso-cial behaviors, suggest a more complex picture of themoral-conventional distinction: behaving accordingto social prescriptions is not sufficient to elicit sup-portive and caring actions, which seem to derive froma genuine concern of others’ distress and might turnout in a higher moral awareness. Clearly this last pointneeds deeper investigation.

Finally, the partial agreement between the twogroups of teachers is worth discussing, regardingabove all the empathy measures in relationship to chil-dren’s emotion comprehension. Young children’s em-pathy and—more generally—prosocial behavior havebeen extensively studied using adult reports, bothteachers and parents. Teachers are the most frequentlyused informants to detect both aggressive and proso-cial behavior in preschoolers, and they showed toprovide valid measures [e.g. Cote´ et al., 2002; Crickand Bigbee, 1998; Crick et al., 1999]. A study on pre-adolescents between 10 and 15 years, compared theassociations between different informants assessingprosocial behavior: the association between teach-ers’ and children’s ratings was significantly strongerthan the one found between teachers’ and mothers’[Nantel-Vivier et al., 2009]. In relation to some lim-itations in using teacher reports, it is true that each

method presents both advantages and disadvantages,according to different variables, above all the age ofthe subjects [Ladd and Kochenderferer-Ladd, 2002]or the characteristics of the teachers. In our study, theteachers of each class have been casually assigned toone of the two groups (A and B), so the differences intheir judgments can be explained only hypothesizingdifferences in their personal attitudes or ideas. Teach-ers’ implicit ideas or stereotypes proved to have agreat influence on their class management, their wayof interacting with pupils, and their teaching meth-ods [e.g. Fiorilli, 2009]. Studies on elementary andhigh school teachers proved that a large number offactors affect teachers’ perceptions of students’ un-desirable behaviors, such as children’s gender, race,age, and socioeconomic background [Dulin, 2001;Hindmand, 1999; Neese, 1998], children’s behaviorsand attitudes [Molins, 1999], teaching experience[Kokkinos et al., 2004, 2005] teachers’ stress and burn-out [Walker, 1991], personality traits, such as neuroti-cism and conscientiousness [Kokkinos et al., 2005].One possible future research direction may includethe investigation of mediating effects of teaching ex-perience and personality traits on their perceptionof certain children’s behaviors. We could therefore ex-plore the existence of different evaluations of childrenconducts according to teacher’s experience and/orteacher’s personality dispositions. It is also worth un-derlining that teachers’ personality traits and rela-tional models have an impact not only on the waythey perceive children’s behaviors, but also on the re-lational atmosphere in the class.

CONCLUSIONS

This study provides some evidences suggesting thatat ages 3–6 years, children begin to build up social-emotional profiles comparable with those of olderchildren. Since early childhood, children who proveto better comprehend others’ emotions are in generalperceived as more empathic and more adaptive andsocially oriented. If a positive involvement of affectiveempathy in prosocial roles and its negative implica-tion in hostile roles are plausible and empirically sup-ported, the most surprising outcome regards cognitiveempathy, which negatively influences hostile roles, buthas no implications in prosocial roles. These results,on one hand, seem to support Dodge and colleagues[Crick and Dodge, 1994; Dodge, 1980; Dodge andFrame, 1982] with their model of scarce social infor-mation processing in bullies, but on the other hand,they could simply mean that the cognitive compo-nent of empathy is not completely developed, given

Aggr. Behav.

162 Belacchi and Farina

the young age of the children involved in the presentstudy.

The characteristics of Victim and Outsider rolesare also worth underlining. Confirming and clarify-ing what has been previously found by Belacchi andFarina [2010], they showed themselves as poorly as-sertive and potentially at risk of social maladjustment.

Of course, further research is needed to generalizethese findings on young children’s emotion compre-hension, empathy attributions and moral reasoning,and their relations to social behavior. In particular,longitudinal investigations may enhance our under-standing of the genesis of maladaptive social profilesand help the implementation of social skills train-ing or rehabilitation programs from early childhood[Malti et al., 2010].

ACKOWLEDGMENTS

The authors wish to thank Beatrice Benelli for heruseful comments to the paper.

APPENDIXEmpathic Responsiveness Scale

(1) He/she often feel affection and concern for sador unlucky people (EC).

(2) Sometimes he/she finds it difficult to see thingsfrom another person’s point of view (PT).

(3) In case of disagreement, he/she tries to considerothers’ point of view (PT).

(4) When he/she sees someone treated badly, he/shefeels protectiveness toward him/her (EC).

(5) If he/she feels right about something, he/she doesnot waste time listening to others’ reasons (PT).

(6) When he/she sees someone treated wrongly,he/she does nothing to help him/her (EC).

(7) He/she could be described as a soft-hearted child(EC).

(8) When he/she is in contrast with someone, he/sheusually tries to put him/herself in other’s shoes(PT).

Social Desirability Scale

(1) No matter who he/she is talking to, he/she isalways a good listener.

(2) In some occasions he/she hurt a classmate.(3) When he/she makes a mistake, he/she always ad-

mits it.(4) Sometimes he/she tries to take his/her revenge if

he/she is mistreated.(5) Sometimes he/she envied others’ fortune.(6) He/she never told something badly in order to

hurt some of his/her classmate.

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