|
|||||
|
|
Aggressive and Prosocial Behaviour in Young Greek Children |
|
| Authors: | Alexandros Kakavoulis |
| Institution: | University of Crete , Panepistimoupoli 74100 Rethymno , Greece |
| Abstract: | Aggression, the behaviour that is intended to cause harm to persons or property, not socially justifiable, a problem of modern society and education, has been a research focus of developmental psychologists and educators in the last few decades and has been extensively studied, because of its consequences in our life. This aspect of emotional expression in young children seems to take different forms in different cultures. At the opposite end of the spectrum from the antisocial behaviour is the prosocial behaviour, the aspect of moral contact that includes socially desirable behaviour (such as sharing, helping and cooperating). Prosocial behaviour or altruism has also attracted recently the interest of the researchers as it seems to be a human characteristic of high value that emerges from a very early stage of child development. In this paper we present the results of an empirical study in which we try to show the ways that the young Greek children of preschool age express aggressiveness and altruism. Actually we combine the results of two pieces of research. One that has been conducted in a natural setting by observing antisocial behaviour of the children in a nursery school and the other by asking about 300 mothers of young children to prescribe the ways their children display prosocial behaviour. The results will be discussed in connection with some aspects of the early childhood moral education. |
| Keywords: | |