Researchers have long been interested in the links between children's socioemotional functioning at school and their academic success (McKinney, Mason, Perkerson, & Clifford, 1975). Historically, much of this work has focused on children who either display prosocial and other positive behaviors (e.g., Caprara, Barbaranelli, Pastorelli, Bandura, & Zimbardo, 2000), or children prone to externalizing problems, such as aggression and inattention (e.g., Hinshaw, 1992). However, in recent years, researchers have begun to examine the unique academic and social challenges faced by shy children at school (Evans, 2010). Shyness is a temperamental trait characterized by wariness, fear, and self-consciousness in social situations (Rubin, Coplan, & Bowker, 2009). Goldsmith et al. (1987) provided a seminal definition of temperament as consisting of "relatively consistent, basic dispositions inherent in the person that underlie and modulate the expression of activity, reactivity, emotionality, and sociability" (p. 524). Contemporary views of temperament acknowledge that it results from interactions between biological and environmental factors (e.g., Shiner et al., 2012). Temperamental traits, including shyness, tend to be relatively stable across time-particularly from the preschool years and onward (Karevold, Ystrøm,
