A Person‐Oriented Analysis of Social Withdrawal in Chinese Children

Abstract

The goal of this study was to compare the socio-emotional and academic adjustment of different subtypes of socially withdrawn (shy, unsociable, avoidant) schoolage children in mainland China. Participants were N 5 1344 children ages 10-12 years from public elementary schools in Shanghai, People's Republic of China. Multi-source assessment included: child self-reports of social withdrawal subtypes and internalizing difficulties (e.g., depression, social anxiety); peer nominations of children's peer relations (e.g., peer victimization, peer preference); and teacher ratings of children's school adjustment (e.g., academic success, internalizing problems). Results from person-oriented analyses indicated that socially avoidant (i.e., shy-unsociable) children reported the most pervasive internalizing difficulties compared to other groups. However, in contrast to findings among Western samples, unsociable children were as likely to have peer and academic difficulties as their shy and socially avoidant peers. Findings are discussed in terms of the implications of different subtypes of social withdrawal among children in collectivistic societies such as China.

Do cultural orientations moderate the relation between Chinese adolescents’ shyness and depressive symptoms? It depends on their academic achievement

“…Our findings suggest that shyness is associated robustly with depressive symptoms. Our data replicate others’ findings (Coplan et al, ; Ding et al, ) and bolster the idea that shyness is associated with negative outcomes among Chinese children and adolescents in contemporary, urban China perhaps as a result of globalization and increasing competition (Chen et al, ).…”

“…Shy children tend to withdraw from social interactions. Withdrawing may prevent them from advancing their social skills and seeking social support, and make them more vulnerable to peer rejection and victimization, internalizing problems, and low self‐worth (Coplan et al, ; Findlay, Coplan, & Bowker, ; Liu et al, ).…”

“…In contrast, in collectivistic countries like China, shyness has been found to be relatively benign in earlier studies and rural samples when/where the cultural values were considered very collectivistic (Chen, Cen, Li, & He, ; Chen et al, ; Chen, Rubin, & Li, ). However, shyness has been found to be problematic in contemporary and urban samples in China (Coplan et al, ; Ding et al, ; Zhang & Eggum‐Wilkens, ). Although contemporary urban China is still more collectivistic than Western countries (Forbes, Zhang, Doroszewicz, & Haas, ), it is relatively individualistic compared with the earlier and rural samples because of social changes during globalization (Chen & French, ).…”

Unsociability in Chinese adolescents: Cross‐informant agreement and relations with social and school adjustment

“…Unsociability is conceptualized as arising from low social approach and low social avoidance motivations, which is differentiated from shyness (high social approach and high social avoidance motivations) and social avoidance (low social approach and high social avoidance motivations; Asendorpf, ). Unsociability has been used interchangeably with preference for solitude, but on a more nuanced level, preference for solitude may encompass both non‐fearful affinity for solitude (akin to ‘unsociability’; e.g., Coplan et al, ) and a desire to avoid social interactions (akin to ‘social avoidance’; e.g., Wang, ; see Coplan, Ooi, & Nocita, ).…”

Trajectory of heart period to socioaffective threat in shy children

“…Person‐oriented approaches are regarded as useful in classifying individuals who share common characteristics and effectively categorize individuals who have conceptually and empirically different behavioral profiles (see Bergman & Trost, , for a review). Indeed, previous research studying shyness (LoBue & Pérez‐Edgar, ; Poole & Schmidt, ; Schmidt, ; Wolfe & Bell, ) and related constructs such as social withdrawal (Coplan et al, ; Nelson, ) and behavioral inhibition (Coplan, Wilson, Frohlick, & Zelenski, ; Kagan et al, ) have illustrated the utility of using a person‐oriented approach in studying social behavior. Likewise, children in the present study were classified as high shy and low shy using a median split (high shy: n = 19, M = 3.18; low shy: n = 18, M = 1.64; t (35) = −9.45, p < 0.001, d = 3.15).…”