Measuring the Friendships of Young Children With Disabilities

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to describe what has been learned over the past 35+ years of research on the friendships of young children with disabilities. An extensive literature review was conducted to critically examine the purposes that guided the friendship studies, the methods used to measure friendships, and the major findings of these studies. A total of eight studies were identified. The results of this review revealed that across all studies, researchers relied on the identification of children's existing friendships to address their main research questions. However, researchers did not always operationally define the construct of friendship they were measuring, and the methods they used to identify friendships varied widely across all studies. Gaps in the literature and implications for future research are discussed.

Social Experiences of Children With Disabilities in Inclusive Portuguese Preschool Settings

“…These differences may be accounted for by the use of different informants and methods associated with different criteria for defining friendship. Note that few studies have considered the perspective of children in identifying friendships of children with disabilities (Meyer & Ostrosky, 2014), with previous reports of children's friendships, clearly more positive, relying mostly on teachers' or parents' reports (e.g., Buysse, 1993). However, recently, using peer nominations, Meyer and Ostrosky (2016) found a similar mean number of friends for children with disabilities prior to implementing an intervention to increase the number of close friendships.…”

“…Note, however, that time is likely to be relevant for both teacher and peer perceptions of children’s social status. Finally, building on the need for more studies with children as informants, including children with disabilities themselves (Meyer & Ostrosky, 2014), we recruited both teachers and children as participants. However, consideration of parents’ reports would add relevant information on children’s experiences with peers, namely outside the preschool setting, due to their role in promoting and supporting children social relationships (Buysse, 1993; Yu, Ostrosky, & Fowler, 2011).…”

“…Friendships of preschool children with and without disabilities seem to be similar (Dietrich, 2005; Hollingsworth & Buysse, 2009; Meyer & Ostrosky, 2014). However, in general, children with disabilities have fewer reciprocal relationships than peers without disabilities (Buysse, Goldman, & Skinner, 2002).…”

Definition, Context, Quality: Current Issues in Research Examining High-Quality Inclusive Education

“…Finally, there are multiple ICP items that are not reflected in the ECERS-R— Adult involvement in peer interactions, Conflict Resolution, Membership, Feedback , and Monitoring of children’s learning . These items are reflective of key features of high-quality inclusion that may significantly differ from global ECE practices, including an emphasis on intentionally facilitating peer interactions and belonging (e.g., Meyer & Ostrosky, 2014), the provision of systematic individualized instruction (e.g., Hurley & Horn, 2010), and the use of individualized progress monitoring (e.g., Fox, Carta, Strain, Dunlap, & Hemmeter, 2010). Thus, the ways global and inclusion quality assessments do and do not converge provide valuable insight into the similarities and differences between these two constructs as they mutually constitute inclusive education quality.…”

Assessing the Differential Effects of Known and Mystery Rewards in a Preschool-Based Group Contingency

“…For example, the development of social-emotional competence, including peer social interactions (SI) and early friendships, is a predictor of later social, academic, and vocational success (Jones, Greenberg, & Crowley, 2015; Weissberg, Durlak, Domitrovich, & Gullotta, 2015). The establishment of these skills through regular interactions is essential for young children both with and without disabilities (Barton, 2013) and is a primary concern for parents (Meyer & Ostrosky, 2014; Petrina, Carter, & Stephenson, 2015). Although typically developing children might be amenable to playing with their peers with MSD, without explicit instruction they may not do so (Buysse, Goldman, & Skinner, 2003; Hanline & Correa-Torres, 2012; Nijs & Maes, 2014).…”