The Role of Self-Regulation Skills and Digital Game Addiction Tendencies in Predicting Preschool Children's Prosocial Behaviors

Abstract

In the study, the role of self-regulation skills and digital game addiction tendencies in predicting the prosocial behavior of preschool children was examined. The study group of the research, which was conducted using the correlational model, consisted of 255 children aged 5-6 years who were studying in the kindergartens of the primary schools affiliated to the Ministry of National Education in the Efeler district of Aydın province in the 2022-2023 academic year. The data of the study were collected through the General Information Form filled by their parents for their children, The Digital Game Addiction Tendency Scale, The Self-Regulation Skills Scale for 4-6 Years-Old Children-Mother Form and The Child Prosociality Scale-Teacher Form filled by their teachers for children. In the research findings, a negative significant weak relationship was determined between the prosocial behaviors of preschool children and the conflict and reflection sub-dimensions of digital game addiction tendencies. A positive and significant weak relationship was determined between pre-school children's prosocial behaviors and the sum of their self-regulation skills and sub-dimensions of attention, working memory, inhibitory control-emotion, and inhibitory control-behavior. As a result of regression analysis, it was determined that self-regulation skills and digital game addiction tendencies of 5-6 year old children together predicted prosocial behavior variability by 14%. The findings showed that the most powerful predictors of the child's prosocial behavior are self-regulation skills, attention and inhibitory control-behavior sub-dimensions, and the tendency for digital game addiction to be the conflict sub-dimension. The findings were discussed in the light of the literature, and suggestions were made to those concerned that prevention and intervention studies should be given importance to the negative effects of digital games that contain negative elements and are exposed for long periods of time, and that it would be effective to address self-regulation skills in interventions and programs aimed at encouraging children's prosocial behaviors.