COGNITION AND EMOTION

2006, 20 (8), 1170 1192

Showing and telling about emotions: Interrelations

between facets of emotional competence and
associations with classroom adjustment in Head Start
preschoolers
Alison L. Miller and Sarah E. Fine
Brown University School of Medicine, Bradley Hospital,
East Providence, RI, USA

Kathleen Kiely Gouley

New York University School of Medicine, USA
Ronald Seifer and Susan Dickstein
Brown University School of Medicine, Bradley Hospital,
East Providence, RI, USA
Ann Shields
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

In this study of low income preschoolers (N
/ 60), we examined relations between

three facets of emotional competence: emotion knowledge, level of negative
emotion expression, and emotion regulation; and their associations with indicators
of classroom adjustment. Emotion knowledge was positively related to positive
emotion regulation but was not related to negative emotion expression or negative
dysregulation. Negative emotion expression related to emotion regulation variables
in expected directions. Negative emotion expression was associated with aggression
and social skills after covarying verbal ability, age, and emotion knowledge.
Negative dysregulation was related in expected directions to aggression, anxiety,
and social skills after covarying verbal ability, age, emotion knowledge, and

Correspondence should be addressed to Dr Alison L. Miller, E. P. Bradley Hospital, Brown

University School of Medicine, 1011 Veterans Memorial Parkway, East Providence, RI 02915,
USA. E-mail: Alison_L_Miller@brown.edu
Drs Miller and Gouley conducted this work while supported by NRSA Postdoctoral
Fellowships (T32) granted to Brown University from the National Institute of Mental Health.
We would like to thank the New Visions for Newport County Head Start programme staff,
especially Kathy Stack, Ann Connery, and Cindy Larson. We would also particularly like to
thank the teachers, children, and families who participated in this project.

# 2006 Psychology Press, an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
www.psypress.com/cogemotion DOI: 10.1080/02699930500405691
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1171
negative emotion expression. Positive emotion regulation was related negatively to
anxiety and positively to social skills after covarying all other variables in the
model. Results are discussed with regard to using the emotional competence
domain to understand how emotion processing relates to early childhood
adjustment.

In the early childhood literature, the term ‘‘emotional competence’’ has been
used to refer to a myriad of emotion-related skills and behaviours that
should relate in predicted ways to positive child outcomes (e.g., social skills,
positive engagement in school; Cassidy, Werner, Rourke, Zubernis, &
Balaraman, 2003; Smith, 2001). Several facets of emotional competence
have been studied, with different research groups traditionally focusing on a
single emotion-processing skill, such as emotion knowledge (e.g., Izard,
Fine, Schultz, Mostow, Ackerman, & Youngstrom, 2001; Mostow, Izard,
Fine, & Trentacosta, 2002) or emotion regulation (e.g., Fox & Calkins, 2003;
Howse, Calkins, Anastopoulos, Keane, & Shelton, 2003). Consequently,
relatively few studies have examined connections between different facets of
emotional competence (for exceptions, see Arsenio, Cooperman, & Lover,
2000 and Denham et al., 2003). Furthermore, even fewer studies have
examined how such skills may relate to early school functioning among low
income children. This is an important group to study not only due to the
increased risk for both emotional and school adjustment difficulties as early
as the preschool years (Kaiser, Cai, Hancock, & Foster, 2002; Webster-
Stratton & Hammond, 1998), but also because there are high rates of within-
group variability in child outcomes among low income children that may be
partially explained by mechanisms like emotion processing skills (McLoyd,
1998; Raver, 2004).
In the current study, we examined connections between three facets of
emotional competence seen as important for child adjustment, namely,
frequency of negative emotion expression, emotion regulation, and emotion
knowledge. We also investigated whether each facet of emotional compe-
tence related to teacher-rated classroom adjustment after taking the other
aspects of emotional competence and other known predictors of child
functioning (i.e., gender, age, verbal ability) into account. We examined these
issues, using observation and interview methods, in a sample of low income
children. Although studies of low income children’s emotional competence
exist, research on associations between different facets of emotional
competence and relations to preschool functioning remains rare in this
population (Raver, 2004). Such work is important in order to understand
the complexity of the emotional competence domain and how it relates to
early school adjustment among low income preschoolers. Positive early
1172 MILLER ET AL.

experiences in school are important because they may place a high risk child
on a more promising developmental trajectory by fostering enthusiasm for
education and positive relationships with peers (Ladd, Buhs, & Seid, 2000)
and teachers (Pianta, 1997), whereas poor adjustment to preschool can set
the stage for more generalised school problems (e.g., poor grades, school
failure, retention, drop-out; Duncan, Brooks-Gunn, & Klebanov, 1994;
McLoyd, 1998). To gain a better understanding of the role of emotion skills
in early school adjustment for children at risk for such difficulties, we
examined individual differences in emotional competence and relations with
different indicators of early classroom adjustment among low income
children.

Connections between facets of emotional competence

According to Saarni (1999), emotional competence consists of several skills,
or facets, that emerge throughout the lifespan and are essential ingredients
for efficacy in interpersonal interactions and relationships. In preschool, as
children grow in their awareness of emotions, begin to interact with peers,
and experience the classroom environment for the first time, three facets of
emotional competence are particularly salient: (1) emotion knowledge, the
ability to discern others’ emotions based on contextual and expressive cues;
(2) emotion regulation, the ability to modulate the intensity or duration of
emotional states; and (3) expressed emotion in social situations (Denham
et al., 2003). Each facet develops at different rates for different children, via
ongoing transactions with the individual’s environment, thus it is likely that
the development of each facet has an impact on the development of the
others (Saarni, 1999).
It is not clear, however, whether or how these different facets of emotional
competence are associated in the early childhood years, at a time when
children generally show substantial growth in all three areas (Denham, 1998;
Garner, Jones, & Miner, 1994). Previous studies including more than one
facet of emotional competence have not typically focused on relations
between facets (e.g., Smith & Walden, 1999). As a result, there is little
information available concerning the interrelations of these three important
components of emotional competence in preschool. When researchers do
investigate interrelations between emotion knowledge, levels of negative
emotion expression, and emotion regulation, findings are mixed. Emotion
expressions and emotion regulation appear to be related, although in some
studies there is little differentiation between the two constructs, and in others
the two are combined into a single variable (see Cole, Martin, & Dennis,
2004; Denham, Blair, Schmidt, & DeMulder, 2002). When interrelations
between negative emotion expressions and emotion regulation are examined,
they appear to be moderate, such that children who express more negative
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1173

emotions tend to regulate through venting strategies, such as crying or using

aggression to release frustration (Denham et al., 2003; Fabes & Eisenberg,
1992).
Some have found that emotion knowledge is related (albeit weakly) to
emotion expressions (Denham et al., 2003). This research suggests that low
risk, middle income preschoolers who have higher levels of emotion
knowledge tend to express relatively more positive and less negative
emotion. Others have found, however, that emotion knowledge is not related
to expressed emotion or emotion regulation (Arsenio et al., 2000; Denham
et al., 2002). Such findings call to mind a child who can identify emotions
when prompted in a one-to-one situation, yet has difficulty regulating his/
her emotional expressions during affectively-charged peer social interac-
tions. Emotion regulation, expression, and knowledge may therefore
complement each other while remaining relatively independent during early
childhood (Halberstadt, Denham, & Dunsmore, 2001).
A shortcoming of previous research that may preclude a more sophisti-
cated understanding of emotional competence is that researchers have often
not considered verbal ability, although it has been linked with emotion
knowledge in both middle and low income samples (Dunn, Brown,
Slomkowski, Tesla, & Youngblade, 1991; Izard et al., 2001; Smith & Walden,
1998). Children with stronger verbal abilities are likely more able to augment
their inferences about emotions with verbal information, which could lead to
more accurate emotion perception. Additionally, most tasks assessing
children’s emotion knowledge contain a substantial verbal component,
rendering them in part a reflection of children’s language development
(Izard, 1971). In the current study, we included verbal ability as a covariate
in our examination of the relations between emotion knowledge, emotion
expression and emotion regulation.

Facets of emotional competence and early classroom

adjustment
Skills that fall within the domain of emotional competence are essential in a
preschool classroom environment. Such settings can be highly challenging
for young children owing to the necessity of following classroom rules
regarding limits, expectations (e.g., for sharing toys), and structure; learning
how to engage and comply with the teacher as a nonparental authority
figure; and negotiating social interactions with a large and initially
unfamiliar peer group (Belsky & MacKinnon, 1994). The abilities to control
emotional displays and to understand others’ emotions become particularly
important in such challenging social situations (Denham, 1998). Thus, the
preschool setting provides a developmentally salient social context in which
1174 MILLER ET AL.

to study how these three facets of emotional competence relate to early

school adjustment.
Preschool-age children’s emotional competence is associated with child
adjustment. For example, emotion knowledge has been linked to prosocial
behaviour, social skills, lower levels of internalising symptoms, and academic
competence (Denham, Bouril, & Belouad, 1994; Fine, Izard, Mostow,
Trentacosta, & Ackerman, 2003; Izard et al., 2001; Miller, Gouley, Seifer,
Dickstein, & Shields, 2004; Raver & Ebanks, 2001). This research suggests
that children who are relatively knowledgeable about others’ emotions may
be able to negotiate emotion-eliciting situations with peers in ways that
facilitate positive outcomes rather than lead to conflict. In later childhood,
these adaptive social skills can lead to additional positive outcomes, such as
high levels of peer acceptance (Mostow et al., 2002; Smith, 2001).
Emotional expressiveness, specifically infrequent expression of negative
emotion, has also been linked to positive outcomes, such as peer status, pro-
social behaviour and social skills (Eisenberg & Fabes, 1992; Eisenberg et al.,
1993; Garner & Estep, 2001; Walden, Lemerise, & Smith, 1999). Conversely,
deficits in emotion-processing skills related to emotion expression have also
been linked to aggression and behaviour problems in preschool (Arsenio &
Lover, 1997; Denham & Burger, 1991; Miller & Olson, 2000). The amount of
negative emotion a child expresses is particularly salient for peer interaction
(Fabes, Hanish, Martin, & Eisenberg, 2002). Children who often display
negative emotions may send the message to peers that they do not wish to
engage in play, for example, or their frequent expression of negative
emotions may reflect their dissatisfaction with peers who reject their efforts
to engage.
Emotion regulation has been closely linked with aggression in low and
high risk samples (Shields, Ryan, & Cicchetti, 2001; Ramsden & Hubbard,
2002). Children who experience difficulty ‘‘down-regulating’’ emotions in
affectively charged situations tend to exhibit more aggressive behaviour.
Adaptive emotion regulation is positively related to social competence in
younger children and peer preference in older children (Denham et al., 2003;
Shields et al., 2001). Low income children who are able to regulate their
emotions adaptively (e.g., who are able to calm themselves quickly when
upset) tend to form closer relationships with their teachers and are rated as
being more well-adjusted in the classroom environment (Shields et al., 2001).
Preschoolers who exhibit optimal emotion regulation also tend to experience
higher academic achievement (Howse et al., 2003).
When seeking to understand emotional competence and child outcomes, it
is important to take into account other child characteristics that may relate to
classroom adjustment, such as verbal ability, age, and sex. As noted above,
verbal ability is related to emotion knowledge (Smith & Walden, 1998).
Children’s emotion knowledge also increases with age (Brown & Dunn, 1996;
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1175

Denham, 1998), and older children are also better able to control and conceal
negative emotion expressions (Saarni, 1984). Although findings regarding sex
differences in emotional competence are somewhat inconclusive, some have
found that girls are more accurate in their perceptions of emotions than boys
(Casey, 1993; Schultz, Izard, & Ackerman, 2000).
In sum, findings indicate that each of the three facets of preschool
emotional competence is important for child outcomes. Few studies,
however, have investigated how each facet relates to child functioning after
taking the other facets (as well as other predictors of child adjustment such
as verbal ability, age, and sex) into account. We examined here not only
relations between facets of emotional competence, but also how each facet
was associated with teachers’ views of child classroom adjustment. Teachers
are an integral part of children’s early school experience, and are typically
the primary source used to judge classroom adjustment during the preschool
years (Milfort & Greenfield, 2002; Webster-Stratton & Lindsay, 1999).
Teacher reports of child functioning during the early years are also fairly
stable predictors of long-term outcomes (e.g., Kratz-Keiley, Bates, Dodge, &
Pettit, 2000). We considered teacher ratings of child functioning, including
social skills, aggression, and anxiety as our primary indices of classroom
adjustment.

Study goals and hypotheses

Our first goal was to examine connections between the three facets of
preschool emotional competence: emotion knowledge, levels of negative
emotion expression, and emotion regulation, covarying age, sex, and verbal
ability. We expected that negative emotion expression would be related to
emotion regulation, such that the tendency to express less negative emotion
in the classroom setting would be associated with teacher reports of higher
positive regulation and lower negative dysregulation of emotion. We
expected there would be some associations between negative emotion
expression and emotion knowledge, such that children who displayed less
negative emotion would be more knowledgeable about emotions. Based on
previous research with middle income samples (e.g., Denham et al., 2003),
we did not necessarily expect a relation between emotion knowledge and
emotion regulation.
Our second goal was to assess how different facets of emotional
competence were related to indices of classroom adjustment, namely social
skills, aggression, and anxiety. We expected children who possessed less
effective emotion-processing skills to have poorer classroom adjustment
outcomes in different areas (e.g., children with poorer emotion knowledge
would be less socially skilled). We did not have specific hypotheses about
which aspect of emotional competence would be more strongly related to
1176 MILLER ET AL.

teacher-rated outcomes, but expected that emotional competence in general

would be associated with classroom adjustment, after covarying age, sex,
and verbal ability.

METHOD
Participants
Participants were 60 children attending Head Start in a small city in the
northeastern United States. There were 18 classrooms represented, with a
maximum of six study children in any given classroom. Each classroom had
approximately 17 children, one lead teacher, and one teacher’s assistant.
Lead teachers completed all questionnaires for the current study.
Families were approached during summertime classroom placement
screenings and classroom open houses and asked if they would be willing
to have their child participate in the study (78% of families approached
agreed to participate). At the time of data collection (Spring of the academic
year), children ranged in age from 3.4 to 5.2 years (M
/4.34, SD
/0.53; 58%
female). This relatively wide age range was due to the fact that children may
enrol in the Head Start programme from as early as 2 years, 9 months of age,
although most children are 4-year-olds. Of the children, 45% (n
/27) were
Caucasian, 17% (n
/10) were African-American, 10% (n
/6) were Latino,
and 27% (n
/16) were Mixed Race/Ethnicity (1% missing data; 1 child).
Mean income for participating families was $11,880 per year (range: $1,973 
30,972), with an average of 3.8 people in the home (1.35 adults; 2.48
children).

Procedure
In the spring (MarchApril) of the school year, children’s teachers
completed several questionnaires, including measures of emotion regulation,
social skills, aggression, and anxiety. Independent observers (two postdoc-
toral-level psychologists) observed children in their classrooms during
‘‘centre-time’’ activities to assess emotional expressiveness during relatively
structured play periods. To assess emotion knowledge and verbal abilities,
children were individually interviewed by a research assistant in a quiet area
outside the classroom.

Measures
Expressed emotions in the classroom
Handheld computers were used to conduct live observations of
children’s classroom behaviour (using the Observer software and the Psion
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1177

Workabout, Noldus Technologies, 1995). The handheld computers gener-

ated ASCII files (representing a second-by-second record of keystrokes;
see below), which were downloaded and processed using SPSS software
and macros. Each child was observed twice (typically a few days to
2 weeks apart) during classroom free play for 10 min each, for a total of
20 min of observation per child. Data from both observations were
combined to create variables representing the mean proportion duration
of each behaviour state (based on 10 min of observation, the average time
per observation).
The Observer software allows coding of behaviour along multiple
dimensions. Continuous behaviour state dimensions are coded by pressing
the key corresponding to the new behaviour state each time a behaviour state
changes. For example, within the continuous behavioural state dimension of
emotion expression (see description below), a child may experience any of
seven different mutually exclusive emotion states (e.g., positive emotion
expression), the onset and offset of which are indicated by a key press. In this
way, continuous behaviour state changes are recorded in a time-linked
fashion. Two continuous behaviour state dimensions (emotion state and
social engagement) were coded, but emotion states are the focus of the
current investigation. Coders trained until they achieved intraclass correla-
tions of .80 or greater for each code (ongoing coder reliability ranged from
.59 to .96).
Seven mutually exclusive, exhaustive, time-based emotion states were
coded (adapted from Miller & Olson, 2000). These included Neutral
Expressions (e.g., no discernible facial or vocal expression), Positive
Expressions (e.g., smiling, laughing), Mild Negative Expressions (e.g.,
whining), Sadness Expressions (e.g., crying), Anger Expressions (e.g., yelling,
angry facial expression), Intense Negative Expressions (e.g., sad or angry
affect displays of such intensity that they disrupt child’s activity), and
Behavioural Dysregulation (e.g., emotionally neutral or positive states of
highly active motor behaviour).

Emotion knowledge
Children’s emotion knowledge was assessed via interviews. Interviews
were conducted by research assistants in a quiet, semi-private area of the
school, and typically took about 15 min to complete.

Emotion recognition. To assess emotion recognition, children were asked

to label pictures of facial expressions (Denham, 1986). They were shown a
series of four drawn feeling faces (depicting happy, sad, angry, and scared)
and asked to identify the emotion using words (expressive recognition).
Subsequently, children were given the name of the emotion and asked to
1178 MILLER ET AL.

identify it out of the series of feeling faces (receptive recognition).

Interviewers were instructed not to give any cues during these tasks in order
to assess whether children could label these common emotions without such
cues. Responses were scored 0 if incorrect, 1 if the correct valence was given
(e.g., ‘‘sad’’ for ‘‘angry’’), and 2 if correct. Due to the objective nature of this
scoring system, reliability was not calculated on these scores; any unclear
responses were resolved by consensus. Following Denham (1986), children’s
responses were standardised within each affective domain (happy, angry, sad,
scared), and summary scores were computed to capture Total Emotion
Recognition (sum of expressive and receptive expression recognition for all
emotions; Cronbach’s a
/.63).

Emotion situation knowledge. To assess their understanding of how

social situations can elicit emotion, children were next read eight vignettes
that typically evoke particular common emotions (Garner et al., 1994).
These vignettes included two each for happy, sad, angry, and scared, and the
children were asked to identify how the character in the story felt (e.g.,
‘‘Susie got an icecream cone; how is she feeling?’’). Children were not given
specific emotion alternatives to choose from; however, they could point to
the faces that were used in the emotion recognition section of the interview.
Interviewers were instructed not to give any behavioural cues in order to
assess whether children could report emotional responses to different
situations based on social context cues alone. Responses were scored as
for emotion recognition (Cronbach’s a
/.74).

Expressive behaviour knowledge. Children’s ability to understand how

others are feeling by reading behavioural cues about emotion in different
contexts were assessed. In this portion of the protocol, interviewers used
puppets and emphasised behavioural emotion cues (i.e., vocal and facial
expressions) to enact stories depicting eight situations in which the main
character likely would experience happiness, sadness, anger, or fear
(Denham, 1986). At the end of each story, children were asked to identify
how they thought the protagonist might feel. Responses were scored as for
emotion recognition (Cronbach’s a
/.71).

Emotion regulation
The 24-item Emotion Regulation Checklist (ERC; Shields & Cicchetti,
1997) was used to measure teacher perceptions of child emotion regulation.
Teachers were asked to rate on a 4-point scale how characteristic each item is
of a child’s emotion regulation style (‘‘almost always’’ to ‘‘never’’). Subscales
were created by taking the mean of all items in the subscale. The subscales
represent Positive Emotion Regulation (7 items; e.g., ‘‘Is empathetic towards
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1179

others; shows concern when others are upset or distressed’’; Cronbach’s

a
/.83) and Negative Dysregulation (16 items; e.g., ‘‘Responds angrily to
limit setting by adults,’’ ‘‘Is prone to disruptive outbursts of energy or
exuberance’’; Cronbach’s a
/.92). (One ERC item was dropped due to
ambiguous wording.)

Verbal abilities
The Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test (PPVT-R; Dunn & Dunn, 1981)
was administered to assess children’s verbal abilities.

Teacher-rated classroom adjustment

Social skills. Teachers reported on children’s social skills using the
subscales of Cooperation (10 items; e.g., ‘‘Compromises in conflict situations
by changing own ideas to reach agreement’’; Cronbach’s a
/.91), Assertion
(10 items; e.g., ‘‘Introduces him/herself to new people without being told’’;
Cronbach’s a
/.89), and Self-Control (10 items; e.g., ‘‘Responds appro-
priately to teasing by peers’’; Cronbach’s a
/.89) from the Social Skills
Rating Scale (SSRS; Gresham & Elliott, 1990). The instrument used a 3-
point response scale that was adapted slightly to read ‘‘never’’, ‘‘sometimes’’,
and ‘‘very often’’. Subscales were created by taking the mean of all items in
the subscale.

Aggression and anxiety. Teachers completed the Hostile/Aggressive (11

items; Cronbach’s a
/.94) and Anxious (9 items; Cronbach’s a
/.81)
subscales of the Preschool Behavior Questionnaire (PBQ; Behar & String-
field, 1974). Responses are measured on a 3-point scale from ‘‘does not
apply’’ to ‘‘certainly applies’’ (e.g., ‘‘Fights with other children’’, ‘‘Is worried.
Worries about many things’’.). The aggression and anxiety subscales were
created by summing the scores of all items in each subscale.

Data reduction
We created a composite variable, Negative Emotion Expression, to reflect
the total mean proportion of time a child spent in a negative emotional state
(Angry, Sad, Mild Negative, or Intense Negative; Cronbach’s a
/.51). We
standardised and aggregated emotion recognition, emotion situation knowl-
edge, and expressive behaviour knowledge scales to create a single index of
children’s Emotion Knowledge (Cronbach’s a
/.86). We also standardised
and aggregated the Cooperation, Assertion, and Self-Control scales to create
a single index of children’s Social Skills (Cronbach’s a
/.91).
1180 MILLER ET AL.

RESULTS
Age, sex, and verbal ability
Table 1 presents raw score means and standard deviations for all simple and
composite variables included in the present study. Zero order correlations
between age, sex, verbal ability, and the facets of emotional competence
revealed that verbal ability was positively related to the emotion knowledge
scales (rs ranged from .36 to .44, p B/.01), total emotion knowledge (r
/.48,
p B/.01), and positive emotion regulation (r
/.28, pB/.05). Age was
positively related to emotion situation knowledge (r
/.47, p B/.01), expres-
sive behaviour knowledge (r
/.45, p B/.01), and the total emotion knowledge
score (r
/.42, pB/.01). Sex was not significantly related to any facets of
emotional competence and was therefore not included in subsequent
analyses.

Associations between facets of emotional competence

We used partial correlation analyses to examine relations between facets
of emotional competence (see Table 2), partialing verbal ability and
age. After covarying verbal ability and age, emotion situation knowledge,
expressive behaviour knowledge, and total emotion knowledge were
positively related to positive emotion regulation. Negative emotion
TABLE 1
Means (and standard deviations) for all variables

Variable M (SD) Min. Max.

PPVT 85.63 (19.88) 41.00 125.00

Emotion recognition 13.10 (2.17) 4.00 16.00
Emotion situation knowledge 10.26 (3.86) 2.00 16.00
Expressive behaviour knowledge 11.51 (3.53) 2.00 16.00
Sadness expressions 0.007 (0.011) 0.00 0.05
Anger expressions 0.003 (0.008) 0.00 0.05
Mild negative expressions 0.024 (0.029) 0.00 0.15
Intense negative expressions 0.001 (0.004) 0.00 0.02
Negative emotion expression 0.035 (0.037) 0.00 0.17
ERC Positive Emotion Regulation 3.25 (0.60) 1.86 4.00
ERC Negative Dysregulation 1.80 (0.57) 1.00 3.38
SSRS Assertion 2.32 (0.38) 1.30 3.00
SSRS Self-Control 2.30 (0.42) 1.40 3.00
SSRS Cooperation 2.37 (0.43) 1.57 3.00
PBQ Aggression 5.60 (5.56) 0.00 21.0
PBQ Anxiety 4.20 (3.10) 0.00 13.0

PPVT, Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test; ERC, Emotion Regulation Checklist; SSRS, Social Skills
Rating Scale; PBQ, Preschool Behaviour Questionnaire.
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1181
TABLE 2
Correlations between facets of emotional competence, controlling for age and verbal
ability

Variable 1 2 3 4 5 6

1. Emotion recognition 1.00

2. Emotion situation knowledge .44** 1.00
3. Expressive behaviour knowledge .44** .63** 1.00
4. Total emotion knowledge .80** .83** .83** 1.00
5. Negative emotion expression .03 /.07 /.11 /.06 1.00
6. Negative dysregulation .10 /.10 /.08 /.03 .45** 1.00
7. Positive emotion regulation .18 .29* .33* .32* /.32* /.50**

*p B/.05; **p B/.01.

expression was related to positive emotion regulation and negative

dysregulation in expected directions.

Emotion knowledge and observed negative emotion

In order to examine the relations between facets of emotional competence
and teacher ratings of classroom adjustment (i.e., aggression, anxiety, and
social skills), we performed a series of three hierarchical regression analyses.
In each analysis, age, and verbal ability were entered in Step 1 and negative
emotion expression and emotion knowledge were entered in Step 2. Positive
emotion regulation and negative dysregulation were entered in Step 3 to
permit examination of the contributions of emotion knowledge and negative
emotion expression to indices of teacher-rated classroom adjustment
separately from the contributions of emotion regulation, which was also
rated by the teacher. Table 3 presents the results of the regression analyses.
The Step 1 variables did not account for significant R2 change in any of
the models. Step 2 of the model accounted for significant R2 change in the
aggression (22%) and social skills (14%) models. Negative emotion expres-
sion was positively related to aggression and negatively related to social skills
after accounting for age, verbal ability, and emotion knowledge. Emotion
knowledge was not related to any of the teacher ratings of classroom
adjustment after controlling for other variables in the model.
Step 3 of the model accounted for significant R2 change in each of the
three indices of classroom adjustment (29 62%). As expected, teacher
ratings of negative dysregulation were positively related to aggression and
anxiety and negatively related to social skills after controlling for all other
variables in the model. Positive emotion regulation was negatively related to
anxiety and positively related to social skills after controlling for verbal
ability, age, and the other facets of emotional competence. Interestingly,
1182 MILLER ET AL.
TABLE 3
Multivariate regression of teacher reported variables on verbal ability, age, and facets
of emotional competence

Teacher variable B SE B b R2 change Model R2

PBQ Aggression .82

Step 1: Age 0.95 1.44 .09 .01
Verbal ability 0.00 0.04 .00
Step 2: Age 0.90 1.58 .08 .22**
Verbal ability /0.02 0.04 /.09
Negative emotion expression 1.01 0.26 .47**
Emotion knowledge 0.22 0.36 .11
Step 3: Age 0.76 0.79 .07 .60**
Verbal ability 0.00 0.02 .02
Negative emotion expression 0.16 0.15 .08
Emotion knowledge 0.24 0.19 .11
Negative dysregulation 8.68 0.76 .86**
Positive emotion regulation /0.16 0.75 /.02
PBQ Anxiety .38
Step 1: Age /0.43 0.80 /.07 .04
Verbal ability /0.03 0.02 /.19
Step 2: Age 0.29 0.97 .05 .05
Verbal ability /0.01 0.03 /.09
Negative emotion expression 0.21 0.16 .17
Emotion knowledge /0.24 0.22 /.20
Step 3: Age /0.13 0.82 /.02 .29**
Verbal ability 0.00 0.02 .00
Negative emotion expression /0.11 0.15 /.09
Emotion knowledge /0.04 0.20 /.03
Negative dysregulation 1.70 0.79 .30*
Positive emotion regulation /2.35 0.78 /.43**
Social Skills .80
Step 1: Age 0.52 0.61 .11 .05
Verbal ability 0.02 0.02 .21
Step 2: Age 0.05 0.72 .01 .14*
Verbal ability 0.02 0.02 .16
Negative emotion expression /0.33 0.12 /.35**
Emotion knowledge 0.12 0.17 .12
Step 3: Age 0.42 0.37 .09 .62**
Verbal ability 0.00 0.01 .03
Negative emotion expression 0.04 0.07 .04
Emotion knowledge /0.06 0.09 /.06
Negative dysregulation /2.42 0.35 /.56**
Positive emotion regulation 2.08 0.34 .50**

*p B/.05; **p B/.01.

 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1183

negative emotion expression was no longer related to social skills or

aggression after the emotion regulation variables had been entered.

DISCUSSION
The purpose of the current investigation was to examine relations between
different facets of emotional competence *specifically emotion displays in
the classroom setting, emotion knowledge, and emotion regulation *among
low income preschoolers, and to examine how each facet of emotional
competence was related to teacher ratings of child adjustment. Although
there were no associations between emotion knowledge and observed
negative emotions, observed negative emotion expression in the classroom
setting was a strong predictor of teacher ratings, and emotion knowledge
predicted positive regulation, even after covarying verbal ability. Results are
discussed with regard to understanding emotional competence at this age
and the implications that different facets of emotional competence may have
for functioning during the early childhood years.

Connections between facets of emotional competence

Consistent with previous research, displays of negative emotion in the
classroom were related to teacher ratings of both positive emotion regulation
and negative dysregulation. Despite the relatively infrequent occurrence of
negative emotion displays in the classroom, it seems clear that children who
express more negative emotions in this setting are perceived as less
emotionally regulated by their teachers.
After covarying age and verbal ability, there were no associations between
displays of negative emotion in the classroom and emotion knowledge. This
result was somewhat surprising, although not entirely dissimilar to what
others have found. That is, relations among these two facets of emotional
competence are often not very strong, but rather in the small to medium
effect size range for both middle and low income samples (e.g., Arsenio
et al., 2000; Denham et al., 2003; Garner & Power, 1996). The lack of
connection between emotion knowledge and observed emotional expression
found in the current study may be partially explained by the notion that
emotion knowledge is a relatively static set of sociocognitive skills a child
possesses, whereas emotional expression is a dynamic behaviour that can
change dramatically with social context. Depending on the nature of a social
interaction, therefore, these two constructs may be relatively unrelated in the
preschool years. For example, if a child gets into conflict with peers in the
preschool classroom, it may be difficult for that child to control his/her
emotional expression, regardless of whether or not he/she can identify
others’ emotions. In less challenging situations, however, a child’s emotion
1184 MILLER ET AL.

knowledge, beyond his/her expressed emotions alone, may be vital for

engaging peers or teachers. These different*yet equally important *aspects
of emotional competence likely each have unique implications for child
functioning.
Emotion knowledge was also unrelated to ratings of negative dysregula-
tion, which is consistent with previous research conducted with middle
income children (e.g., Denham et al., 2002). We did find, however, that
emotion knowledge was associated with ratings of positive emotion
regulation, a construct that often has not been measured in previous
research. Children who possessed greater understanding of emotion expres-
sions, situations, and expressive behaviours were rated as more likely to
respond positively to peer and teacher overtures, more able to state clearly
how they feel, and more likely to show concern and empathy toward others.
It may be that emotion knowledge skills are most crucial in circumstances
that do not require a child to use energy and resources to control his/her own
negative emotion displays. In such situations, a child who possesses strong
emotion knowledge skills and is not flooded by his/her own negative
emotions may be more available to respond to the emotional cues of others.
Emotion knowledge skills may thereby foster extended social interactions
and facilitate the growth of interpersonal relationships. Emotion knowledge
skills may be less helpful in emotionally challenging situations. Maintaining
a neutral expression on one’s face can be paramount when a bully
approaches, for example, whereas being able to identify how the bully is
feeling may not make a difference for the threatened child. In sum, a child
who possesses strong emotion knowledge skills, above and beyond verbal
abilities, is likely at an advantage in situations that do not pose great
emotional challenge, but such skills may not play as important a role in the
‘‘heat of the moment’’, when the child’s own emotion displays may more
directly determine the outcome of an emotionally charged interaction
(Lemerise & Arsenio, 2000).
Our findings indicate that although the domain of emotional competence
is theoretically useful, all facets of emotional competence are not necessarily
empirically related, at least during the early childhood years (see also
Denham et al., 2003; Halberstadt et al., 2001). Although we did not find
associations between preschoolers’ emotion knowledge and negative emo-
tion expressions, it seems likely that, over time, a child’s propensity to
express negative emotions in the classroom setting (or not) would relate to
the growth of that child’s abilities to discern others’ emotion expressions,
and to understand how different situations may elicit different emotions. For
example, a child who spends significant amounts of time expressing negative
emotions and focusing on his/her own negative emotional state may have less
opportunity for interacting with peers under emotionally neutral circum-
stances and thus have less of a chance to notice others’ emotions and
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1185

develop an understanding of how others feel in different situations. Thus, in

later childhood, these facets of emotional competence may become
increasingly interrelated.
The current study focused on low income children, so it is important to
note that findings may not generalise to all children. For low income
children, whose home, neighbourhood, and school environments may
expose them to higher levels of stress than are experienced by their middle
income counterparts (McLoyd, 1998; Raver, 2004), greater demands may be
placed on their emotion-processing skills, and a deficit in one facet may have
more influence over the development of the others. For example, children as
young as preschool age are able, to some extent, to regulate their emotional
displays based on contextual cues and their understanding of emotion
situations, such as the likelihood of receiving comfort or getting in trouble
for expressing emotions (Zeman, Penza, Shipman, & Young, 1997). Pre-
school-aged children who are exposed to multiple stresses, such as those
faced by individuals living in poverty, may benefit more from strong
connections between facets of emotional competence, as more may be at
stake as a result of the ability to modulate and express emotions. Although
we could not test this hypothesis in the current study, it may be an interesting
direction for future work.

Facets of emotional competence

We found that only two facets of emotional competence predicted teacher
ratings of preschool classroom adjustment. Specifically, expression of
negative emotion was related to teacher-rated social skills and aggression
in the expected direction, even when controlling for other covariates (age,
gender, verbal ability, and emotion knowledge). However, it is important to
note that negative emotion expression was no longer related to these
variables once the teacher-rated emotion regulation variables had been
entered. Both positive and negative aspects of emotion regulation predicted
social skills, anxiety, and aggression when controlling for all other covariates.
Although conclusions about the strength of association between emotion
regulation and indices of classroom adjustment must be tempered in the
present study because both ratings were provided by children’s teachers,
these findings are consistent with past research with middle income children
indicating that regulating one’s emotions is an important achievement in
early childhood, one that is crucial to success in the structured classroom
environment (Denham et al., 2003). Children who are perceived as
experiencing fewer changes in their emotional states, better able to calm
themselves when upset, and generally more emotionally even-keeled are also
rated as exhibiting fewer aggressive and anxious behaviours. In addition,
these children are rated as being better able to engage with peers in an
1186 MILLER ET AL.

adaptive manner, suggesting they may be more available for social

interaction and less consumed by the intense emotions that often accompany
early peer conflicts, such as having to share toys or waiting for a turn on the
tricycle. As noted earlier, teacher-rated emotion regulation was related to
expressed emotion, providing some evidence to support this idea.
Although there is heuristic value in distinguishing between the regulation
and expression of emotion, it is also important to highlight that distinctions
between these two facets of emotional competence are often not empirically
or theoretically clear, and that these constructs may in fact be part of the
same ongoing process (Campos, Frankel, & Camras, 2004). The informant
confound in the present study precluded an in-depth examination of
relations between emotion regulation, emotion expression, and child
outcomes. For example, we were not able to determine whether a lack of
negative emotion expression in the classroom was due to low emotional
arousal or to effective regulation, which could be important in under-
standing intersystem connections (Eisenberg & Spinrad, 2004). In future
work, using multiple methods and/or controlled settings to elicit emotion
may help explicate the process by which these facets are related and how
each relates to child outcomes. Furthermore, when considering emotional
competence and child outcomes from a functional perspective, it is perhaps
most important to understand how a child’s emotion behaviour has an
impact on his/ her social functioning in the classroom, rather than to focus
on primarily whether such behaviour was the result of strong feelings or low
regulation (Campos et al., 2004).
In the current study, we found that expressed negative emotion in class
was clearly salient for teachers’ views of children’s classroom adjustment.
Children who spent more time in negative emotional states were rated by
teachers as less socially skilled and more aggressive. Although not
surprising, it was notable that even though the mean levels of expressed
negative emotion were relatively low, negative emotions explained significant
variance in two teacher-rated outcomes after controlling for verbal ability,
age, gender, and emotion knowledge. Thus, the expression of negative
emotion in the classroom setting was something that teachers viewed as
particularly meaningful, beyond a child’s age or the ability to communicate
verbally. A child’s emotional presence in the classroom may differ from his/
her verbal contributions. That is, although a child may be able to express
him/herself well verbally, even using emotion-related words, displays of
negative emotions may be even more important for that child’s classroom
adjustment from the teacher’s perspective. Teachers in a busy classroom
setting, who must manage the needs of many children at once, may prioritise
observed expressions of emotion over emotion knowledge. In a preschool
classroom, a child who frequently expresses negative emotions is likely more
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1187

disruptive to classroom activities than a child who is unable to state clearly

how he/she is feeling using emotion vocabulary words.
After controlling for facets of emotional competence and other predictors
of child classroom adjustment, emotion knowledge was not related to
teacher ratings of social skills, aggression, or anxiety. Although past studies
have suggested that emotion knowledge in early childhood does contribute
to concurrent adaptive functioning (Denham, McKinley, Couchoud, &
Holt, 1990), few take the simultaneous roles of other facets of emotional
competence into account. It may be that in early childhood, the ability to
modulate and regulate one’s negative emotions is most important for
succeeding in the classroom environment, as our results suggest. As children
develop, however, sociocognitive skills, such as discerning the emotions of
others based on contextual cues, may be increasingly valuable as interactions
become subtler and the social world becomes more complicated. Children
with more advanced emotion knowledge skills in the initial years of formal
schooling may be able to lay the groundwork for positive social interactions
and relationships early. Although this advantage may not be evident in
preschool, as time passes these children may benefit from such skills
(Denham et al., 2003; Fine et al., 2003; Izard et al., 2001).

Limitations and directions for future research

As in all studies, there are limitations that should be noted. First, there is a
clear informant confound in that one of the facets of emotional competence
and all indices of classroom adjustment were measured using teacher ratings.
Although we conducted our analyses in a way that enabled us to examine the
contributions of emotion knowledge and emotion expressions separately
from the contributions of teacher-rated emotion regulation, this method
precluded comparisons of the relative strengths of associations between all
facets of emotional competence and indices of classroom adjustment.
Furthermore, the fact that children were nested within classrooms (and
thus rated by the same teacher) is also an important statistical limitation.
Although sample size precluded examination of classroom-level effects in the
current study, it would be important to consider the potential role of
classroom influence in future work.
A second limitation is that the lack of association between some facets of
emotional competence may be due to measurement and power issues. With a
larger sample size we might have found stronger relations between observed
emotion expression and emotion knowledge; however, even in studies with
larger samples (e.g., Denham et al., 2003), correlations between these two
facets of emotional competence were moderate at best. Low correlations
with observed emotion expression variables may also partially be explained
by the relatively low reliability coefficients of some of these variables. This
1188 MILLER ET AL.

issue is often a hazard of observational research due to low base rates of

salient behaviours, such as negative dysregulation (Wehby & Symonds,
1996), and in future research it would be helpful to collect more observations
in order to maximise the possibility of seeing negative emotions expressed.
Similarly, it would have been ideal to collect multiple measures of each
construct of interest. For example, as noted earlier, the emotion knowledge
measures used in the current study (and most others) prioritise verbal
abilities, such that a child who is verbally advanced will likely be able to
describe his/her knowledge of emotions more effectively than another child.
It would thus be helpful in future research to assess emotion knowledge
skills in particular in ways that place fewer verbal demands on the child.
Others are currently developing such methods that may prove to be useful in
this regard (e.g., Izard, Haskins, Schultz, Trentacosta, & King, 2003). Even
with a less verbally demanding task, however, it is crucial to remember that a
child’s ability to articulate his/her emotion knowledge in a one-to-one
interview context still may not translate to that child’s emotional behaviour
in the peer context, where the emotional demands may be greater. Thus, it
will always be important to consider how a given emotional competence skill
is used in context when deciding methods by which to assess the skill.
Finally, because this was a correlational study, we cannot determine the
direction of effects with regard to associations among facets of emotional
competence and classroom adjustment. For example, it may be that
children’s expressed negative emotion in the classroom led to greater
difficulty with peers and teachers. Alternatively, it may be that children
who experienced more classroom success to begin with displayed less
negative emotion because they were content in the classroom setting. In
all likelihood these relations are bidirectional, requiring longitudinal study
designs in order to determine directions of effects over time in the
development of adaptive functioning in school and the social arena.

Conclusion
Emotional competence is a broad unifying domain that can be helpful in
organising research and theory regarding emotion-processing skills. It is
crucial to consider how different facets of this domain interrelate, and not to
assume that because someone may be proficient with regard to one facet of
emotional competence that he/she is competent in all areas, particularly
early in development. In fact, discrepancies in emotion-processing skills that
become entrenched over time can be a feature of mental health difficulties
(Cole, Michel, & Teti, 1994). The current study adds to the early childhood
emotional competence literature by examining relations between three facets
of emotional competence seen as important for child adjustment, namely,
expressed negative emotion, emotion regulation, and emotion knowledge.
 FACETS OF EMOTIONAL COMPETENCE 1189

By studying these issues in a sample of low income preschool-age children,

we were able to expand upon previous research on middle income
populations (e.g., Arsenio et al., 2000; Denham et al., 2003) by providing
some evidence for conceptual similarity in the emotional competence
construct, yet also uncovering potentially important within-group varia-
bility. Such variability indicates that emotion-processing skills may serve as a
point of entry for intervention with low income children at risk for early
classroom adjustment problems. In future work we plan to examine
longitudinal relations among facets of emotional competence in order to
assess how different emotion-processing skills interrelate and are associated
with child outcomes throughout development.

Manuscript received 10 December 2003

Revised manuscript received 9 February 2005

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