Preschool Children's Acceptance Attitudes Toward Peers with Disabilities: Empathy, Parental Expectations, and Differences Across Inclusive and Non-Inclusive Preschools

Description

This dataset was collected to examine the associations between preschool children’s empathy, parental expectations, and children’s acceptance attitudes toward peers with disabilities in both inclusive and non-inclusive kindergarten settings in China. The study hypothesized that (1) children's empathy would be positively associated with acceptance attitudes across contexts, (2) parental expectations would moderate this association, and (3) this moderation effect would be context-dependent, occurring only in inclusive preschools. The dataset contains cross-sectional data from 498 typically developing preschool children (254 boys, 244 girls) and their parents. Variables include child gender, grade level, classroom type (inclusive vs. non-inclusive), empathy scores (assessed using the vignette-based emotion task by Strayer & Rossberg-Gempton, 1992), parental expectation scores (measured by the Parental Expectations Questionnaire adapted by Wang et al., 2019), and children’s acceptance attitude scores (assessed by the Chinese version of the Acceptance Scale for Kindergartners–Revised, ASK-CR). Data were collected in Lishui City, Zhejiang Province, China. Notable findings included: empathy positively predicted acceptance attitudes in both inclusive and non-inclusive preschools, with no significant difference in this association across contexts; parental expectations moderated the empathy–acceptance link only in inclusive preschools, such that the positive association was stronger when parental expectations were higher. These findings suggest that empathy functions as a cross-contextual predictor of peer acceptance attitudes in early childhood, whereas the role of parental expectations depends on contact opportunities available in the educational setting. For detailed information on measures and procedures, please refer to the associated article.

Steps to reproduce

Data were collected cross-sectionally from 498 typically developing preschool children (254 boys, 244 girls) and their parents in Lishui City, Zhejiang Province, China. Children were recruited from both inclusive classrooms (with at least one child with disabilities) and non-inclusive classrooms. Children's empathy was assessed individually using a vignette-based emotion task (Strayer & Rossberg-Gempton, 1992), which measures children's ability to recognize and resonate with four basic emotions. Children's acceptance attitudes toward peers with disabilities were assessed in small groups (1–7 children) using the Chinese version of the Acceptance Scale for Kindergartners–Revised (ASK-CR; Ning & Liu, 2017). Parents independently completed the Parental Expectations Questionnaire (Wang et al., 2019), a 20-item scale assessing expectations across four dimensions: learning and development, family life, social competence, and self-care/independence. Data were analyzed using SPSS 27.0 and Mplus 8.3. For a complete description of participants, inclusion criteria, measures, and procedures, please refer to the Method section of the associated article.

Institutions

• Shaoxing University

  Zhejiang, Shaoxing

Categories

Funders

• National Education Sciences Planing of China

  Grant ID: BHA230157

Licence