In the first five years, children develop rapidly across five primary developmental domains. Social competence is one of the five developmental domains where children begin to identify the feelings of others, use moral reasoning, and ability to cooperate. At this stage, children also develop attachments and learn how to interact with others, for instance, sharing, and accepting differences that exist between their peers, exploring new things, and developing respect and responsibility in the community. At the social competence stage, children develop different types of relationships with peers, parents, teachers, and community members (Daelmans et al., 2015). Examining the social competence developmental domain and its vulnerability is critical towards understanding how the child interacts with other children and the environment.
Vulnerability among children is the outcome of the interaction between an individual and environmental factors. The types and degree of child vulnerability vary depending on the changes that happen in the individual and environmental factors. For example, age in children determines their needs and at the same time exposes them to potential new risks. Infants who completely depend on their caregivers are particularly vulnerable to parent's conditions and material deprivation. Young children are vulnerable and can be affected by the stress that the family is experiencing because they are at a rapid pace of early brain development (Nurius et al., 2015). In the social competence developmental domain, a vulnerable kid can portray some behaviors such as inability to learn and make sound decisions, shyness, inability to explore and engage with the environment, and inability to establish and sustain positive relationships.
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Examining a single School District as a whole is essential towards understanding how infants and early school-age children perform when it comes to social competence development. The long-term trend results from wave 2 to wave 7 indicate that three out of four basic subscales in the social competence domain (respect and responsibility, approaches to learning, and overall social competence) are in a worsening vulnerability trend. The subscale on readiness to explore new things indicates a different pattern from the other where it shows a relatively stable long-term trend from wave 2 to wave 7. The overall child vulnerability between wave 2 and wave 7 has increased from 29.9% to 33.4% respectively.
Several factors contribute to the vulnerability of a child, for instance, environmental factors, and genetic factors among the children. The type of environment where a child is brought up plays a critical role in determining the level of vulnerability, for instance, children who access necessary resources are likely to have good development and become less vulnerable compared to those with little or no resources. Genetic factors, on the other hand, determines the level of vulnerability of a child by influencing the behavior and attitude of an individual. The interaction between the environment and genetics influences the rate of vulnerability among children.
The environment where an individual is raised or lives plays a critical role in determining the level of vulnerability among the children and applies to both family and community levels. On the family level, there are factors such as poverty and material deprivation, the health of the parents and guardians, parent's education level, and family stress. On the community level factors revolve around the school for the school-going children and the neighborhood environments. Poverty and deprivation of materials increase the level of vulnerability of a child because it determines the availability of necessary resources that ensure proper development and wellbeing of children (Blair & Raver, 2016). For example, children in homeless families are likely to suffer from low well-being due to various stressors they experience such as poor diet, missing meals, high level of anxiety, overcrowded living condition, loss of contact and support from friends, and stigmatization. Exposing a child to such a condition affect their normal development and increases their vulnerability level in the community.
The parent's education level also determines the vulnerability among the children. Because the level of education and the income of the parent help the children to succeed regardless of the ability and skills. Parents who are educated provide their children with numerous benefits and resources that enable them to overcome the challenges allowing them to grow well and advance. The stress in the family can also increase the vulnerability among the children. The presence of chronic stress among children in their early stages of life contributes to emotional and behavioral difficulties. Stress during childhood stages weakens the foundation of brain development, causes epigenetic adaptations, and affects the immune system of an individual (Provençal & Binder, 2015). Therefore, when children live in a family full of stress, they are likely to develop high rates of vulnerability because it exposes them to poor development and emotional difficulties.
The neighborhoods also have a causal effect on the development of children. Some of the neighborhoods vary in opportunities that allow normal development among the infants and early school-age children because some have support mechanisms to promote effective child development, while other have numerous stressor and few protective factors (Parent et al., 2021). On the other hand, neighborhoods can also be a high-opportunity place to ensure a proper child development. Some neighborhoods have good resources that improve social interaction among many other essential requirements for proper child development. Depending on the type and nature of the neighborhood, children can experience a reduced or increased vulnerability where an increase in vulnerability level is observed when there are many stressors and few protective factors.
The genes of a child and that of a parent play a critical role in determining vulnerability level. Some of the environmental factors induce epigenetic changes, for instance, pollution, and exposure to a high level of stressors. Many chemicals can cause a permanent change in gene expression during the developmental stage of a child causing cognitive developmental disabilities thus increasing vulnerability. Heavy metal pollutants such as arsenic, copper, aluminum, cadmium, and iron can cause epigenetic alterations that can cause developmental abnormalities and challenges among children in the process increasing their vulnerability rates. Exposure to a high level of psychological stressors at an early age can induce epigenetic changes influencing normal development among the children, in turn increasing their vulnerability levels (Vaiserman, 2015). The health condition of the child also determines their level of vulnerability. Due to genetics parents can transmit risk factors for poor health to their offspring. High socioeconomic status also moderates certain genetic risks; for instance, smoking can influence a gene variant that predicts high educational attainment and learning capability. Epigenetics also indicates that exposure to stressful early life can affect gene expression affect the normal development of children and also increasing their vulnerability rates.
Social competence is one of the developmental domains where children begin to identify the feelings of others, enhanced cooperation, and the ability to establish moral reasoning. In this stage children also learn to interact with others, explore new things and develop respect and responsibility in society. EDI vulnerability results indicate that majority of the basic subscale in social competence between wave 2 and wave 7 is worsening except the one for exploring new things. The overall vulnerability between wave 2 and 7 is at 29.9% and 34.4% respectively. Many factors influence the level of vulnerability among the children and it includes; the environment and genetic dispositions. The interaction between the individual and environment can influence the developmental process and the outcomes influencing the rate of vulnerability. Changes in the genetics of an individual can expose one to diseases or abnormal developments among the children in turn increasing their vulnerability rate. Mitigating the risks and reducing negative outcomes from the environment and epigenetic changes enable children to benefit from the positive experience and reduce their vulnerability.
References
Blair, C., & Raver, C. C. (2016). Poverty, stress, and brain development: New directions for prevention and intervention. Academic pediatrics, 16(3) , 30-36.
Daelmans, B., Black, M. M., & Lombardi, J. (2015). Effective interventions and strategies for improving early child development. Bmj , 351.
Nurius, P. S., Green, S., & Logan-Greene, P. (2015). Life course pathways of adverse childhood experiences toward adult psychological well-being: A stress process analysis. Child abuse & neglect, 45 , 143-153.
Parent, N., Guhn, M., Brussoni, M., & Almas, A. (2021). Social determinants of playing outdoors in the neighbourhood: Family characteristics, trust in neighbours and daily outdoor play in early childhood. Canadian Journal of Public Health, 112(1) , 120-127.
Provençal, N., & Binder, E. B. (2015). The effects of early life stress on the epigenome: from the womb to adulthood and even before. Experimental neurology, 268 , 10-20.
Vaiserman, A. M. (2015). Epigenetic programming by early ‐ life stress: Evidence from human populations. Developmental Dynamics, 244(3) , 254-265.
