Social behaviour, socio-cognitive skills and attachment style in school-aged children: what is the relation with academic outcomes?

The present research explored the relation between socio-cognitive skills, as Theory of Mind and affective empathy, social behaviour, attachment style and scholastic success in children, aged from 8 to 11 years (N = 159; 90 females, 69 males; Mage = 9,60; DS =.78). Several assessment tools were administered to children on mentalizing abilities (Stories), empathy (FASTE), language (PPVT-R), attachment style (SAT) and learning (M.T. and AC-MT 6-11), while the teachers were asked to complete a questionnaire about every child’s social behaviour (SDQ). The correlational analysis and MANOVA prove that ‘secure’ children show more prosocial behaviour, moral mentalizing and empathic capacities in the classroom, receiving better evaluations from teachers and in learning tests. Moreover, socio-cognitive skills and prosocial behaviour are associated with academic performance, while the affective empathy is only related to teachers’ evaluations. Finally, the implications of these findings for theoretical and research development on socio-cognitive skills are discussed.