Resilience Coping in Preschool Children: The Role of Emotional Ability, Age, and Gender

Abstract

Background: In the process of children’s physical and mental development, emotional ability is an important part of their cognitive and social ability. Resilience in the face of difficulties or setbacks and other adversity will also produce differences in adaptability, thus affecting physical and mental development. Objectives: This study aimed to measure the effect of children’s emotional ability on resilience and to provide an in-depth analysis based on age and gender differences. Methodology: A total of 300 preschool children aged 3–6 years old in kindergartens of China were randomly selected as the research subjects. Through a combination of experiments and questionnaires, the emotional ability and resilience of children were measured, and differences were analyzed according to the actual situation, using age and gender. Results: Children of different ages have significant differences in the dimensions and total scores of emotional ability and resilience, but only some of the resilience dimensions have significant gender differences. Moreover, the emotional ability has a significant positive effect on resilience. Discussions: The results confirm the influence of children’s emotional ability on resilience, but the research hypothesis has not been fully verified. Limitations: This study has the limitations of a single measurement method and a more effective research tool.