Violence Prevention Must Begin Early

A high school diploma has the potential to open doors to family-supporting careers and can serve as a powerful protective factor against the lure of criminal behavior and substance abuse. The positive news is that high school graduation rates are on the rise across America. Unfortunately, this increase is seen predominantly in middle- and high-income students; data show that low-income students still graduate at often substantially lower rates. A state-by-state study published by the U.S. Department of Education revealed that the four-year graduation rate for low-income students nationally was only 76%, with gaps between low-income students and their higher-income peers in as much as 28% in some states (https://eddataexpress.ed.gov/data-element-explorer.cfm/tab/data/deid/6108/).

Recently a long-awaited research report was released in the American Journal of Public Health. The authors were a team of researchers involved in a 20-year, federally funded study of youth violence prevention called the Fast Track Research Project. In the early 1990s, the researchers asked kindergarten teachers at four sites around the country to complete a short, eight-item behavior rating form. These teachers were asked to rate the degree to which a cohort of 753 kindergarteners from low-income rural and urban families demonstrated social competence skills in their interactions with classmates and teachers. The items included skills such as “Shares materials with others,” “Is helpful to others” and “Very good at understanding other people’s feelings.” The researchers controlled for background variables such as poverty, race and gender, and the children did not receive any additional social competence interventions after kindergarten.

At age 25, for every one-point increase on the eight-item scale, the child was:

• Twice as likely to attain a college degree in early adulthood;
• 54% more likely to earn a high school diploma; and
• 46% more likely to have a full-time job at the age of 25.

For every one-point decrease on the eight-item scale, the child had a:

• 67% higher chance of having been arrested by early adulthood;
• 82% higher rate of recent marijuana usage; and
• 82% higher chance of being in or on a waiting list for public housing.

This report contributed to a mounting body of evidence that “social skills” have a major impact on later-life outcomes, an impact that may even exceed those of IQ and reading readiness. “Being ready for school” in ways beyond knowing the alphabet has taken on a new urgency. Children who enter kindergarten already possessing the social skills necessary to learn effectively in a classroom full of other 4- and 5-year-olds have a significant leg up. The typical environment in which to learn these pre-kindergarten skills is the home, and the primary teachers are the parents and extended family.

Researchers at the highly regarded Child Study Center at Penn State University (http://csc.psych.psu.edu/research/head-start-redi-project) have concluded that children entering kindergarten should have the following social and emotional skills to be successful in their new school environment:

1. Identify common feeling states that they are experiencing.
2. Identify common feeling states in others.
3. Show self-control of aggression.
4. Play cooperatively with age-mates.
5. Solve problems nonviolently.

The good news is that in almost every cohort of kindergarten students, including low-income students, most of the children come to school already prewired with these social and emotional skills. However, communities need to get very serious about how to wire-up the rest of them. If one examines the records of students who graduate from high school and examines the records of students who end up in juvenile corrections, many of the roads will lead straight back to the first years of school. The data are clear that social and emotionally skilled children have a discernable and measurable advantage.

The challenges are substantial, and many parents have all they can handle just trying to keep their children safe and healthy today, let alone worrying about what those little ones should be doing two or three years from now. Poverty, racism, immigration worries and counterproductive child-rearing practices all interact to put many children at significant risk. These real and significant challenges may be surmountable, but there is a need for creative thinking and a willingness to explore new methodologies.

For schools and communities, this is a budget item and a substantial one. Today, it costs over $100,000 a year to house an 18-year-old in secure detention. Bringing effective training in social and emotional skills to a 4-year-old costs a fraction of that, and the payoff can be incalculable.

-Jim Larson, Ph.D., Scientific Board Member, Developmental psychologist, research scientist and educator who serves as a Senior Scientist at both Education Development Center (EDC) and the Center on Media and Child Health.