Examining trajectories of children's social-emotional development across cultures

Social-emotional skills are increasingly recognized as key competencies and target outcomes of schooling around the world. Nevertheless, evidence on what social-emotional development looks like and what supports it largely stems from Minority World (i.e., high income, Western) samples. We used longitudinal data from 9,667 children (M_age at baseline = 7.61 years; 50% female) living in Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda, and Vietnam to describe children's growth in six social-emotional skills across the first 3 years of formal schooling (i.e., Grades 1-3). For the majority of sites and skills examined, we found annual improvements of 0.04-0.25 standard deviations in children's interpersonal (e.g., relationships and interpersonal negotiation) and intrapersonal social-emotional skills (e.g., creativity and confidence). We also found that children's positive experiences in their primary school classrooms were associated with stronger social-emotional outcomes, particularly in the intrapersonal domain. This finding is in line with our hypothesis that classroom environments may play a particularly important role in supporting children's intrapersonal skill development within Majority World settings experiencing sociodemographic transitions and cultural hybridization. At the same time, we also identified substantial unexplained variability in children's social-emotional outcomes across skills, sites, and time, affirming the need for additional research on how both macro- and microlevel contextual factors shape social-emotional development in the Majority World. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).