Understanding how certain personality traits impact children’s enjoyment of school and teachers’ perceptions of children’s behaviour

We were curious about…

How children’s personality traits, especially callous-unemotional (CU) traits like seeming less sensitive to others’ feelings, might affect how teachers see their behaviour, and whether these traits change how much children enjoy school.

So we…

Looked at data from nearly 200 children aged 6 to 9 years old who were part of the Healthy Start, Happy Start study. We collected information from three sources:

• Parents, who shared information about their child’s personality traits
• Teachers, who told us about the child’s behaviour at school
• The children themselves, who let us know how much they enjoy going to school

We learned that…

Teachers were more likely to report behaviour concerns for children with higher CU traits. Interestingly though, the children themselves didn’t say they enjoyed school any less, regardless of their CU traits.

This suggests that even if some children show challenging behaviours or seem emotionally distant, they can still have a positive experience at school.