Investigation of the effect of a new emotional literacy skills training program on children's peer relationships

Abstract While family members are important in the socialization process of children in the first years of life, relationships with peers gain importance in the following years. In this process, children could experience conflicts and disagreements with their peers and fail to develop positive peer relationships. In this study, a new Emotional Literacy Skills Training Program was prepared. The effect of this program on children's ability to develop positive relationships with their peers was examined. The prepared training program focuses on children's abilities to recognize emotions, empathize, manage their emotions, heal emotional damage, and apply emotional literacy as a whole. This training program is organized as a 12-week course with 24 sessions, two per week. The study included 40 children aged 48–60 months (20 experimental and 20 control). The Education Program was only applied to the experimental group for 12 weeks. As a result of the research, it was determined that after the program, a significant difference occurred in favor of the experimental group both in terms of the total scores obtained from the Peer Relationship Rating Scale and in terms of positive social skills, aggression, emotional interaction, and communication skills, which constitute the sub-dimensions of the related scale. To assess the magnitude of the difference that emerged, the effect size was calculated, and it was determined that this difference was quite strong. As a result, it was determined that the Emotional Literacy Skills Training Program was effective in improving children's peer relationships.