Early childhood social emotional behavior and their role in education for sustainable development in Indonesia

This study aims to investigate the complex connections between parental involvement, teacher–child interaction, self-regulation, and social-emotional behavior among early childhood learners in Indonesia. The research explores both direct and conditional pathways through which home and school environments influence children’s emotional and behavioral outcomes. Specifically, the study tests nine hypotheses involving direct effects, mediation, and moderation roles of self-regulation using structural equation modeling (SEM). A quantitative causal–correlational design was employed, involving 100 matched teacher–parent dyads (N = 200 individual respondents) drawn from early childhood education institutions (PAUD) in Bandung City, West Java Province, Indonesia. Each dyad consisted of one teacher and one parent reporting on the same child. Validated questionnaires were used to measure parental involvement, teacher–child interaction, self-regulation, and children’s social-emotional behavior. Data were analyzed using SmartPLS with bootstrapping and multi-group moderation tests. The findings revealed that both parental involvement and teacher–child interaction significantly associated with children’s self-regulation and social-emotional behavior. However, contrary to theoretical expectations, self-regulation did not mediate the connection between parental involvement or teacher–child interaction and social-emotional behavior. Notably, self-regulation moderated the effect of parental involvement—strengthening its positive associated with social-emotional behavior. Conversely, it weakened the predict of teacher–child interaction on social-emotional behavior. These results offer novel contributions to the understanding of differential pathways in early childhood development. The rejection of mediation effects suggests that parental and teacher predict may exert more immediate and direct effects on children’s emotional outcomes than previously assumed. The dual role of self-regulation as a moderator underscores the need to consider child-level variables in contextualized educational interventions. The findings have practical implications for curriculum design, teacher training, and parenting programs in the Indonesian PAUD context, highlighting the need for synchronized home-school strategies to foster holistic child development and to cultivate education for sustainable development from an early age.