Self-awareness of Preschoolers Born from Multiple Pregnancies

Kuzmina Anna Sergeevna PhD in Psychology Associate Professor, Department of Clinical Psychology, Altai State University 656049, Russia, Altai Krai, Barnaul, Lenin str., 61, office 302 annakuz87@yandex.ru Other publications by this author     Praizendorf Ekaterina Sergeevna ORCID: 0000-0002-9014-8927 Senior Lecturer of the Department of Clinical Psychology of Altai State University 656049, Russia, Altaiskii krai, g. Barnaul, ul. Lenina, 61, of. 302 catherinears@list.ru Other publications by this author     Khummel' Natal'ya Vladimirovna Assistant, Department of Clinical Psychology, Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Education "Altai State University" 656000, Russia, Altai Krai, Barnaul, Lenin str., 61, office 302 nfokina98@mail.ru

Kulagina Dar'ya Alekseevna Postgraduate Student, Department of Clinical Psychology, Federal State Budgetary Institution of Higher Education "Altai State University" 656000, Russia, Altai Krai, Barnaul, Lenin str., 61, office 302 psy.daria.kulagina@gmail.com

The relevance of the study is due to a special social request to study the impact of multiple pregnancies on the development of self-awareness of preschoolers.

Large-scale social changes in modern Russian society, the transformation of its social and age structure, the particular severity of demographic problems cause interest in the phenomenon of reproductive health, and in the study of its problems from a number of sciences. Multiple pregnancies are often the result of the use of assisted reproductive technologies.

The increase in the number of dizygotic twins in modern society raises questions of studying the peculiarities of their personality development in comparison with single-born children. And the central concept in the study of personality is the concept of self-consciousness.

The importance of studying the self-consciousness of a preschooler is evidenced by studies conducted by scientists in general and child psychology. On the example of a developed form of self-consciousness, its importance in the formation of an active life position, the orientation of the individual to self-expression and self-realization is shown (A.N. Leontiev, S.R. Pantileev, N.I. Sarjveladze, V.V. Stolin, I.I. Chesnokova) ^{[8, 9, 10, 13, 15]}.

In child psychology, there is information about the emergence and mechanisms of self-awareness formation through attitudes to oneself and others in early and preschool ages (A.V. Zaporozhets, A.D. Kosheleva, M.I. Lisina, O.S. Nikolskaya, E.O. Smirnova, R.H. Shakurov, etc.). The available data indicate that by the end of preschool at the age of the child, the first independent opinion about himself, his merits is formed (M.I. Lisina, E.O. Smirnova) ^{[6, 11, 12, 13, 16]}.

Despite the fact that in all traditional sections of psychology certain steps have been taken in the study of the inner world of preschool children, many important lines of development of this sphere have not yet become the subject of special study. One of these lines is the study of the peculiarities of the development of self-consciousness of preschool-age twins in the context of their stay in the so-called twin situation.

R. Zazzo in his works emphasizes that twins often create their own unique microcosm of relationships that determines their behavior and personality development. Gemini is characterized by establishing a fairly close relationship, which is much closer than the relationship between brothers and sisters of different ages. Such a symbiotic relationship is called the twinning effect, in which twins identify with each other. The reverse side of gemini is the relationship of rivalry between twins. Competition for the love of parents, positive assessments of others, the manifestation of their own uniqueness and identity. Therefore, the development of self-awareness of the gemini personality is associated with a special social situation of development ^{[20, 21, 22]}.

It is the parents and the peculiarities of the relationship with them that act as the main trigger for the development of a preschooler's personality.

In this context, it is important and relevant to study the self-awareness of the personality of twins in comparison with single-born preschoolers in order to find and identify valid and reliable methods of working with children born from multiple pregnancies, due to their special development situation.

Self-awareness allows the child not only to reflect the outside world, but also, having distinguished himself in this world, to know himself, analyze his qualities and treat himself in a certain way. Self-awareness makes it possible for a person to understand who he is, to evaluate himself.

The analysis of psychological and pedagogical literature on the research problem allowed us to determine the structure of self-consciousness through a number of interrelated elements, including self-knowledge, self-esteem, the level of claims and self-acceptance ^{[1, 2, 19]}.

Self-knowledge is achieved through the evaluation of the results of one's own activities, awareness of the attitude of other people towards oneself and serves as the basis for the development of self-control and self-esteem. Self-esteem is the emotional attitude of a child to himself and is revealed through the level of claims, which is manifested in the choice of the degree of difficulty of the tasks that a person sets for himself. Self-acceptance is an integral indicator of personal well-being, built on the basis of self-assessments ^{[2, 4, 6, 13]}.

The mechanisms of self-consciousness development in preschool age are revealed in the works of Russian psychologists M.I. Lisina, O.S. Nikolskaya, E.O. Smirnova, R.H. Shakurov.

M.I. Lisina in her works notes that an important element of the developing self-consciousness of a preschooler is self-esteem and the emerging level of claims ^[6].

The development of the child's self-consciousness occurs only within the social situation of development and is associated with the peculiarities of the parent's relationship to the child from two different positions. Positions of unconditional love and appreciation. M.I. Lisina in her works emphasizes that parents certainly love a child regardless of his behavior, but give his behavior and personality an assessment. The twin situation creates conditions for additional assessments of the child in comparison with his twin, who is identical in age, physical and social status ^[6].

V.V. Stolin holds similar views on the development of self-awareness of a preschooler's personality. As a result of the relationship of the parent to the child, the child, according to V.V. Stolin, develops an integral self-relationship that determines the feeling "For or against his own Self"^[13].

M.I. Lisina, E.O. Smirnova, R.H. Shakurov agree with V.V. Stolin on this issue. According to the authors, love and unconditional acceptance by parents create the basis for emotional experiences associated with the formation of a positive self-attitude in a child, called by the authors "Global Self-love". Global self-love, which is superimposed with assessments, praise and criticism of the child, forms the child's self-esteem ^{[16, 17]}.

Unconditional acceptance of a child in the family, according to M.I. Lisina, should be the dominant component of the parent's relationship before the evaluation, which becomes difficult in the framework of a twin situation when two children occupy the same position in the family, are at the same stage of physical and mental development. Usually the child loves and accepts himself regardless of the grades. But in a twin situation, due to the frequent comparison of a child with a twin, the unconditional acceptance of oneself by the child decreases, the evaluative component begins to dominate in the structure of self-consciousness ^{[6, 15]}.

Evaluative relations are such a form of social relations, the main content of which is the assessment by one subject of the degree of conformity of another to accepted norms and standards. Evaluative relationships can come from both parents and peers. According to R.H. Shakurov, on the basis of evaluative attitudes, a child builds a system of self-relations, which forms the self-consciousness of the individual.

Thus, the evaluative relationship of a child with an adult and a peer is an important factor in the development of a child's self-consciousness (L.I. Bozhovich, M.I. Lisina, V.E. Mukhina, E.O. Smirnova, V.V. Stolin, R.H. Shakurova, etc.).

In play activity, the experience of his relationships with peers begins to penetrate into the child's self-consciousness, which allows the child to look at himself through the eyes of another, from the outside. Due to the twin situation, the child constantly compares himself with his twin, which affects his awareness of his qualities, skills and abilities. On the one hand, twins have the opportunity to better understand themselves, due to the constant situation of comparison with a twin, and on the other hand, this comparison situation reduces the child's self-esteem. Thus, the relationship of parents from the predominance of unconditional acceptance becomes oriented to the evaluative component ^{[3, 7]}.

In connection with the above, it is interesting to study the structure of self-consciousness of preschool-age twins in comparison with single-born preschoolers.

The aim of the study was a comparative analysis of the structure of self-consciousness of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies and single-born preschoolers with and without siblings due to the influence of special evaluative relationships within the social situation of development.

The subject of the study is the self—awareness of a preschooler's personality.

Scientific novelty of the research. The existence of differences in the structure of self-consciousness of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies and single-born preschoolers associated with the influence of special evaluative relationships within the social situation of development is theoretically substantiated and empirically proven.

Research methodology: cultural and historical approach (L.S. Vygotsky), concepts of self-consciousness of a preschool child (M.I. Lisina, V.E. Mukhina, R.H. Shakurov), the effect of twins R. Zazzo.

The hypothesis of the study: there are probably differences in the characteristics of self-consciousness of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies and single-born preschoolers, especially related to the evaluative relationships of parents.

The study involved 160 preschoolers (82 girls and 78 boys), among them^[5]:

- 88 preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies;

- 38 single-born preschoolers who do not have siblings (brother or sister);

- 34 single-born preschoolers with siblings.

All preschoolers have a full family. Preschoolers participated in the study with the written consent of their parents. The order of birth and the presence of siblings in single-born preschoolers was determined during an oral conversation with the child.

Research methods and techniques:

Structured interview method. The self-esteem of preschoolers was studied according to the method of "What am I" by O.S. Bogdanova. The technique is an interview during which the experimenter offers the child to evaluate himself by 10 positive qualities, answering the question "What am I?". 1 point is awarded for each positive response. The child's self-esteem is determined by the total amount of points scored for all qualities.

Method of psychological diagnostics. The methodology of studying V.G. Shchur's self-esteem "Ladder" included the parameters of the child's self-assessment of himself, self-assessment through the eyes of mom, dad and educator. The ladder contains 7 steps, which makes it possible to quantify the child's self-esteem on a scale from 1 to 7 ^[14].

 The methodology for studying the level of claims was carried out in an individual form, preschoolers were offered 3 series of tasks using the Koos cubes method. According to the instructions, preschoolers need to choose a task in accordance with three levels of difficulty (easy, medium, difficult). For the correct performance of an easy task, 2 points are awarded, an average – 4 points, a difficult – 5 points, if a mistake was made, the child was awarded 1 point, regardless of the degree of complexity of the task ^[18].

The method of observation. The assessment of the parameters of the preschool child's self-consciousness was carried out using standardized observation using the method of T.I. Dmitrov, which makes it possible to quantify such parameters as "Prediction of the success of one's own activity", "Experiencing one's own successes", "Experiencing one's own failures", "Evaluating the results of one's own activity" at 3 stages of performing game tasks (before the start of activity, during the activity, after the activity).

The table shows quantitative estimates for each of the parameters of self-awareness (see tab. 1.).

Table 1. Quantitative assessment of the parameters of preschool self-awareness by the method of standardized observation

Methods of mathematical statistics: one-factor analysis of variance using the Scheffe criterion. Data processing was carried out using the statistical data processing software package SPSS 23.00.

Research results

To identify differences in the structure of self-awareness of preschoolers, a one-factor analysis of variance was carried out based on the results obtained using the V.G. Shchur "Ladder" self-assessment methodology, O.S. Bogdanova's "What am I" methodology, T.I. Dmitrov's methodology, the method of assessing the level of claims in three groups of subjects (single-born preschoolers who do not have siblings, single-born preschoolers who have a younger brother or sister, dizygotic twins-preschoolers). One-factor analysis of variance was applied in connection with the identification of differences in three groups of subjects (Rain Shower Criterion ?0.05).

As a result of the use of a single-factor ANOVA, significant differences in the self-esteem index according to the method of "What am I" by O.S. Bogdanova (F=3.29 at p?0.05) were revealed in three groups of subjects (see Fig. 1).

Fig. 1. Comparative analysis of the self-esteem indicator according to the method of "What am I" by O.S. Bogdanova (1 – single–born preschoolers who do not have siblings, 2 - single-born preschoolers who have siblings, 3 - preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies)

As a result of multiple pairwise comparisons using the Scheffe criterion (see tab. 2) it was found that there are significant differences between the group of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies and the groups of single-born preschoolers with and without siblings (p?0.05).

Table 2. The results of the application of the Scheffe criterion on the indicator of self-esteem "What am I" by O.S. Bogdanova

* p- significance level

For preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies, a lower level of self-acceptance is reliably characteristic. When evaluating themselves, they identify fewer positive personal qualities than single-born preschoolers who have and do not have siblings. The results obtained can be associated with a special system of evaluative relationships within the social situation of the development of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies. The presence of sibling of the same age often leads to comparison of each other by preschoolers. Preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies often compare with each other, and begin to treat themselves more critically, which affects their self-acceptance.

In the qualitative analysis of the content of the qualities that preschoolers identified in themselves, no significant differences in the selected characteristics were found in the three groups of subjects. Preschoolers of all experimental groups noted the presence of such qualities as kind, good, smart. The least frequently noted qualities of preschoolers were such qualities as neat, obedient, attentive, hardworking.

The latter relate to the compliance of preschoolers with accepted social norms and standards. It is such qualities as neat, attentive, obedient that often become the subject of a child's assessment, both by parents at home and by kindergarten teachers.

Additionally, significant differences in the self-assessment index according to the "Ladder" method of V.G. Shchur (F=5.11 at p?0.01) were revealed in three groups of subjects (see Fig. 2).

Fig. 2. Comparative analysis of the self-esteem index using the "Ladder" method by V.G. Shchur (1 – single-born preschoolers without siblings, 2 - single-born preschoolers with a younger brother or sister, 3 - preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies)

As a result of multiple pairwise comparisons using the Scheffe criterion (see tab. 3) it was found that there are significant differences between a group of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies and a group of single-born preschoolers who do not have siblings (p?0.01).

Table 3. Results of the application of the Scheffe criterion in terms of self-assessment according to the "Ladder" method V.G. Shchur

* p- significance level

When assessing themselves, preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies put themselves at a lower level than single-born preschoolers.

There were no significant differences in the three groups of subjects between the level of claims, self-assessment through the eyes of mom, dad and educator, prediction of the success of their own activities, experience of their own successes and failures, evaluation of the results of their own activities

The differences between the characteristics of self-consciousness in single-born girls and boys without siblings were also revealed. As a result of the use of a single-factor ANOVA, significant differences were revealed in the indicators of "Self-assessment through the eyes of the educator" of the "Ladder" technique V.G. Shchur (F=2.85 at p?0.05) and the indicator "Prediction of the success of one's own activity" of the T.I. Dmitrov method (F=4.12 at p?0.01) in girls and boys of preschool age, not having siblings (see Fig. 3, 4).

Fig. 3. Comparative analysis of the indicator "Self-esteem through the eyes of a teacher" by the method of "Ladder" V.G. Shchur in single–born preschoolers who do not have siblings (1 - girls, 2 - boys)

As a result of multiple pairwise comparisons using the Scheffe criterion (see tab. 4) it was found that there are significant differences between the group of girls and boys of single-born preschoolers who do not have siblings (p?0.05).

Table 4. Results of the application of the Scheffe criterion for the indicator "Self-assessment through the eyes of the educator" according to the method "Ladder" V.G. Shchur

*p – significance level

Girls reliably rate themselves higher through the eyes of educators than boys. According to the girls, the teachers rate them quite highly.

Fig. 4. Comparative analysis of the indicator "Prediction of the success of their own activities" in single-born preschoolers who do not have siblings according to the method of T.I. Dmitrov (1 - girls, 2 – boys)

As a result, multiple pairwise comparisons using the Scheffe criterion (see tab. 5) it was found that there are significant differences between the group of girls and boys of single-born preschoolers who do not have siblings (p?0.05).

Table 5. Results of the application of the Scheffe criterion according to the indicator "Forecast of the success of own activity" by T.I. Dmitrov

*p – significance level

Girls more accurately predict the success of their own activities, the result of the activity and the expected forecast often coincide. It is more typical for girls to anticipate the results of their own activities than for boys.

Thus, for single-born preschoolers, the educator's assessments become significant, which are related to the content of the child's compliance with the rules and norms of behavior accepted in society. Moreover, it is typical for boys to expect lower grades from educators than for girls. It is often the boys in kindergarten who violate the established rules and receive negative assessments of their own actions from educators. In the results obtained, one can see the beginning of the formation of self-criticism and the importance of the evaluative relations of the educator for the formation of self-consciousness of a single-born preschooler.

In addition, single-born preschoolers are characterized by a difference in the characteristics of the prognosis of the success of their own activities in girls and boys. Girls more accurately anticipate the success of their actions.

There were no significant differences in the characteristics of self-consciousness of single-born girls and boys with siblings.

The next stage of the study revealed differences between the characteristics of self-awareness in girls and boys born from multiple pregnancies.

As a result of the use of a single-factor ANOVA, significant differences were revealed in the indicators of "Self-esteem through the eyes of dad" (F=2.85 at p?0.05) "Self-esteem through the eyes of mom" (F=3.9 at p?0.05) according to the "Ladder" technique of V.G. Shchur in the group of girls and boys of twins (see Fig. 5, 6).

Fig. 5. Comparative analysis of the indicator "Self-esteem through the eyes of dad" according to the V.G. Shchur "Ladder" method in preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies (1 – girls, 2 - boys)

As a result, multiple pairwise comparisons using the Scheffe criterion (see tab. 6) it was found that there are significant differences between the group of preschool girls and boys born from multiple pregnancies (p?0.05).

Table 6. Results of the application of the Scheffe criterion for the indicator "Self-esteem through the eyes of the pope" according to the method "Ladder" V.G. Shchur

*p – significance level

Gemini boys, when performing the "Ladder" technique, assume that dad will put them on a higher level, girls evaluate themselves through dad's eyes below.

Fig. 6. Comparative analysis of the indicator "Self-esteem through the eyes of a mother" according to the V.G. Shchur "Ladder" method in preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies (1 – girls, 2 - boys)

As a result, multiple pairwise comparisons using the Scheffe criterion (see tab. 7) it was found that there are significant differences between the group of preschool girls and boys born from multiple pregnancies (p?0.05).

Table 7. Results of the application of the Scheffe criterion for the indicator "Self-esteem through the eyes of a mother" according to the "Ladder" method V.G. Shchur

*p – significance level

Girls, when performing the "Ladder" technique, assume that their mother will put them on a higher level, boys evaluate themselves through their mother's eyes below.

Thus, for preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies, differences in the content of self-esteem through the eyes of mom and dad, depending on the sex of the child, are characteristic. For boys, it is typical to expect positive ratings from dad and more negative ones from mom, for girls on the contrary.

The results obtained indicate that for preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies, the evaluative relationship of a parent of the same sex with a twin is significant. It is the evaluative relationships of a parent of the same sex that are a significant factor in the formation of self-assessments in preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies, from which the self-consciousness of the individual is formed.

The paper draws the following conclusions:

1.                  Preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies are characterized by a significantly lower level of self-esteem and self-acceptance in comparison with single-born preschoolers, which may be related to the characteristics of the parent's evaluative relationships as a result of a special social situation of development.

2. For single-born preschoolers, the assessments of the educator, which determine the conformity of the child's behavior with established social rules and norms, become significant in the development of self-awareness of the individual. Single-born preschool girls who do not have siblings more accurately predict the success of their own activities in comparison with boys.

3. For preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies, evaluative relationships of a parent of the same sex are significant for the formation of self-awareness. So -boys expect high marks from their father, and girls from their mother.

The conducted research shows differences in the characteristics of self-consciousness of preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies and single-born preschoolers. Preschoolers born from multiple pregnancies require special psychological and pedagogical attention due to the specifics of the development situation, determined by a special system of evaluative relationships of parents..

The results of this study can be useful to teachers-psychologists of preschool educational institutions in the organization of psychological and pedagogical support of preschoolers and psychological consultations of parents on preparation for pregnancy and upbringing of preschoolers.