Language Skills and Friendships in Kindergarten Classrooms: A Social Network Analysis

Impact and Implications Children acclimate differently to new social environments. This study suggests that children who enter school with lower language skills are less central in their classroom friendship networks, with fewer reciprocated friendships. Of children at risk for specific language impairment, girls were significantly more central than boys. The purpose of this study was to determine the extent that language skills contribute to kindergarten children's classroom-based friendship networks. We assessed language skills and collected friendship data via individual interviews of 419 children from 21 kindergarten classrooms. Using social network analysis, we found that language skills were significantly associated with friendship centrality and reciprocity after controlling for classroom and child-level factors. Children classified as at risk for specific language impairment (SLI) were significantly less central to friendship networks, and the odds of a reciprocal friendship tie were more than 50% lower compared to children who were not classified as at risk. Of children at risk, girls were significantly more central than boys. We couch our results within limitations of our study and provide recommendations for future research.