The Relationship Between Family Socio-Economic Status and Preschool Children’s Social Competence: The Chain Mediating Role of Family Internal Support and Children’s Empathy

The present study aims to explore the relationship between family socioeconomic status and children’s social competence and to examine the chain-mediating mechanism of the relationship between family internal support and children’s empathy. A questionnaire survey was conducted among 1246 parents of preschool children in Henan Province using a stratified random sampling method, using questionnaires on family socioeconomic status, family internal support, children’s empathy, and social competence. The results showed that (1) there was a significant positive correlation between family socioeconomic status, family internal support, children’s empathy, and social competence and (2) family internal support and children’s empathy played an important chain-mediating role in the relationship between family socioeconomic status and children’s social competence. These results indicate that strengthening social support for preschool children’s families, guiding parents to reasonably adjust the content of family support for preschool children (education, psychology, games, life), and improving preschool children’s empathy can be regarded as effective intervention strategies to alleviate the problems of poor social adaptation and social integration of preschool children from low socioeconomic status families.