Explaining children’s social relationships in early childhood: the role of parental social networks

Abstract

In this article, we examined young Finnish children’s social relationships, characteristics of their parents’ social networks and the role of parental networks in children’s peer relationships. We drew on the data collected from a Finnish longitudinal study known as Steps to the Healthy Development and Well-Being of Children. The data from two measurement points were included in the analyses to explore children’s peer relations at 13 months (N = 1, 212) and 4 years (N = 795). We further studied the association between children’s social networks at different time points and the role of parental sociodemographics and parental social relationships in predicting children’s social networks. Special emphasis was placed on examining how parental social networks are linked with children’s peer relations. Our results revealed a significant association between children’s social relationships at different time points and the significance of parental social networks for children’s peer networks.