Next Article in Journal
Digital University: A Study of Students’ Experiences and Expectations in the Post-COVID Era
Next Article in Special Issue
Study of Factors Associated with the Development of Emotional Intelligence and Resilience in University Students
Previous Article in Journal
A Literature Review Comparing Experts’ and Non-Experts’ Visual Processing of Graphs during Problem-Solving and Learning
Previous Article in Special Issue
Conceptual Model of Differentiated-Instruction (DI) Based on Teachers’ Experiences in Indonesia
 
 
Font Type:
Arial Georgia Verdana
Font Size:
Aa Aa Aa
Line Spacing:
Column Width:
Background:
Systematic Review

Social–Emotional Skills Correlate with Reading Ability among Typically Developing Readers: A Meta-Analysis

1
Department of Psychology, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
2
Department of Sport and Exercise Science, College of Education, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Educ. Sci. 2023, 13(2), 220; https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci13020220
Submission received: 27 January 2023 / Revised: 14 February 2023 / Accepted: 16 February 2023 / Published: 20 February 2023
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Students’ Emotions in Learning Contexts)

Abstract

:
This meta-analysis examined the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability and identified possible moderators by synthesizing 285 correlations from 37 studies among 38 samples with 28,404 participants. Results showed a significantly positive correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability among typically developing readers, r = 0.23, 95% CI [0.19, 0.28]. The moderation analysis revealed that, after controlling for types of social–emotional skills and grade level, the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability was moderated by the levels of reading (i.e., word reading vs. reading comprehension), β = 0.07, 95% CI [0.02, 0.11], t = 5.03, p < 0.05. Specifically, social–emotional skills had a significantly stronger correlation with reading comprehension than it with word reading. This work provides support for the lattice model of reading, suggesting that future research efforts are needed to examine the underlying mechanisms between social–emotional skills and reading ability.

1. Introduction

Reading ability is crucial not only for academic success but also for participation in the workforce and society [1]. The lattice model of reading (LMR) proposes that the social–cognitive process plays an essential role in the development of reading ability (i.e., word reading and reading comprehension) [2]. The social–cognitive process includes executive function, motivation, metacognition, learning-related social skills, and emotional intelligence (e.g., self-motivation and emotion regulation) [2]. Previous studies examining the contribution of the social–cognitive process to reading mainly focused on the role of executive function and motivation [3,4], and less is known about the role of social skills and emotional intelligence. Social skills and emotional intelligence are defined as social–emotional skills in this study. Although an increasing number of studies examined the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability, the results are inconsistent, with some studies finding a significant correlation between them [5], while other paper did not find any [6]. It is also unclear whether the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability differs in various sub-groups. Understanding the correlation between emotional skills and reading ability and the potential moderators can provide information for future targeted policies and interventions to improve students’ social–emotional skills and reading ability. To better understand the extent to which social–emotional skills (i.e., social skills and emotional intelligence) impact reading ability and the potential moderators, we conducted this meta-analysis—as far as we know, the first of its kind—that systematically tests the correlation between these two variables.

2. Social–Emotional Skills and Reading Ability

In this study, the social–emotional skills refer to social skills, i.e., the ability to function competently at social tasks [7], and emotional intelligence, i.e., the ability to understand one’s own and others’ emotions, control one’s emotions, and be self-motivated [8]. The reading ability refers to word reading, i.e., the ability to identify written words [9], and reading comprehension, the ability to understand the text [10]. According to LMR, social skills and emotional intelligence, which act as essential components in social–cognitive processes, play important roles in students’ reading ability (i.e., word reading and reading comprehension) [2]. As social skills and emotional intelligence share certain components, e.g., assertiveness and interpersonal skills [11,12,13,14,15], both were considered in this meta-analysis.
LMR suggests that during early and middle childhood, social–emotional skills in the social–cognitive process have a reciprocal correlation with reading ability, each affecting the development of the other [2]. Indeed, some researchers argue that books, and in particular works of literature, are a resource of human emotions by which individuals can increase their emotional knowledge. In turn, understanding the nature, causes, and control/regulation of emotions expressed in reading materials can promote reading comprehension [16]. Prior studies support this theoretical hypothesis [17,18], suggesting that reading ability can also predict children’s social–emotional skills. For example, Benner et al.’s longitudinal study [19] showed that from kindergarten to second grade, word reading (i.e., letter-word identification) and reading comprehension (i.e., passage comprehension) were significantly and positively related to children’s social skills (i.e., cooperation, assertiveness, and self-control) [17]. Furthermore, word reading could account for children’s social skills (i.e., social adjustment) [17], while reading difficulty might lead to social–emotional problems, such as antisocial emotional disorder [20]. Similarly, using the data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study program, Caemmerer and Keith [21] showed that social skills might have a reciprocal correlation with students’ reading ability from kindergarten to the eighth grade. Another study among 468 first graders indicated that their reading comprehension in the fall could predict their social skills, indexed by cooperation, assertion, and self-control, in the winter, which in turn could predict their reading comprehension in the spring [22].
Several potential explanations may account for the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. The first is that social–emotional skills may influence reading ability through cognitive ability. For example, emotions have been related to working memory [23], with readers of higher social–emotional skills, such as empathy, more likely to connect emotionally with characters in stories, a connection that helps them more accurately memorize the content of the reading material [23,24,25]. Social–emotional skills may also be related to nonverbal intelligence [26], as individuals with higher social–emotional skills are likely to be smarter than those with poor social–emotional skills [27]. Thus, readers with higher social–emotional skills are also more likely to be proficient readers. It is thereby highly possible that the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability might be mediated by cognitive abilities.
Second, effective social–emotional skills may help readers increase their language skills, such as vocabulary knowledge, which can then improve their understanding of reading materials. Children with high social–emotional skills may have more social interactions, during which vocabulary knowledge may develop through incidental learning. For example, one prior study showed that early mother–child conversations were positively related to children’s vocabulary knowledge in kindergarten and second grade [28]. Another study indicated that Iranian English children’s vocabulary learning could occur through computer-mediated communication and face-to-face interaction [29]. Vocabulary development facilitates the reading process since the core of reading is to extract meaning from written texts. Some theoretical models of reading even consider vocabulary knowledge as the foundation for proficient reading comprehension [30]. Vocabulary knowledge also contributes to the development of reading-related skills, such as the phonological process [31]. Thus, vocabulary knowledge could be a potential mediator in the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability.
Third, the emotioncy theory suggests that reading may be a sense- and emotion-related understanding process that is jointly influenced by our familiarity with the specific topic, the frequency of exposure to that topic, and our emotions towards that topic [32]. In other words, our reading ability is correlated with our sensory experiences. We know that social interactions can be similar to situations in some reading materials. Individuals with higher social–emotional skills tend to acquire knowledge about diverse topics because they interact more with others, which means that they may be more familiar with the related topics and have a higher frequency of exposure to those topics. One previous study, for example, indicated that learning a new reading passage was easier for students with more sensory-related experiences [32].
Fourth, social–emotional skills may be related to reading ability through reading motivation. Since students with high social–emotional skills have more social interactions and communicate with others on many topics, they become more familiar with these topics. Children usually display higher reading motivation for familiar topics than for unfamiliar ones. For example, one prior study found that students with more sensory experiences (e.g., hearing more) on specific topics tended to have high reading motivation when reading material on these topics, which ultimately contributed to their reading comprehension [33]. Students with high social–emotional skills are also more likely to have good relationships with teachers and peers, which may influence students’ school adjustment, including their motivation to learn and read. For instance, Li et al.’s study [34] found that peer relationships could influence Chinese adolescents’ learning motivation at school. Thus, social–emotional skills may be correlated with reading ability via reading motivation.
Though the majority of past studies have reported that social–emotional skills are positive predictors of individuals’ reading comprehension even after controlling for educational level and IQ [5,18,35], some studies did not find a significant correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. For instance, Pishghadam [36] found that emotional intelligence was not significantly related to undergraduate students’ English reading comprehension. Similarly, a study among a sample of Australian fifth graders indicated that social skills were not associated with reading comprehension, r = 0.08 [37]. We examined this inconsistency by synchronizing past studies to systematically test the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability among different subgroups.

3. Potential Moderators

We explored whether three potential moderators: types of social–emotional skills, types of reading outcomes, and grade level, could explain the inconsistency in the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability.

3.1. Types of Social–Emotional Skills

Despite their overlap, social and emotional skills differ in some respects. From a social perspective, social skills refer to a range of verbal and nonverbal skills that individuals use during social interaction that can influence the responses of others without causing distress [38]. Theoretical models of emotions or emotional intelligence define emotional skills in different ways. For instance, Mayer and Salovey [39,40] proposed a four-branch hierarchical model of emotional skills indicating that emotional intelligence can be defined according to emotion-related abilities, namely, emotional perception, emotional facilitation of thought, emotional understanding, and emotional management. In sum, social skills focus on verbal and nonverbal skills needed during social tasks, such as communication and cooperation skills [7,14], while emotional intelligence focuses on emotion-related skills, such as stress management and empathy [11,12,13]. Thus, different aspects of social–emotional skills were assessed in past studies. The question of whether a specific type of social-emotional skill could moderate the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability naturally arose.
We postulated that some social–emotional skills might be more closely related to reading activities. For example, individuals with a high level of empathy are more likely to identify with characters and become deeply engaged in the reading material [24,25]. An engaged reader always has a high level of reading motivation [41,42], which is positively and significantly related to individuals’ reading ability [43]. Smith et al. [44] also found that American children’s social skills (i.e., communication skills) at five years old were significantly correlated to reading comprehension at fourteen years old, r = 0.32, p < 0.01, but their emotional intelligence (i.e., frustration tolerance) at ten years old was not significantly correlated to reading comprehension, r = 0.21, p > 0.05. Therefore, the correlation between social–emotional skills might be moderated by a specific type of social–emotional skill. To verify this prediction, we evaluated the moderation effect of the types of social–emotional skills on the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading comprehension.

3.2. Types of Reading Outcomes

It is unclear whether the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading varies with different reading outcomes. In the present study, we included word reading and reading comprehension as reading outcomes. Word reading is the ability to recognize letters or words accurately and fluently [45,46]. Reading comprehension is the ability to read and understand a passage or text [10,47]. In a recent study, Sparapani and colleagues [22] tested the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability among first graders. The results showed that social–emotional skills were more strongly correlated with word reading ability (i.e., cooperation, r = 0.47; assertiveness, r = 0.42; and self-control, r = 0.30) than with reading comprehension ability (i.e., cooperation, r = 0.36; assertiveness, r = 0.23; and self-control, r = 0.25) [22]. This implies that social–emotional skills may play a more critical role in word-level reading in younger children. Thus, we tested whether the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading differs across different reading outcomes. We hypothesized that this relation could be moderated by the types of reading outcomes.

3.3. Grade Level

A prior meta-analysis found a significantly stronger association between emotional competence and academic achievement in primary school students than in college students [48], though it is unclear whether grade level moderated the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability. The correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability may increase with educational level, with a stronger correlation for readers in high school or above than readers in preschool and primary school. One possibility is that readers with a higher educational level may have more emotional and social experiences to draw on and thus be able to better analyze the social relations among characters and their emotions in the reading material, which, in turn, contributes to their reading progress. Indeed, one prior longitudinal study showed that students’ emotional vocabulary improved from the 10th to the 12th grade [49]. Similarly, another three-year longitudinal study found that children’s social–emotional skills increased after they entered kindergarten [50].
However, MacCann et al. [51] suggested that younger children with poor emotional skills are more easily affected by psychological factors and unable to focus on their learning. Chall [52] suggested that children after nine years old tend to read to satisfy their desire to gain new knowledge, to learn new ideas and attitudes, and to experience new feelings and learn more efficiently than children below nine. Similarly, Boud [53] posited that older students become autonomous learners whose learning activities are less likely to be influenced by emotions. For example, correlational and experimental studies indicated that, after controlling for cognitive factors, social–emotional skills were significant predictors of reading ability in kindergarten students [17,54], primary school students [17], and secondary school students [54], with or without autism spectrum disorder. In contrast, another study showed that undergraduate students’ social–emotional skills were not significantly related to their reading ability [55,56]. Therefore, grade level might moderate the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading abilities.

4. The Present Study

This meta-analysis had two aims. First, we evaluated whether significant correlations exist between social–emotional skills and reading ability and, if so, what the strengths of these correlations are. Second, we examined whether the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability was moderated by the types of social–emotional skills (i.e., social skills and emotional intelligence), types of reading abilities (i.e., word reading and reading comprehension), and grade level. We predicted that: (1) social–emotional skills and reading ability would be significantly correlated with each other, and (2) the types of social–emotional skills, types of reading abilities, and grade levels would moderate the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability.

5. Method

This meta-analysis was conducted and reported following the guidelines of the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and Meta-analyses (PRISMA) [57]. This study was registered in the international prospective register of systematic reviews (PROSPERO) with reference number CRD 42020195841.

6. Literature Search

6.1. Electronic Database Search

Five electronic databases (i.e., ProQuest, PsycARTICLES, PsycINFO, PubMed, and Web of Science) were used to identify relevant studies published in English before December 2021. The search terms were grouped into two categories: (1) reading ability (i.e., word reading and reading comprehension) and (2) social–emotional skills (i.e., social skills and emotional intelligence).

6.2. Manual Search

We also performed a manual search on Google Scholar based on these keywords: emotional intelligence, social skills, word reading, and reading comprehension. Six additional articles [36,56,58,59,60,61] were obtained through this manual search. Another paper [62] was identified by reviewing the references of the included papers.

7. Inclusion and Exclusion Criteria

Articles were included in this meta-analysis if they met the following criteria: (1) they were papers published or unpublished in English; (2) they measured the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability; (3) the participants included in the studies were typically developing readers without any physical disabilities (e.g., hearing loss) or special education needs; (4) if the article reported the correlation among typically developing and nontypically developing children, respectively, only the correlation among the typically developing children was included; and (5) if the article reported the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability for a group in which the majority of participants were typically developing children, we included it. To illustrate (4), Schwab et al.’s study [37] reported the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability among students with and without special educational needs; we included only the data for students without special educational needs. To illustrate (5), we included Hall and DiPerna's study [63] since 92.10% of the participants were typically developing children.
Studies were excluded if: (1) they were books, (2) reviews or commentaries, or (3) qualitative or case studies; (4) all the participants were nontypically developing children, such as those with a learning disability [64,65], attention-deficit–hyperactivity disorder [66], or an autism spectrum disorder [67]; and (5) they reported the same correlation among the same group; in this case, we used only one study (e.g., of the two studies by Firdaus [60,68] reporting the correlation between emotional intelligence and reading comprehension for the same group, we included only one of them).

8. Paper Filtering

The paper filtering process is shown in Figure 1. The initial search yielded 5123 papers, of which 4376 were left after removing 747 duplications. Next, two reviewers (i.e., the first author and a research assistant (RA)) were trained to screen the title and abstract of the remaining records independently. During this step, we excluded: (1) qualitative or case studies; (2) meta-analyses or reviews; (3) neurophysiological studies; (4) papers that recruited only nontypically developing readers (e.g., those with a learning/reading disability, attention-deficit–hyperactivity disorder, an autism spectrum disorder, or other disabilities); and (5) papers that did not mention social–emotional skills or reading ability, of which there were 179. Finally, the same reviewers screened the full-text articles for inclusion. During this step, we excluded: (1) unrelated papers; (2) qualitative studies; (3) whole papers that were unavailable even after a request to the author’s university library; and (4) papers that did not report the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability among typically developing readers (e.g., they reported the correlation only between social–emotional difficulty and reading ability or between social–emotional skills and reading difficulty). This filtering yielded 42 papers. Reviewing the references of all included papers yielded another paper. Thus, 43 papers with 44 samples met the inclusion criteria. As we identified six influential samples, 37 studies with 38 samples, including 285 effect sizes, were considered in our meta-analysis. The coding reliabilities for both title–abstract and full-text screening were greater than the excellent level of agreement (k = 0.86 and 0.94, respectively, which is >0.75) [69]. Any disagreements arising in the aforementioned phases were resolved via discussion with the other two authors. The final agreement was 100%.

9. Data Coding

The two reviewers independently coded the included studies. All discrepancies were resolved through discussion with the other two authors before data analysis. The percentage of agreement for all coded variables was 100%. All studies that met the inclusion criteria were extracted based on the following aspects: the design (i.e., cross-sectional and longitudinal), grade level (i.e., kindergarten, primary school, secondary school, and university or above), sample size, gender (the percentage of males among the participants), studied language, types of social–emotional skills (i.e., emotional intelligence and social skills), types of reading ability (i.e., word reading and reading comprehension), and Pearson’s correlation (r) between social–emotional skills and reading ability (for details, see Table 1). The sample size (n) indicated the number of participants who completed the social–emotional skills scale and reading ability test. If the study did not report the number of participants who completed the social–emotional skills scale and reading ability test, the number of participants who took part in the study was coded as the sample size. If a study reported more than one r value between social–emotional skills and reading ability for one sample, all the r values were included in the present study.

10. Quality Assessment

The first author and the RA independently evaluated the quality of methodology for each article using three aspects of the McMaster Critical Review Form (i.e., sample, measurement, and analyses) [98,99]. For the sample criterion, studies were evaluated based on the reduction of selection bias, sample size, and details related to participants’ characteristics. Sample size indicates whether the sample was large enough to conduct that study, and a sample size greater than 10 cases per parameter meets this criterion [100]. For the measurement criterion, papers were assessed based on the validity and reliability of both the social–emotional skills scale and the reading ability task. For the analysis criterion, statistical significance, provision of point estimates and variability, and the discussion of practical importance were considered. Each criterion was assigned one star if the study did not meet any criteria, two stars if the study partially met the criteria or if the report was unclear, and three stars if the study fully met the criteria [98].
The interrater reliability between the two researchers was 100% from all three aspects: sample, measurement, and analyses. Table 1 summarizes the characteristics of the included studies and presents ratings on quality assessment. Results showed that for the Sample criterion, eight studies used a representative sample, one study calculated the power of sample size, and eight studies did not provide the participants’ grade level or gender. For the Measurement criterion, the social–emotional skills scale in all 43 studies was successfully used in previous studies, four studies did not report the task used to measure participants’ reading ability, and 22 studies reported the reliability of both the social–emotional skills scale and reading ability task. For the Analysis criterion, four studies provided the confidence interval, and 40 studies reported the significance of the results and thoroughly discussed the implications of the findings.

11. Statistical Analysis Strategy

To conduct this meta-analysis, three packages (i.e., METACOR [101], METAFOR [102], and ROBUMETA [103]) in R were used (see Figure 2). Pearson’s correlation (r) between social–emotional skills and reading ability was transferred to Fisher’s z, and Fisher’s z was used to indicate effect size in the meta-analysis. When examining the influential samples and publication bias, we calculated the mean for each sample with more than one effect size before calculating the DFBETAS and COVRATIO values and the z value. After excluding the effect sizes of all influential samples, to examine the overall correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability and potential moderators, we handled the samples with more than one effect size using robust variance estimation (RVE) [104].
Specifically, Pearson’s r was first converted to Fisher’s z using the DerSimonian–Laird (DSL) random-effect meta-analytical approach in the “metacor.DSL” function of the METACOR package. Second, we excluded the effect sizes for samples with an extremely high or lower average correlation between social–emotional skills and reading comprehension. In this step, the mean value was used for each sample with more than one effect size. If a study reported the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability for two or more independent samples, each sample was treated separately when conducting the meta-analysis. For example, Caemmerer and Keith's study [21] reported the correlation between social skills and reading ability of both the validation and the calibration samples; our meta-analysis coded this study to two independent samples. Then, we identified the influential samples by calculating the DFBETAS value and the COVRATIO value of each sample using the “influence” function in the METAFOR package. The DFBETAS value refers to the effect on the estimates for the regression coefficients when excluding each study [105], and the COVRATIO value refers to the effect on the variance–covariance matrix of the estimates when excluding each study [105]. A sample with a DFBETAS value greater than 1 [106] or a COVRATIO value smaller than 1 [107] could be identified as an influential sample and would be excluded in the later meta-analysis to generate a more precise estimation. We excluded all the effect sizes of six influential samples before calculating the overall correlation and the moderator analysis. Therefore, 37 studies with 38 samples, including 285 effect sizes, were considered in the fourth step.
Third, we examined the publication bias by using the “rma” function, the “regtest” function, and the “funnel plot” function in the METAFOR package. The funnel plot shows the distribution of the effect size of each sample, and an even distribution on the left and right sides of the mean effect size suggests no publication bias. The “regtest” function indicates the significance of publication bias with a mixed-effects meta-regression model. In this model, the standard error of each sample’s effect size acted as the predictor, and each sample’s effect size acted as the dependent variable [108,109].
Fourth, we calculated the overall correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability and conducted subgroup analysis and moderator analysis using the “robu” function in the ROBUMETA package with 37 studies with 38 samples, including 285 effect sizes. Robust variance estimation (RVE) was used to deal with dependent effect sizes [104]. For the moderator analysis, three moderators (i.e., social–emotional skills, reading ability, and grade level) were entered into one model when performing the meta-regression. The I-squared, which refers to the percentage of variation among the studies resulting from heterogeneity rather than chance [110,111], was calculated to check heterogeneity.

12. Results

There were 5123 studies located in the initial search. After removing 747 duplicates, 4376 articles were screened by their titles and abstracts, with 179 further screened by full texts using the preestablished criteria (see Figure 1). Eventually, 43 studies among 28,765 participants met the inclusion criteria, and 37 studies among 38 samples with 28,404 participants were included in the meta-analysis after excluding six influential samples (see Table 1 for details of all papers meeting inclusion criteria).

13. Study Characteristics

As shown in Table 1, of the 43 studies, 28 were cross-sectional (65.12%), and 15 were longitudinal (34.88%). Twenty-five studies (58.14%) measured participants’ emotional intelligence, 15 (34.88%) measured social skills, two (4.65%) measured emotional intelligence and social skills, and one (2.33%) measured emotional skills and social–emotional skills. Twenty-eight studies (65.12%) measured participants’ reading comprehension, nine (20.93%) measured participants’ word reading, five (11.63%) measured participants’ word reading and reading comprehension, and one (2.33%) did not report the type of reading ability. Thirty-six studies (83.72%) measured participants’ reading ability in English, two (4.65%) in French, one (2.33%) in German, one (2.33%) in Turkish, one (2.33%) in Chinese, and two (4.65%) did not report the language measured. All studies reported Pearson’s r value between social–emotional skills and reading ability. The r value ranged from −0.26 to 0.84.

14. Participant Characteristics

Participants’ sample sizes ranged from 18 to 9225, and grade levels ranged from kindergarten to post-undergraduate. In terms of gender, thirty-two studies (74.42%) included male and female participants, with the male percentage ranging from 18.88% to 66.67%, three studies (6.98%) included only female participants, one study (2.33%) included only male participants, and seven studies (16.28%) did not report participants’ gender. The participants were recruited from kindergarten in 13 studies (30.23%), primary school in seven studies (16.28%), secondary school in five studies (11.63%), university or above in 13 studies (30.23%), both kindergarten and primary school in one study (2.33%), and four studies (9.30%) did not report participants’ grade level.

15. Influential Samples

Each study’s DFBETAS and COVRATIO values were calculated to determine whether the study was an influential sample. When analyzing small to medium data sets, a study with a DFBETAS value greater than one is often considered an influential sample [106,107]. As shown in Figure 2, the DFBETAS values of all 44 samples were smaller than 1. No influential samples were found based on this value.
When a study’s COVRATIO value is smaller than 1, the removal of that study can yield a more precise estimation [107]. As shown in Figure 2, the COVRATIO value for Sample 1 [59], Sample 4 [72], Sample 5 [5], Sample 15 [68], Sample 20 [81], and Sample 39 [95] were below 1. These studies were identified as influential samples and removed in the later analysis.

16. Publication Bias

Publication bias means that journals prefer studies with statistically significant results [112]. The funnel plot of the distribution of effect sizes and Egger’s regression test were conducted to examine publication bias. As shown in Figure 3, the effect sizes of the studies were, to some extent, symmetrically distributed around the overall effect size, suggesting no publication bias. Many papers did not plot in the white-shaded area of the triangle, suggesting high heterogeneity among the studies. Egger’s regression test showed that the standard error of the effect size could not predict the effect size, with z = 0.50 and p = 0.62, indicating that the statistical significance of the paper’s results would not influence its publication.

17. Overall Correlation between Social–Emotional Skills and Reading Ability

The “robu” function in the ROBUMETA package was used to calculate the overall effect size between social–emotional skills and reading ability. The result indicated that social–emotional skills were moderately and significantly correlated with reading ability, r = 0.23, 95% CI [0.19, 0.28], p < 0.001 (see Table 2 and Figure 4).

18. Moderation Effects

18.1. Moderation Effect of the Types of Social–Emotional Skills

In this study, we coded social–emotional skills as emotional intelligence (30 effect sizes) and social skills (254 effect sizes). As shown in Table 2, reading ability was significantly correlated with emotional intelligence, r = 0.22, 95% CI [0.14, 0.30], p < 0.001, and social skills, r = 0.24, 95% CI [0.19, 0.29], p < 0.001. As shown in Table 3, after controlling for types of reading ability and grade level, emotional intelligence and social skills were related to a similar degree to reading ability, β = 0.00, 95% CI [−0.11, 0.10], t = −0.09, p = 0.927, which suggested that the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability was not affected by the types of social–emotional skills.

18.2. Moderation Effect of Types of Reading Ability

The outcomes of reading ability were categorized into two types (i.e., word reading, including 120 effect sizes; and reading comprehension, including 163 effect sizes). As shown in Table 2, the average correlations between social-emotional skills and both types of reading ability were significant (r = 0.25, 95% CI [0.17, 0.32], p < 0.001 for word reading, and r = 0.25, 95% CI [0.20, 0.30], p < 0.001 for reading comprehension). Additionally, after controlling for types of social–emotional skills and grade level, reading comprehension was more strongly related to social–emotional skills than word reading, β = 0.07, 95% CI [0.02, 0.11], t = 5.03, p = 0.022 (see Table 3), suggesting that the relationship between social—emotional skills and reading ability did vary with types of reading ability.

18.3. Moderation Effect of Grade Level

In this study, we coded grade level into four groups (i.e., kindergarten, including 89 effect sizes; primary school, including 155 effect sizes; secondary school, including 25 effect sizes; and university or above, including 14 effect sizes). As shown in Table 2, the average relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability was significant for all four groups: kindergarten, r = 0.22, 95% CI [0.18, 0.27], p < 0.001; primary school, r = 0.22, 95% CI [0.16, 0.27], p < 0.001; secondary school, r = 0.29, 95% CI [0.13, 0.44], p = 0.006; and university or above, r = 0.20, 95% CI [0.09, 0.30], p = 0.001. As shown in Table 3, after controlling for types of social–emotional skills and types of reading ability, a numerical tendency for a bigger magnitude in the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability occurred for elementary school students than for kindergarteners, β = 0.02, 95% CI [−0.004, 0.05], t = 2.90, p = 0.070. Given the small sample size, the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability may vary across grade levels.

19. Discussion

The present study examined the overall correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability and the potential moderators of this correlation. Consistent with LMR, this study showed that the overall correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability was significant, r = 0.23, p < 0.001. In addition, the moderator analysis indicated that types of reading ability could moderate the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability after controlling for types of social–emotional skills and grade level, with reading comprehension showing a stronger correlation with social–emotional skills than with word reading. Contrary to our hypothesis, the moderating effect of types of social-emotional skills and grade level were not significant.

20. The Relationship between Social–Emotional Skills and Reading Ability

This meta-analysis is the first to test the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability guided with the LMR [2]. Consistent with the LMR, this study found a significant and moderate correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. This finding also aligns with many previous studies, indicating a significantly positive correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. For example, in a sample of American adolescents aged 16 to 18, Froiland and Davison [79] found that social–emotional skills (i.e., social perception) could predict students’ reading comprehension even after controlling gender, grade, and ethnicity. In a longitudinal study, Ortiz et al. [85] found that children’s social–emotional skills (i.e., social skills) in kindergarten were significantly and positively related to their word reading in kindergarten and reading comprehension at grade one. Similarly, in a sample of English learners in grade eleven, Firdaus [60] found that students’ social–emotional skills (i.e., emotional skills) could predict their reading comprehension.
Several potential explanations exist for the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. First, students with high social–emotional skills are more likely to build and maintain friendly relationships with teachers [113] and peers [114], which enables them to learn efficiently at school [115], and ultimately result in good academic performance including reading. For example, in a sample of college students, Schutte et al. [116] found that students’ social–emotional skills (i.e., emotional skills) were positively related to their scores in close and affectionate relationships. Another previous study also showed that college students’ social–emotional skills (i.e., emotional management) could predict positive interpersonal relationships, and students with higher social–emotional skills tended to report fewer negative interactions with close friends [117]. The interpersonal relationship was related to children’s academic motivation at school. A prior study conducted on a sample of Chinese adolescents aged 13 to 17 indicated that peer relationships could influence their academic motivation, which could affect academic performance (i.e., mathematics achievement) [34]. Future studies should further examine whether social–emotional skills influence reading ability through the interpersonal relationship at school.
Second, individuals with higher social–emotional skills may have more high-quality social interactions and communications, causing their verbal skills to improve through incidental learning, which is ultimately related to reading ability [118]. In a sample of Spanish preschoolers who learned English as a second language, Winsler et al. [119] found that children’s social–emotional skills (i.e., initiative, self-control, and attachment with adults) at age four could predict their oral language skills in English at the end of kindergarten. Similarly, some other studies reported that social–emotional skills were positively related to specific language skills, such as vocabulary knowledge [28] and listening comprehension [79]. Language skills, such as vocabulary knowledge and listening comprehension, play essential roles in reading development [2]. Thus, social-emotional skills may be related to reading ability through language skills.
Additionally, there are some similar scenarios in reading comprehension and social interactions. Reading comprehension, especially when reading fiction, is a transportation into a narrative world that involves cognitive, emotional, and creative–imaginary processes [42]. Exposed to characters in different roles and various scenarios similar to social interactions in life, young readers may draw on their prior experiences to understand the emotions and feelings of each character, which enables them to practice and forge their social–emotional skills [120]. Vice versa, the frequency of exposure to a specific scenario and familiarity with this scenario will influence children’s understanding of reading materials related to this scenario [32]. Therefore, children who struggle to draw inferences and conclusions when reading a text might also have difficulty understanding others’ perspectives and predicting others’ intentions during social interactions, and children with lower social–emotional skills perform worse in reading tasks [121,122].

21. Moderation Effect of Types of Reading Outcomes

We also found that the types of social–emotional skills significantly moderated the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading comprehension, but this moderating effect was not significant for the correlation between social–emotional skills and word reading. This finding is quite understandable. First, reading comprehension is relatively more complicated than word reading and involves both lower-level word processing skills and higher-level cognitive–linguistic processing skills [123]. Readers with higher social–emotional skills “would be able to carry out higher-level processing more effectively and efficiently” [59]. In contrast, word reading can become automatic with increasing learning, which may not be much associated with individuals’ social–emotional skills [124]. The CMR model posits that social–emotional skills, which are important elements of the psychological domain, could significantly and directly relate to reading comprehension [17] but may indirectly relate to word reading through reading comprehension [2].

22. Moderation Effect of Types of Social–Emotional Skills

Inconsistent with our prediction, types of social–emotional skills did not moderate the magnitude of the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading comprehension. One potential explanation for this unexpected result is the highly overlapped items used to measure social skills and emotional intelligence. Interpersonal skills, for instance, were used to measure social skills and emotional intelligence in the studies reviewed. Specifically, 16 of the 28 studies measured participants’ emotional intelligence using the Bar-On emotional quotient inventory [11,12,13] (N = 13) or the trait emotional intelligence questionnaire [125] (N = 3), both of which include interpersonal skills as an index of emotional intelligence. Six studies considered interpersonal skills as components of social skills measured by the social skills rating system [15]. Therefore, the nonsignificant moderating effect of types of social–emotional skills may be due to overlaps between social skills and emotional intelligence.

23. Moderation Effect of Grade Level

Inconsistent with our prediction, the grade level could not influence the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. This result is inconsistent with one prior study showing that the correlation between emotional intelligence and academic performance was more robust for lower-grade students than for higher-grade students [48]. This result is consistent with another prior study, indicating that the correlation between emotional intelligence and academic performance was not influenced by age [51]. The insignificant moderating effect of the grade level should be interpreted cautiously. Although we did not find significant differences in the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability across grade levels, the correlational value of secondary school students was numerically larger than that of primary school students (i.e., 0.29 versus 0.22). The nonsignificant moderating effect of grade level may be due to the limited studies conducted in secondary schools. As shown in Table 2, only six studies recruited participants from secondary schools. Future studies with bigger sample sizes should be conducted further to examine the moderating effect of the grade level

24. Limitations

This study has at least three limitations. First, we focused on typically developing individuals only, which may limit the generalization of the findings to clinical samples. For example, previous studies also showed that social–emotional skills were significantly correlated with the reading ability of students with autism spectrum disorders [126,127]. Future studies should examine whether the results can be extended to disabled groups and whether the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability varies in normal and disabled groups. Second, at 38 samples, after excluding influential samples, our sample size for the overall meta-analysis was sufficient, but the sample sizes of some subgroups were insufficient. For example, the subgroup of secondary schools had only six samples, slightly larger than four, which, according to Fu et al. [128], is the minimum sample for a categorical subgroup variable. This low sample size may account for our inability to find a significant moderator effect of grade level, although the correlation for secondary schools (r = 0.29) was statistically higher than other grade levels (rs = 0.20–0.29). Finally, we did not examine the moderation effect of IQ in the present study. Though we initially considered IQ as a potential moderator, we found that most studies did not report IQ scores, resulting in many missing values. The few studies that did measure participants’ IQ used different tasks with different scales and provided the raw score of IQ. Therefore, including IQ with different scales as a moderator was statistically infeasible. Instead, the moderators used in this study were grade level, a categorical variable divided by grade; types of social–emotional skills, a categorical variable divided into social skills and emotional intelligence; and reading ability, a categorical variable divided into word reading and reading comprehension.

25. Implications

This study was the first to systematically examine the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. The findings have implications for theories of reading as well as for instructions to improve students’ social–emotional skills and reading ability. Specifically, we examined the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability based on LMR. In support of LMR, we found a significant correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability, suggesting that social–emotional skills, as essential components of social–cognitive processes, could influence individuals’ reading ability. In turn, this developed reading ability could influence the development of children’s social–emotional skills during early and middle childhood [2]. We also examined the moderation effects of types of social–emotional skills, types of reading ability, and grade level on the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. Results indicated that, compared to word reading, reading comprehension had a stronger correlation with social–emotional skills, which supports the simple view of reading (SVR) and suggests that reading comprehension is more complicated than word reading [9,129]. Future studies should explain the difference in the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading comprehension and between social–emotional skills and word reading.
Furthermore, our findings have practical implications for social–emotional intervention programs to improve children’s reading ability. One previous study indicated that social–emotional intervention for preschool students from low SES families contributed to their reading development in grade one, even after controlling for vocabulary and emergent literacy skills [130]. Findings in previous studies, combined with those in this meta-analysis, suggest that social–emotional skills play important roles in the reading ability development of students in various grade levels, ranging from kindergarten to university and above. Parents and teachers should create opportunities that explicitly enhance social–emotional skills and integrate the growth of these skills with the development of students’ reading ability at home or in the classroom. However, it should be noted that the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability was moderate, ranging from 0.20 to 0.29. Translating the correlations into variances, social-emotional skills accounted for a small percentage of variance in reading ability, ranging from 4.00% to 8.41%. These numbers indicate that although a social–emotional intervention program can contribute to reading development, the effects may be small, suggesting that social–emotional intervention alone may not be sufficient to improve reading ability [2]. The best approach to improving reading ability may be to combine social–emotional and reading intervention.
Our findings also have implications for reading intervention programs to improve children’s social–emotional skills. Specifically, since readers need to comprehend the emotions of the characters and the relationships among these characters, social–emotional skills showed a stronger correlation with reading comprehension than with word reading [119]. Thus, compared to word reading, reading comprehension intervention may have a stronger effect on social–emotional skills.
In summary, this meta-analysis examined the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability and the potential moderators of this relationship. The results indicated that social–emotional skills were moderately correlated with reading ability and that social–emotional skills had a stronger correlation to reading comprehension than word reading. These findings suggest that teachers, educators, and parents should consider the roles of social–emotional skills in children’s reading development and, conversely, the role of reading ability in developing one’s social–emotional skills. High social–emotional skill levels could improve children's reading ability and general wellbeing.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, X.T.; methodology, J.J.Y. and L.Y.; software, L.Y.; validation, L.Y. and J.J.Y.; formal analysis, J.J.Y. and L.Y.; investigation, L.Y.; resources, L.Y.; data curation, L.Y.; writing—original draft preparation, X.T. and L.Y.; writing—review and editing X.T. and L.Y.; visualization, X.T. and L.Y.; supervision, X.T. and J.J.Y.; project administration, X.T. and L.Y.; funding acquisition, X.T. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Funding

This research was supported by Seed Fund Grant, the Education University of Hong Kong with grant number RG60/21-22R.

Data Availability Statement

Data for performing analyses are available; please email us ([email protected]) for access to the data.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

References

  1. Gao, Y.; Zheng, L.; Liu, X.; Nichols, E.S.; Zhang, M.; Shang, L.; Ding, G.; Meng, X.; Liu, L. First and second language reading difficulty among Chinese–English bilingual children: The prevalence and influences from demographic characteristics. Front. Psychol. 2019, 10, 2544. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  2. Connor, C.M. A lattice model of the development of reading comprehension. Child Dev. Perspect. 2016, 10, 269–274. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  3. Follmer, D.J. Executive Function and Reading Comprehension: A Meta-Analytic Review. Educ. Psychol. 2018, 53, 42–60. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  4. Toste, J.R.; Didion, L.; Peng, P.; Filderman, M.J.; McClelland, A.M. A Meta-Analytic Review of the Relations Between Motivation and Reading Achievement for K-12 Students. Rev. Educ. Res. 2020, 90, 420–456. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  5. Arabsarhangi, M.; Noroozi, I. The relationship between self-awareness and learners’ performance on different reading comprehension test types among Iranian EFL elementary learners. Theory Pract. Lang. Stud. 2014, 4, 675–685. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  6. Ghabanchi, Z.; Rastegar, R. The correlation of IQ and emotional intelligence with reading comprehension. Read. Matrix: Int. Online J. 2014, 14, 135–144. [Google Scholar]
  7. Cook, C.R.; Gresham, L.K.; Barreras, R.B.; Thornton, S.; Crews, S.D. Socials skills training for secondary students with emotional and/or behavioral disorders: A review and analysis of the meta-analytic literature. J. Emot. Behav. Disord. 2008, 16, 131–144. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  8. Law, K.S.; Wong, C.-S.; Song, L.J. The construct and criterion validity of emotional intelligence and its potential utility for management studies. J. Appl. Psychol. 2004, 89, 483–496. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  9. Hoover, W.; Gough, P. The simple view of reading. Read. Writ. 1990, 2, 127–160. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  10. Gough, P.B.; Tunmer, W.E. Decoding, Reading, and Reading Disability. Remedial Spec. Educ. 1986, 7, 6–10. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  11. Bar-On, R. The Emotional Quotient Inventory (EQ-I): A Test of Emotional Intelligence; Multi-Health Systems Inc.: North Tonawanda, NY, USA, 1997. [Google Scholar]
  12. Bar-On, R. Emotional and social intelligence: Insights from the emotional quotient inventory (EQ-I). In The Handbook of Emotional Intelligence; Bar-On, R., Parker, J.D., Eds.; JosseyBass: Hoboken, NJ, USA, 2000; pp. 363–388. [Google Scholar]
  13. Bar-On, R. The Bar-On emotional quotient inventory (EQ-i): Rationale, description and psychometric properties. In Measuring Emotional Intelligence: Common Ground and Controversy; Geher, G., Ed.; Nova Science: Hauppauge, NY, USA, 2004; pp. 111–142. [Google Scholar]
  14. Elliott, S.N.; Gresham, F.M. SSIS-RS Intervention Guide; NCS Pearson: Bloomington, IN, USA, 2008. [Google Scholar]
  15. Gresham, F.M.; Elliott, S.N. The Social Skills Rating System; American Guidance Services: Circle Pines, MN, USA, 1990. [Google Scholar]
  16. Barton, J. Reading the Old Testament: Method in Biblical Study; Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville, KY, USA, 1996. [Google Scholar]
  17. Benner, G.J.; Beaudoin, K.; Kinder, D.; Mooney, P. The relationship between the beginning reading skills and social adjustment of a general sample of elementary aged children. Educ. Treat. Child. 2005, 28, 250–264. [Google Scholar]
  18. Mason, L.; Scrimin, S.; Zaccoletti, S.; Tornatora, M.C.; Goetz, T. Webpage reading: Psychophysiological correlates of emotional arousal and regulation predict multiple-text comprehension. Comput. Hum. Behav. 2018, 87, 317–326. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  19. Tamir, D.I.; Bricker, A.B.; Dodell-Feder, D.; Mitchell, J.P. Reading fiction and reading minds: The role of simulation in the default network. Soc. Cogn. Affect. Neurosci. 2016, 11, 215–224. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  20. McMichael, P. The hen or the egg? Which comes first-antisocial emotional disorders or reading disability? Br. J. Educ. Psychol. 1979, 49, 226–238. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  21. Caemmerer, J.M.; Keith, T.Z. Longitudinal, reciprocal effects of social skills and achievement from kindergarten to eighth grade. J. Sch. Psychol. 2015, 53, 265–281. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  22. Sparapani, N.; Connor, C.M.D.; McLean, L.; Wood, T.; Toste, J.; Day, S. Direct and reciprocal effects among social skills, vocabulary, and reading comprehension in first grade. Contemp. Educ. Psychol. 2018, 53, 159–167. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  23. Fivush, R. Gendered narratives: Elaboration, structure, and emotion in parent-child reminiscing across the preschool years. In Autobiographical Memory: Theoretical and Applied Perspectives; Thompson, C.P., Herrmann, D.J., Bruce, D., Read, J.D., Payne, D.G., Eds.; Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Inc.: Mahwah, NJ, USA, 1998; pp. 79–104. [Google Scholar]
  24. Gilbert, D.T.; Tafarodi, R.W.; Malone, P.S. You can’t not believe everything you read. J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 1993, 65, 221–233. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  25. Green, M.C.; Brock, T.C. The role of transportation in the persuasiveness of public narratives. J. Personal. Soc. Psychol. 2000, 79, 701–721. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  26. MacCann, C.; Joseph, D.L.; Newman, D.A.; Roberts, R.D. Emotional intelligence is a second-stratum factor of intelligence: Evidence from hierarchical and bifactor models. Emotion 2014, 14, 358–374. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  27. Glenn Schellenberg, E. Music lessons, emotional intelligence, and IQ. Music Percept. 2011, 29, 185–194. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  28. Weizman, Z.O.; Snow, C.E. Lexical output as related to children’s vocabulary acquisition: Effects of sophisticated exposure and support for meaning. Dev. Psychol. 2001, 37, 265. Available online: https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/0012-1649.37.2.265 (accessed on 15 February 2023).
  29. Mirzaei, S.; Hayati, A.F. Effects of the computer mediated communication interaction on vocabulary improvement. Telkomnika (Telecommun. Comput. Electron. Control) 2018, 16, 2217–2225. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  30. Lervåg, A.; Dolean, D.; Tincas, I.; Melby-Lervåg, M. Socioeconomic background, nonverbal IQ and school absence affects the development of vocabulary and reading comprehension in children living in severe poverty. Dev. Sci. 2019, 22, e12858. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  31. August, D.; Carlo, M.; Dressler, C.; Snow, C. The critical role of vocabulary development for English language learners. Learn. Disabil. Res. Pract. 2005, 20, 50–57. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  32. Pishghadam, R.; Abbasnejad, H. Emotioncy: A potential measure of readability. Int. Electron. J. Elem. Educ. 2016, 9, 109–123. Available online: https://www.iejee.com/index.php/IEJEE/article/view/147 (accessed on 15 February 2023).
  33. Shahian, L.; Pishghadam, R.; Khajavy, G.H. Flow and reading comprehension: Testing the mediating role of emotioncy. Issues Educ. Res. 2017, 27, 427–549. [Google Scholar]
  34. Li, L.; Peng, Z.; Lu, L.; Liao, H.; Li, H. Peer relationships, self-efficacy, academic motivation, and mathematics achievement in Zhuang adolescents: A moderated mediation model. Child. Youth Serv. Rev. 2020, 118, 105358. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  35. Suchy, Y.; Rau, H.; Whittaker, W.J.; Eastvold, A.; Strassberg, D.J. Facial affect recognition as a predictor of performance on a reading comprehension test among criminal sex offenders. Appl. Psychol. Crim. Justice 2009, 5, 73–89. [Google Scholar]
  36. Pishghadam, R. A quantitative analysis of the relationship between emotional intelligence and foreign Language learning. Electron. J. Foreign Lang. Teach. 2009, 6, 31–41. Available online: http://e-flt.nus.edu.sg/v6n12009/pishghadam.pdf (accessed on 15 February 2023).
  37. Schwab, S.; Hessels, M.G.P.; Gebhardt, M.; Krammer, M.; Gasteiger-Klicpera, B. The relationship between social and emotional integration and reading ability in students with and without special educational needs in inclusive classes. J. Cogn. Educ. Psychol. 2015, 14, 180–198. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  38. Rinn, R.C.; Markle, A. Modification of social skill deficits in children. In Research and Practice in Social Skills Training; Beiaack, A., Hersen, M., Eds.; Plenum Press: New York, NY, USA, 1979; pp. 107–129. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  39. Mayer, J.D.; Salovey, P. What is emotional intelligence? In Emotional Development and Emotional Intelligence: Educational Implications; Salovey, P., Sluyter, D., Eds.; Basic Books: New York, NY, USA, 1997; pp. 3–31. [Google Scholar]
  40. Fan, H.; Jackson, T.; Yang, X.; Tang, W.; Zhang, J. The factor structure of the Mayer-Salovey-Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test V 2.0 (MSCEIT): A meta-analytic structural equation modeling approach. Personal. Individ. Differ. 2010, 48, 781–785. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  41. Gerrig, R.J. Experiencing Narrative Worlds; Yale University Press: New Haven, CT, USA, 1993. [Google Scholar]
  42. Green, M.C.; Brock, T.C.; Kaufman, G.F. Understanding media enjoyment: The role of transportation into narrative worlds. Commun. Theory 2004, 14, 311–327. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  43. De Naeghel, J.; Van Keer, H.; Vansteenkiste, M.; Rosseel, Y. The relation between elementary students’ recreational and academic reading motivation, reading frequency, engagement, and comprehension: A self-determination theory perspective. J. Educ. Psychol. 2012, 104, 1006–1021. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  44. Smith, L.E.; Borkowski, J.G.; Whitman, T.L. From reading readiness to reading competence: The role of self-regulation in at-risk children. Sci. Stud. Read. 2008, 12, 131–152. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  45. Geva, E.; Farnia, F. Developmental changes in the nature of language proficiency and reading fluency paint a more complex view of reading comprehension in ELL and EL1. Read. Writ. 2012, 25, 1819–1845. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  46. Kirby, J.R.; Savage, R.S. Can the simple view deal with the complexities of reading? Literacy 2008, 42, 75–82. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  47. Pearson, P.D.; Hamm, D.N. The assessment of reading comprehension: A review of practices—Past, present, and future. In Children’s Reading Comprehension and Assessment; Paris, S.G., Stahl, S.A., Eds.; Lawrence Erlbaum Associates: Mahwah, NJ, USA, 2005; pp. 13–69. [Google Scholar]
  48. Perera, H.N.; DiGiacomo, M. The relationship of trait emotional intelligence with academic performance: A meta-analytic review. Learn. Individ. Differ. 2013, 28, 20–33. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  49. Costa, A.; Faria, L. The impact of emotional intelligence on academic achievement: A longitudinal study in Portuguese secondary school. Learn. Individ. Differ. 2015, 37, 38–47. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  50. Wolf, S.; McCoy, D.C. The role of executive function and social-emotional skills in the development of literacy and numeracy during preschool: A cross-lagged longitudinal study. Dev. Sci. 2019, 22, e12800. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  51. MacCann, C.; Jiang, Y.; Brown, L.E.R.; Double, K.S.; Bucich, M.; Minbashian, A. Emotional intelligence predicts academic performance: A meta-analysis. Psychol. Bull. 2020, 146, 150–186. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  52. Chall, J.S. Stages of Reading Development; McGraw-Hill: New York, NY, USA, 1983. [Google Scholar]
  53. Boud, D. Developing Student Autonomy in Learning; Routledge: England, UK, 2012. [Google Scholar]
  54. Danesh, M.; Nourdad, N. On the relationship between creative problem solving skill and EFL reading comprehension ability. Theory Pract. Lang. Stud. 2017, 7, 234–240. Available online: http://dx.doi.org/10.17507/tpls.0703.10 (accessed on 15 February 2023).
  55. Zandi, M. The role of emotional intelligence in French language learning and academic success of the female students. Procedia—Soc. Behav. Sci. 2012, 46, 4986–4989. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  56. Zarezadeh, T. The effect of emotional intelligence in English language learning. Procedia—Soc. Behav. Sci. 2013, 84, 1286–1289. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  57. Moher, D.; Liberati, A.; Tetzlaff, J.; Altman, D.G. Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses: The PRISMA Statement. PLoS Med. 2009, 6, e1000097. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  58. Abdolrezapour, P. Improving learners’ oral fluency through computer-mediated emotional intelligence activities. ReCALL 2017, 29, 80–98. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  59. Abdolrezapour, P.; Tavakoli, M. The relationship between emotional intelligence and EFL learners’ achievement in reading comprehension. Innov. Lang. Learn. Teach. 2012, 6, 1–13. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  60. Firdaus, M.A. The Correlation between Emotional Intelligence and Reading Comprehension of The Eleventh Grade Students of Sma Sandika Banyuasin. Master’s Thesis, UIN Raden Fatah Palembang, Palembang, Indonesia, 2017. [Google Scholar]
  61. Zandi, M. The role of emotional intelligence in French language learning and academic success of the male students. Procedia—Soc. Behav. Sci. 2012, 46, 5714–5717. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  62. Motallebzadeh, K. The relationship between the emotional intelligence of Iranian EFL learners and their reading comprehension and structural ability. J. Teach. Engl. A Foreign Lang. Lit. 2009, 1, 39–55. [Google Scholar]
  63. Hall, G.E.; DiPerna, J.C. Childhood social skills as predictors of middle school academic adjustment. J. Early Adolesc. 2017, 37, 825–851. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  64. Bryant, H.C. The Relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Reading Comprehension in High-School Students with Learning Disabilities. Ph.D. Thesis, Andrews University, Berrien Springs, MI, USA, 2007. [Google Scholar]
  65. Kheyrkhahnia, Y.; Ghonsooly, B.; Salehi Fadardi, J. Induction of emotions from TOEFL iBT reading tests as a construct-irrelevant factor and its interference with emotional intelligence. Int. J. Foreign Lang. Teach. Res. 2020, 8, 93–105. [Google Scholar]
  66. Rutherford, L.E.; Dupaul, G.J.; Jitendra, A.K. Examining the relationship between treatment outcomes for academic achievement and social skills in school-age children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. Psychol. Sch. 2008, 45, 145–157. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  67. Åsberg Johnels, J.; Carlsson, E.; Norbury, C.; Gillberg, C.; Miniscalco, C. Current profiles and early predictors of reading skills in school-age children with autism spectrum disorders: A longitudinal, retrospective population study. Autism 2019, 23, 1449–1459. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  68. Firdaus, M.A. Looking at the link between emotional intelligence and reading comprehension among senior high school students. J. Educ. Instr. 2017, 4, 18–28. [Google Scholar]
  69. Orwin, R.G.; Vevea, J.L. Evaluating coding decisions. In The Handbook of Research Synthesis and Meta-Analysis; Cooper, H., Hedges, L.V., Valentine, J.C., Eds.; Russell Sage Foundation: New York, NY, USA, 2009; pp. 177–203. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  70. Abdorazik, S. The relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Reading Comprehension among ELT Undergraduate Students. Master’s Thesis, Eastern Mediterranean University, Famagusta, Cyprus, 2017. [Google Scholar]
  71. Agostin, T.M.; Bain, S.K. Predicting early school success with developmental and social skills screeners. Psychol. Sch. 1997, 34, 219–228. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  72. Alipanahi, F.; Tariverdi, H. The relationship between emotional intelligence and reading comprehension of Iranian EFL learners. ELT Voices—Int. J. Teach. Engl. 2016, 6, 20–28. [Google Scholar]
  73. Arnold, D.H.; Kupersmidt, J.B.; Voegler-Lee, M.E.; Marshall, N.A. The association between preschool children’s social functioning and their emergent academic skills. Early Child. Res. Q. 2012, 27, 376–386. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  74. Aryanto, I. Correlational study between students’ emotional intelligence and reading comprehension in the English department at Unisma. J. Penelit. Pendidik. Dan Pembelajaran 2020, 15, 1–11. [Google Scholar]
  75. Ateş, A. The impact of the emotional intelligence of learners of Turkish as a foreign language on reading comprehension skills and reading anxiety. Univers. J. Educ. Res. 2019, 7, 571–579. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  76. Chen, Z.; Zhang, P. Trait emotional intelligence and second language performance: A case study of Chinese EFL learners. J. Multiling. Multicult. Dev. 2020, 43, 731–745. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  77. Farajnezhad, Z.; Tabatabai, O. Relationship between Emotional Intelligence and Reading Comprehension Ability and Vocabulary Knowledge of Iranian EFL Learners in Tehran Azad Universities. In Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference on Applied Research in Language Studies, Tehran, Iran, 24 January 2019; Available online: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3511156 (accessed on 20 January 2021).
  78. Feshbach, N.D.; Feshbach, S. Affective processes and academic achievement. Child Dev. 1987, 58, 1335–1347. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  79. Froiland, J.M.; Davison, M.L. Emotional intelligence, listening comprehension, and reading comprehension among diverse adolescents. J. Child Fam. Stud. 2020, 29, 1385–1390. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  80. Hindman, A.H.; Morrison, F.J. Differential contributions of three parenting dimensions to preschool literacy and social skills in a middle-income sample. Merrill-Palmer Q. 2012, 58, 191–223. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  81. Karbalaei, A.; Sanati, F. The study of the relationship between emotional intelligence, reading motivation, and anxiety with reading comprehension among Iranian EFL learners. Int. J. Engl. Lang. Lit. Stud. 2015, 4, 171–183. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  82. Konold, T.R.; Jamison, K.R.; Stanton-Chapman, T.L.; Rimm-Kaufman, S.E. Relationships among informant based measures of social skills and student achievement: A longitudinal examination of differential effects by sex. Appl. Dev. Sci. 2010, 14, 18–34. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  83. Medford, E.; McGeown, S.P. Social, emotional and behavioural influences on young children’s pre-reading and word reading development. J. Appl. Dev. Psychol. 2016, 43, 54–61. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  84. Montroy, J.J.; Bowles, R.P.; Skibbe, L.E.; Foster, T.D. Social skills and problem behaviors as mediators of the relationship between behavioral self-regulation and academic achievement. Early Child. Res. Q. 2014, 29, 298–309. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  85. Ortiz, M.; Folsom, J.S.; Al Otaiba, S.; Greulich, L.; Thomas-Tate, S.; Connor, C.M. The componential model of reading: Predicting first grade reading performance of culturally diverse students from ecological, psychological, and cognitive factors assessed at kindergarten entry. J. Learn. Disabil. 2012, 45, 406–417. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  86. Martí, G.P.; Caballero, F.S.; Sellabona, E.S. Does emotional intelligence have an impact on linguistic competences? A primary education study. Sustainability 2020, 12, 10474. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  87. Pishghadam, R.; Tabataba’ian, M.S. Emotional intelligence: Can it be a predictor of performance on different test formats? Int. J. Linguist. 2011, 3, 1–21. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  88. Ponitz, C.C.; McClelland, M.M.; Matthews, J.S.; Morrison, F.J. A structured observation of behavioral self-regulation and its contribution to kindergarten outcomes. Dev. Psychol. 2009, 45, 605–619. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  89. Quirk, M.; Dowdy, E.; Goldstein, A.; Carnazzo, K. School readiness as a longitudinal predictor of social-emotional and reading performance across the elementary grades. Assess. Eff. Interv. 2017, 42, 248–253. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  90. Razza, R.A.; Martin, A.; Brooks-Gunn, J. Are approaches to learning in kindergarten associated with academic and social competence similarly? Child Youth Care Forum 2015, 44, 757–776. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  91. Saeidi, M.; Yusefi, M. The relationship between EFL learners’ emotional intelligence and critical reading. J. Engl. Lang. Pedagog. Pract. 2008, 1, 134–161. [Google Scholar]
  92. Sartika, D.; Septarani, D.; Asmara, R. The correlation between students’ emotional intelligence and reading comprehension achievement. J. Engl. Educ. Linguist. 2021, 2, 10–17. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  93. Smith-Adcock, S.; Leite, W.; Kaya, Y.; Amatea, E. A model of parenting risk and resilience, social-emotional readiness, and reading achievement in kindergarten children from low-income families model. J. Child Fam. Stud. 2019, 28, 2826–2841. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  94. Tabrizi, A.R.; Esmaeili, L. The relationship between the emotional intelligence and reading comprehension of Iranian EFL impulsive vs. reflective students. Int. J. Engl. Linguist. 2016, 6, 221–229. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  95. Talebinejad, M.R.; Fard, Z.R. The relationship between emotional quotients, socioeconomic status and performance in reading comprehension: A case study of Iranian high school students. J. Lang. Teach. Res. 2012, 3, 844–850. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  96. Wang, C.; Algozzine, B. Rethinking the relationship between reading and behavior in early elementary school. J. Educ. Res. 2011, 104, 100–109. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  97. Yu, L.; Tong, X. The Relation between Emotional Skills and Reading Comprehension and Reading Comprehension Difficulties: A Two-Year Longitudinal Study. Ph.D. Thesis, The Education University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China, 2023. [Google Scholar]
  98. Imms, C. Children with cerebral palsy participate: A review of the literature. Disabil. Rehabil. 2008, 30, 1867–1884. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  99. Law, M.; Stewart, D.; Letts, L.; Pollock, N.; Bosch, J.; Westmorland, M. Guidelines for Critical Review of Qualitative Studies; McMaster University Occupational Therapy Evidence-Based Practice Research Group: Hamilton, Canada, 1998; Available online: https://medfac.tbzmed.ac.ir/Uploads/3/cms/user/File/10/Pezeshki_Ejtemaei/conferance/dav.pdf (accessed on 28 January 2020).
  100. Laliberté, E. Package ‘metacor’, Version 1.0-2.1; The R Project for Statistical Computing; The R Foundation: Vienna, Austria, 2011; Available online: http://CRAN.R-project.org/package=metacor (accessed on 14 January 2021).
  101. Kline, R.B. Principles and Practice of Structural Equation Modeling, 3rd ed.; Guilford Press: New York, NY, USA, 2011. [Google Scholar]
  102. Fisher, Z.; Tipton, E.; Zhipeng, H. Package ‘robumeta’, Version 2.0; The R Project for Statistical Computing; The R Foundation: Vienna, Austria, 2017; Available online: https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/robumeta/robumeta.pdf (accessed on 20 October 2022).
  103. Viechtbauer, W. Package “metafor”, Version 3.0-2; The R Project for Statistical Computing; The R Foundation: Vienna, Austria, 2017; Available online: https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/metafor/ (accessed on 20 September 2022).
  104. Fisher, Z.; Tipton, E. robumeta: An R-package for robust variance estimation in meta-analysis. arXiv 2015, arXiv:1503.02220. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  105. Belsley, D.A.; Kuh, E.; Welsch, R. Regression Diagnostics: Identifying Influential Data and Sources of Collinearity; John Wiley and Sons: Hoboken, NJ, USA, 1980. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  106. Neter, J.; Kutner, M.H.; Nachtsheim, C.J.; Wasserman, W. Applied Linear Statistical Models; McGraw-Hill/Irwin: New York, NY, USA, 1996. [Google Scholar]
  107. Viechtbauer, W.; Cheung, M.W.L. Outlier and influence diagnostics for meta-analysis. Res. Synth. Methods 2010, 1, 112–125. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  108. Egger, M.; Smith, G.D.; Schneider, M.; Minder, C. Bias in meta-analysis detected by a simple, graphical test. BMJ 1997, 315, 629–634. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  109. Sterne, J.A.C.; Egger, M. Regression methods to detect publication and other bias in meta-analysis. In Publication Bias in Meta-analysis; Rothstein, H.R., Sutton, A.J., Borenstein, M., Eds.; John Wiley and Sons: Hoboken, NJ, USA, 2005; pp. 99–110. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  110. Higgins, J.P.T.; Thompson, S.G. Quantifying heterogeneity in a meta-analysis. Stat. Med. 2002, 21, 1539–1558. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  111. Higgins, J.P.; Thompson, S.G.; Deeks, J.J.; Altman, D.G. Measuring inconsistency in meta-analyses. BMJ 2003, 327, 557–560. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  112. Sterne, J.A.C.; Egger, M.; Smith, G.D. Investigating and dealing with publication and other biases in meta-analysis. BMJ 2001, 323, 101–105. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  113. Poulou, M. Teacher-Student Relationships, Social and Emotional Skills, and Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties. Int. J. Educ. Psychol. 2015, 4, 84–108. [Google Scholar]
  114. Trentacosta, C.J.; Izard, C.E. Kindergarten children’s emotion competence as a predictor of their academic competence in first grade. Emotion 2007, 7, 77–88. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  115. Ellis, H.C.; Ashbrook, P.W. Resource allocation model of the effects of depressed mood states on memory. In Affect, Cognition, and Social Behavior; Fiedler, K., Forgas, J., Eds.; Hogrefe: Göttingen, Germany, 1988; pp. 25–43. [Google Scholar]
  116. Schutte, N.S.; Malouff, J.M.; Bobik, C.; Coston, T.D.; Greeson, C.; Jedlicka, C.; Rhodes, E.; Wendorf, G. Emotional Intelligence and Interpersonal Relations. J. Soc. Psychol. 2001, 141, 523–536. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  117. Lopes, P.N.; Salovey, P.; Straus, R. Emotional intelligence, personality, and the perceived quality of social relationships. Personal. Individ. Differ. 2003, 35, 641–658. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  118. Hofmann, V.; Müller, C.M. Language skills and social contact among students with intellectual disabilities in special needs schools. Learn. Cult. Soc. Interact. 2021, 30, 100534. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  119. Winsler, A.; Kim, Y.K.; Richard, E.R. Socio-emotional skills, behavior problems, and Spanish competence predict the acquisition of English among English language learners in poverty. Dev. Psychol. 2014, 50, 2242–2254. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  120. Green, M.C. Transportation into narrative worlds: The role of prior knowledge and perceived realism. Discourse Process. 2004, 38, 247–266. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  121. Catts, H.W.; Adlof, S.M.; Weismer, S.E. Language deficits in poor comprehenders: A case for the simple view of reading. J. Speech Lang. Hear. Res. 2006, 49, 278–293. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  122. Kidd, D.C.; Castano, E. Reading literary fiction improves theory of mind. Science 2013, 342, 377–380. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed] [Green Version]
  123. Grabe, W.; Stoller, F.L. Teaching and Researching Reading; Pearson Education: Harlow, UK, 2002. [Google Scholar]
  124. Segalowitz, N. Automaticity and second languages. In The Handbook of Second Language Acquisition; Doughty, C.J., Long, M.H., Eds.; Carlton Publishing Group: London, UK, 2003; pp. 382–408. [Google Scholar]
  125. Petrides, K.V. Psychometric Properties of the Trait Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire (TEIQue). In Assessing Emotional Intelligence: Theory, Research, and Applications; Stough, C., Saklofske, D.H., Parke, J.D.A., Eds.; Springer Science: Berlin/Heidelberg, Germany, 2009; pp. 85–101. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  126. Davidson, M.M.; Ellis Weismer, S. Characterization and prediction of early reading abilities in children on the autism spectrum. J. Autism Dev. Disord. 2014, 44, 828–845. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  127. Miller, L.E.; Burke, J.D.; Troyb, E.; Knoch, K.; Herlihy, L.E.; Fein, D.A. Preschool predictors of school-age academic achievement in autism spectrum disorder. Clin. Neuropsychol. 2017, 31, 382–403. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
  128. Fu, R.; Gartlehner, G.; Grant, M.; Shamliyan, T.; Sedrakyan, A.; Wilt, T.J.; Griffith, L.; Oremus, M.; Raina, P.; Ismaila, A.; et al. Conducting quantitative synthesis when comparing medical interventions: AHRQ and the Effective Health Care Program. J. Clin. Epidemiol. 2011, 64, 1187–1197. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [PubMed]
  129. Joshi, R.M.; Aaron, P.G. The component model of reading: Simple view of reading made a little more complex. Read. Psychol. 2000, 21, 85–97. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef]
  130. Nix, R.L.; Bierman, K.L.; Domitrovich, C.E.; Gill, S. Promoting children’s social-emotional skills in preschool can enhance academic and behavioral functioning in kindergarten: Findings from Head Start REDI. Early Educ. Dev. 2013, 24, 1000–1019. [Google Scholar] [CrossRef] [Green Version]
Figure 1. Flow diagram for the search and inclusion criteria for studies in the present review.
Figure 1. Flow diagram for the search and inclusion criteria for studies in the present review.
Education 13 00220 g001
Figure 2. Plot of the (a) DFBETAS values and (b) COVRATIO values for 44 samples examining the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. Note: for the samples with more than one effect size, the mean value was used to calculate each sample’s DFBETAS and COVRATIO values.
Figure 2. Plot of the (a) DFBETAS values and (b) COVRATIO values for 44 samples examining the correlation between social–emotional skills and reading ability. Note: for the samples with more than one effect size, the mean value was used to calculate each sample’s DFBETAS and COVRATIO values.
Education 13 00220 g002
Figure 3. Funnel plot for the overall analysis of the social–emotional skills with reading ability after excluding influential samples. Note: for the samples with more than one effect size, the mean value was used to calculate publication bias.
Figure 3. Funnel plot for the overall analysis of the social–emotional skills with reading ability after excluding influential samples. Note: for the samples with more than one effect size, the mean value was used to calculate publication bias.
Education 13 00220 g003
Figure 4. Overall correlation between the social–emotional skills and reading ability after excluding effect sizes of influential samples. Note: K refers to the number of effect size for each sample. a This study reported the r values for two independent samples.
Figure 4. Overall correlation between the social–emotional skills and reading ability after excluding effect sizes of influential samples. Note: K refers to the number of effect size for each sample. a This study reported the r values for two independent samples.
Education 13 00220 g004
Table 1. Summary of key features coded for studies meeting inclusion criteria.
Table 1. Summary of key features coded for studies meeting inclusion criteria.
Author, Year of PublicationDesign aGrade bN cES dGender
(Male Percentage)
LanguageOutcome MeasuresrQuality of Methodology
Social–Emotional Skills eReading fSample hMeasurement hAnalysis h
Abdolrezapour and Tavakoli [59]CNull631NullEnglishEIRC0.66*****
Abdorazik [70]CU49132.35%EnglishEIRC0.25*******
Agostin and Bain [71]LK184347.30%EnglishSSWR0.08–0.29******
Alipanahi and Tariverdi [72]CU50160.00%EnglishEIRC0.68*******
Arabsarhangi and Noroozi [5]CNull501NullEnglishEIRC0.70*******
Arnold et al. [73]CK467151.82%EnglishSSWR0.13*******
Aryanto [74]CU461NullEnglishEIRC0.16*****
Ates [75]CS138129.71%TurkishEIRC0.35*******
Benner et al. [17]CK and P150154.00%EnglishSSWR0.49******
Caemmerer and Keith [21]LK780212049.40%EnglishSSRC0.17–0.31*******
Chen and Zhang [76]CU72366.67%EnglishEIRC0.03–0.14*******
Farajnezhad and Tabatabai [77]CU150163.33%EnglishEIRC0.18*****
Feshbach and Feshbach [78]LP133250.00%EnglishEINull−0.08–0.11*******
Firdaus [68]CS531NullEnglishEIRC0.66******
Froiland and Davison [79]CNull40145.00%EnglishEIRC0.45******
Ghabanchi and Rastegarl [6]CU55145.45%EnglishEIRC0.19*****
Hall and DiPerna [63]LP9225450.20%EnglishSSRC0.10–0.14*******
Hindman and Morrison [80]CK229250.00%EnglishSSWR0.10–0.17*******
Karbalaei and Sanati [81]CNull651NullEnglishEIRC0.84******
Konold et al. [82]LK11029651.00%EnglishSSWR0.01–0.31*******
Medford and McGeown [83]LK85249.41%EnglishSSWR0.15–0.20*******
Montroy et al. [84]LK103266.10%EnglishSSWR0.29–0.32********
Motallebzadeh [62]CU170122.80%EnglishEIRC0.54******
Ortiz et al. [85]LK203343.75%EnglishSSRC and WR0.24–0.25*******
Martí et al. [86]CP180152.80%NullEIRC0.21*******
Pishghadam and Tabataba'ian [87]CU90144.44%EnglishEIRC0.17*******
Pishghadam [36]CU508126.38%EnglishEIRC0.06******
Ponitz et al. [88]LK343148.00%EnglishSSWR0.15*******
Quirk et al. [89]LK112255.00%EnglishSE and EIWR0.00–0.37*******
Razza et al. [90]LK669247.83%EnglishSSRC0.25–0.27*******
Saeidi and Yusefi [91]CU143118.88%EnglishEIRC0.20******
Sartika et al. [92]CS1401NullNullEIRC0.24*****
Schwab et al. [37]LP181227.78%GermanSS and EIRC and WR−0.26–0.31*******
Smith et al. [44]LK79452.00%EnglishSS and EIRC and WR0.21–0.34*******
Smith-Adcock et al. [93]LK3444348.30%EnglishSSRC0.20–0.42*******
Sparapani et al. [22]LP449346.00%EnglishSSRC and WR0.32–0.37*******
Tabrizi and Esmaeili [94]CS12110.00%EnglishEIRC0.55******
Talebinejad and Fard [95]CS8010.00%EnglishEIRC0.80******
Wang and Algozzine [96]CP257257.98%EnglishSSRC and WR0.28–0.32*******
Yu and Tong, 2023 [97] gCP679150.70%ChineseEIRC0.20*********
Zandi [55]CU23910.00%FrenchEIRC0.12*****
Zandi [61]CU2001100.00%FrenchEIRC0.15*****
Zarezadeh [56]CU3301NullEnglishEIRC0.18******
Notes: This table presents key study features only. Null means did not report. a Design was coded as C (cross-sectional) and L(longitudinal). b Grade was coded as K (kindergarten), P (primary school), S (secondary school), and U (university or above). c N = Sample size is reported as the maximum number of participants for calculating correlations. d ES = number of effect sizes (r) provided in the study. e Social–emotional skills were coded as EI (emotional intelligence), SS (social skills), and SE (social–emotional skills mixed). f Reading was coded as WR (word reading) and RC (reading comprehension). g This paper was unpublished. h Each criterion was assigned one star if the study did not meet any criteria, two stars if the study partially met the criteria or if the report was unclear, and three stars if the study fully met the criteria. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001
Table 2. Relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability after excluding the influential samples.
Table 2. Relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability after excluding the influential samples.
MeasuresNS aES bFisher’s Z95% CITau. sq cp-Value
Overall382850.23[0.19, 0.28]0.011<0.001 ***
Social–emotional skills d
Emotional intelligence22300.22[0.14, 0.30]0.017<0.001 ***
Social skills192540.24[0.19, 0.29]0.010<0.001 ***
Reading ability e
Word reading141200.25[0.17, 0.32]0.012<0.001 ***
Reading comprehension281630.25[0.20, 0.30]0.011<0.001 ***
Grade level f
Kindergarten14890.22[0.18, 0.27]0.006<0.001 ***
Primary school131550.22[0.16, 0.27]0.007<0.001 ***
Secondary school6250.29[0.13, 0.44]0.0110.006 **
University and above12140.20[0.09, 0.30]0.0160.001 **
Notes: a NS = number of samples; b ES = number of effect sizes; c Tau. sq = between-study sampling variance. d Studies mixing the emotional intelligence and social skills together were not reported here, but were considered when calculating the overall correlation. e Studies mixing the word reading and reading comprehension together were not reported here, but were considered when calculating the overall correlation. f Studies did not report the grade of students or mixed above four categories together were not shown here, but were included when calculating the overall correlation. Robust variance estimation (RVE) was used to handle the samples with more than one effect size after excluding the effect sizes of all influential samples. ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.
Table 3. Meta-regression of the moderation analysis on the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability.
Table 3. Meta-regression of the moderation analysis on the relationship between social–emotional skills and reading ability.
MeasureBetaSEt95% CIp
Social–emotional skills
Emotional intelligence vs. social skills0.000.05−0.09[−0.11, 0.10]0.927
Reading ability
Word reading vs. reading comprehension0.070.015.03[0.02, 0.11]0.022 *
Grade level
Kindergarten vs. primary school0.020.012.90[−0.004, 0.05]0.070
Kindergarten vs. secondary school0.020.021.07[−0.07, 0.10]0.410
Kindergarten vs. university−0.060.06−0.98[−0.19, 0.07]0.344
Primary school vs. secondary school−0.0050.01−0.39[−0.07, 0.06]0.741
Primary school vs. university−0.080.06−1.37[−0.22, 0.05]0.194
Secondary school vs. university−0.080.06−1.24[−0.22, 0.06]0.233
Notes: All moderators were entered in one model. Several models were run for the variable with more than two categories (i.e., grade level). For the convenience of presentation, subgroup comparisons within categorical moderators are all listed in the model. The first group in each group comparison variable is the reference group (e.g., in word reading versus reading comprehension, word reading is the reference group in the dummy coding of reading ability). Number of samples for this model is 38. Number of correlations for this model is 285. Between-study sampling variance (τ2) for this model is 0.001. Robust variance estimation (RVE) was used to handle the samples with more than one effect size after excluding the effect sizes of all influential samples. p < 0.1, * p < 0.05.
Disclaimer/Publisher’s Note: The statements, opinions and data contained in all publications are solely those of the individual author(s) and contributor(s) and not of MDPI and/or the editor(s). MDPI and/or the editor(s) disclaim responsibility for any injury to people or property resulting from any ideas, methods, instructions or products referred to in the content.

Share and Cite

MDPI and ACS Style

Yu, L.; Yu, J.J.; Tong, X. Social–Emotional Skills Correlate with Reading Ability among Typically Developing Readers: A Meta-Analysis. Educ. Sci. 2023, 13, 220. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci13020220

AMA Style

Yu L, Yu JJ, Tong X. Social–Emotional Skills Correlate with Reading Ability among Typically Developing Readers: A Meta-Analysis. Education Sciences. 2023; 13(2):220. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci13020220

Chicago/Turabian Style

Yu, Liyan, Jane Jie Yu, and Xiuhong Tong. 2023. "Social–Emotional Skills Correlate with Reading Ability among Typically Developing Readers: A Meta-Analysis" Education Sciences 13, no. 2: 220. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci13020220

Note that from the first issue of 2016, this journal uses article numbers instead of page numbers. See further details here.

Article Metrics

Back to TopTop