From running a cross-country race to beating fellow classmates at academics, children are subjected to a lot of competition at school in some form or the other.
Whether competition helps in the overall development of a child or is detrimental to it has been a matter of debate for decades.
But what about social competence?
What most parents fail to realise is that while social competition can cause unnecessary pressure and lead to negative feelings, competence, on the other hand, helps a child develop their social, emotional, and cognitive thinking skills.
So, what really is important for a child? Social competence or competition?
Before we answer that, let’s break these terms down and see their pros and cons to understand them better.
What is Social Competence?
As per Wiley Online Library, social competence, by definition is “the ability to handle social interactions effectively.”
In simpler words, it is just the measure of how well a person can get along with people; how good they are at maintaining and forming close relationships.
Social competence is often influenced by the environment a child is in.
For instance, a quiet, studious child may appear to be socially incompetent when forced to interact with a group of athletes. However, the same child may do perfectly well socially when surrounded by a peer group that matches the child’s interests in