Maternal influence on children’s emotional intelligence and reading competence

Abstract

The influence of the family on the education of their children is indisputable and mothers play a fundamental role on the educational process, especially on their reading competence. On the other hand, the natural way to train reading competence is by reading, so that consolidated reading habits of the mother could influence those of their children and their reading competence since both constructs have an intrinsic relationship as recent research points. In addition, different studies point to the direct relationship between reading and emotional intelligence; thus, studying them in terms of maternal reading habits can yield information that nuances the teaching-learning process. The objective of this study is to establish the existence of relationships between reading habits, sex, and emotional intelligence regarding the reading comprehension of children. The participants in the study (644 in total, 303 male and 341 female), were high school students who attended three public secondary schools in the province of Málaga and two in the province of Granada; all of them are located in areas of medium socio-cultural context. The results show that girls with higher emotional intelligence and whose mothers have higher reading habits obtain higher reading competence.