Overview and Insight from the China Research Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

Abstract

Social and emotional skills are important for students in 21st century study, life, and future work. In 2018, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) officially launched the first round of social and emotional skills tests for 10-year-old and 15-year-old students worldwide. After 3 years of research, the first round of global data collection ended and at the end of 2019 the OECD published the Social and Emotional Ability Assessment International Report. As one of the participating cities, Suzhou, China, successfully completed the first round of testing and released a series of reports. This article summarizes the research work of the OECD and China on social and emotional capabilities of students and discusses a few insights from the data.

Full text

Overview and Insight from the China
Research Report on the Global Youth
Survey of Social and Emotional Skills
by the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development
Fengping Zhao1, Weijie Meng2, Fangmei Li3, Longjun Zhou4
1. Shandong Changle No.2 Middle School, Changle 262400, China
2. Nanjing Yutong Experimental School, Nanjing 211100, China
3. Nanjing Dianji Institute of Psychological Education, Nanjing 210000, China
4. Jiangsu Second Normal University, Nanjing 211200, China
Abstract. Social and emotional skills are important for students in 21st
century study, life, and future work. In 2018, the Organization for Eco-
nomic Cooperation and Development (OECD) officially launched the
first round of social and emotional skills tests for 10-year-old and 15-
year-old students worldwide. After 3 years of research, the first round of
global data collection ended and at the end of 2019 the OECD published
the Social and Emotional Ability Assessment International Report. As
one of the participating cities, Suzhou, China, successfully completed the
first round of testing and released a series of reports. This article sum-
marizes the research work of the OECD and China on social and emo-
tional capabilities of students and discusses a few insights from the data.
Best Evidence in Chinese Education 2021; 9(1):1169-1195.
Doi: 10.15354/bece.21.re055.
How to Cite: Zhao, F., Meng, W., Li, F., & Zhou, L. (2021). Overview and insight
from the China research report on the global youth survey of social and emotional
skills by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Best Evi-
dence in Chinese Education, 9(1):1169-1195.
Keywords: Student Social and Emotional Abilities, Educational Evaluation,
OECD, China, Education

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.8, No.2, 2021 1170
About the Author: Fengping Zhao, Shandong Changle No.2 Middle School, Changle 262400, China. E-mail:
zhaofengping5138@163.com
Weijie Meng, Principal of Nanjing Yutong Experimental School, 22 Jiangjun Avenue, Jiangning District, Nanjing
211100, Jiangsu, China. E-mail: 13608955415@126.com
Fangmei Li, Nanjing Dianji Institute of Psychological Education, Nanjing210000, Jiangsu, China. E-mail:
1037576462@qq.com
Correspondence to: Longjun Zhou, Jiangsu Second Normal University, Nanjing 211200, Jiangsu, China. E-mail:
294437034@qq.com
Conflict of Interests: None.
© 2021 Insights Publisher. All rights reserved.
Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Crea-
tive Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 License (http://www.creativecommons.org/licenses/by-
nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission provided
the original work is attributed by the Insights Publisher.

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1171
OCIAL and emotional abilities are widely regarded by researchers as core ele-
ments of human growth and development. The United Nations Educational, Sci-
entific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) proposed that education in the 21st
century must break the constraints of a singular emphasis on academic, scientific and
technological ability. Rapid world changes and increasing maturity of the application of
automation technology, make the development of social emotional abilities crucial
(UNESCO, 2019). The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development
(OECD) also emphasizes that, in modern life, children’s success is inseparable from a
complete set of cognitive, social and emotional skills, such as achieving goals and inter-
acting with others. The ability to cooperate effectively and manage emotions is essential
to meet the challenges of the 21st century (OECD, 2015). Therefore, it has become the
consensus of educators worldwide to regard social and emotional abilities as an im-
portant component of student training.
OECD started the Survey of Social and Emotional Skills (SSES) research in
2013, with the aim to promote the balanced development of cognitive ability and social
emotional ability. Compared to earlier started projects that focused on cognitive ability
(e.g., PISA, IELS, PIAAC and others), the SSES project fills a gap in the OECD ability
assessment project and guides the future development of global education and the shift
in the focus of talent training. The SSES project is not a simple international competi-
tion. Rather, it aims to discover the effectiveness and blind spots of various countries’
education policies through evaluation and research. The objective is to analyze prob-
lems existing in the development of education in various countries and show their re-
spective achievements and advantages, to provide countries around the world with ex-
periences from other countries.
In 2018, the Social and Emotional Skills Assessment was officially launched.
At the end of 2019, the first round of the official assessment was completed in 10 cities
from nine countries around the world. On 7 September 2021, the OECD released a
global assessment report (OECD, 2021) at its headquarters in Paris based on this survey.
The report provides an overview of the social and emotional abilities of young people in
the ten participating cities, and reports on the factors that affect social and emotional
abilities. From an international perspective, it provides information for the improvement
of social and emotional abilities, educational decision-making and educational practice
in various countries.
Definition and Value of Social and Emotional Capa-
bilities
Definition of Social and Emotional Competence
The proposed assessment of social emotional ability is based on research of social and
emotional ability. Social skills are considered a cognitive skill that allows effective per-
formance in a group. Social skills encompass skills found in the three dimensions of
communication, cooperation and identification. These skills ultimately enable individu-
S

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1172
als to show appropriate behaviors during group activities (Gold, 2009), including com-
munication skills and the ability to cooperate with others. Emotional ability refers to a
person’s ability to master their own emotions, to bear external pressure, and to use emo-
tions to facilitate interpersonal relationships, including empathy, emotion recognition,
emotion regulation, understanding of experiences, and recognition of one’s own desires
(Huy, 1999). Emotional competence develops through interpersonal communication,
social structure and culture (Turner & Stets, 2005). Thus, some scholars combine these
abilities under the term social emotional competence.
Elias et al. (1997) defined social and emotional competence as the ability to
understand, manage and express the social and emotional aspects of life. This ability
can help individuals successfully manage their life affairs, such as learning, establishing
interpersonal relationships, solving daily problems, and adapting to complex needs in
growth and development. Osher et al. (2016) suggested that social emotional compe-
tence is a series of core competencies related to self-adjustment and social development
that children master and apply, including recognizing and managing emotions, setting
and achieving positive goals, appreciating others, establishing and maintaining good
relationships, and making responsible decisions.
At the national level, the British Ministry of Education defines social-
emotional competence as including the five aspects of “self-awareness, managing feel-
ings, motivation, empathy, and social skills” (Lendrum & Humphrey, 2010). Singa-
pore’s Ministry of Education suggests social-emotional competence is at the core of
21st century skills and goals, describing social emotional competence as “skills for rec-
ognizing and managing emotions, developing care for others, making responsible deci-
sions, building positive relationships, and effectively handling challenging situations”
(Tan et al., 2017). Australia also pays attention to the development of students’ social
and emotional well-being; its definition includes seven dimensions: overall social and
emotional health, psychological flexibility, positive social orientation, positive work
orientation, positive school indicators, positive family indicators, and positive commu-
nity indicators (Frydenberg et al., 2017). China’s “Social Emotional Learning and
School Management Improvement Project” team proposed that social emotional compe-
tence is the ability to acquire knowledge, skills, and attitudes to enable the emotional
experience of understanding and managing relationships with themselves, with others,
and with the collective; it includes self-awareness and self-management, cognition and
management of others, collective cognition and collective management (Mao et al.,
2018). Related organizations have also expounded on the definition of social emotion-
al competence. For example, the American non-profit organization, Collaborative for
Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL), works from a perspective of joint
development of human cognition, sociality, and emotion, suggesting that social emo-
tional capabilities specifically include self-awareness, self-management, social aware-
ness, relationship skills, and responsible decision making. The World Economic Forum
(2016) summarized ten social and emotional skills, including four competencies (prob-
lem solving/critical thinking, creativity, communication, and collaboration) and six

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1173
character qualities (curiosity, initiative persistence/grit, adaptability, leadership, social
and cultural awareness). The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Develop-
ment (OECD) defines social and emotional skills as an individual ability consisting of a
characteristic quality of individuals facing different situations. The OECD (2015) di-
vides this quality into three categories: 1) the ability to achieve goals, including persis-
tence/perseverance, self-control, and the passion to achieve goals; 2) the ability to col-
laborate with others, including social interaction, respect, and care; and 3) emotional
management capabilities, including self-esteem, optimism, and self-confidence.
Thus, while the definition of social emotional abilities differs among theoreti-
cal foundations and research perspectives, scholars, organizations, countries, and re-
searchers, all definitions emphasize the involvement of an individual’s abilities to man-
age internal and interpersonal domains.
The Value of Social and Emotional Capabilities
Social and emotional abilities are of great significance to individual development and i
affect students’ academic and life success. Numerous domestic and foreign scholars
have conducted research on the value of social and emotional abilities from different
perspectives. Such research has helped individuals achieve professional success and
happiness in life and has promoted the overall ability of individuals to meet the re-
quirements of future social contexts. Several studies focus on the impact of social and
emotional skills on student academic achievement.
Social and Emotional Abilities Affect Academic Perfor-
mance
Nearly all empirical studies on social emotional ability have confirmed that social emo-
tional ability has a positive impact on students’ academic performance. Durlak et al.
(2011) conducted a meta-analysis of the results of the Social and Emotional Learning
(SEL) program covering 213 schools and 270,034 students from kindergarten to high
school. Using meta-analysis of the results of the program revealed that compared to
control students, students who received the intervention of the SEL project had an 11%
higher performance (Alzahrani et al., 2019). The authors also note that social and emo-
tional abilities have an impact on children’s learning outcomes and their ability to en-
gage in good behavior.
Elias (2008) studied third grade students from urban ethnic minorities in the
United States and showed that the social emotional ability of these minority students
had significant predictive ability on their academic performance, with a regression coef-
ficient of 0.619. Zhou (2010) and Liu (2017) found that, in Chinese students, a complex
interaction exists between children’s personality, academic performance, and social
adjustment. They also found that social and emotional abilities of students, as assessed
by parents, can significantly predict student academic performance (regression coeffi-
cient = 0.37). Liu (2017) found that self-esteem, self-motivation, and emotional percep-

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1174
tion components of the trait emotional intelligence can significantly predict mathemati-
cal ability in primary school students.
Social and Emotional Abilities Affect Personal Income
Many empirical studies have shown that cognitive ability has a positive effect on wages
and economic growth (Hanushek, 2013). The potential explanatory effect of non-
cognitive abilities on income, independent of cognitive abilities, has also received atten-
tion (Huang & Xie, 2017). Heckman (2006) found that non-cognitive abilities not only
affect educational decision-making, but also affect an individual’s social performance
and professional income in a study of participants in the General Educational Develop-
ment (GED) program in the United States. Some scholars suggest that non-cognitive
skills, like obedience, loyalty and persistence, are more important than cognitive skills,
especially in the low-skilled labor markets (Bowles & Gintis, 2002), such as the service
industry (Mýtna Kureková et al., 2016). Other studies have supported this conclusion.
Adhitya et al. (2019) analyzed data from the Fifth Indonesia Family Life Survey (IFLS),
and found that personality characteristics affect job prospects in the labor market. For
example, conscientiousness and extroversion had a significant positive effect on job
success. Responsible people tend to work hard, be productive, punctual, and organized.
Extroverted individuals were more willing to take on social activities and leadership
roles, and this had a positive impact on their careers.
Succi & Canovi (2020) used a questionnaire to compare views of students and
employers on the importance of soft skills in different European countries and found
that 86% of respondents indicated that they have paid increasing attention to soft skills
in the past 5-10 years, and that companies believe soft skills are more important than
academic performance of students/graduates.
Social Emotional Ability Contributes to Personal Happiness
Harvard University began a comprehensive longitudinal study in 1938 that has lasted
nearly a century. The longitudinal study involves three classes of people, including 268
Harvard graduates, 456 urban blue-collar males, and 90 high-IQ middle-class women.
Researchers tracked participants from birth to old age to explore correlates of happiness
and longevity. In 2012, the project leader released an adult development prospective
report that, combined with the analysis of tracking data in these 814 people for nearly a
century, found that happiness is closely related to good interpersonal relationships and
an optimistic attitude (Vaillant, 2012).
Other research results also show that personal happiness is closely related to
social emotional ability. On the one hand, good social and emotional abilities can con-
tinuously and cumulatively affect other areas of an individual’s life, help students better
adapt to school life, achieve better academic performance, obtain a higher professional
status, and effectively enhance life satisfaction (Heckman & Kautz, 2012). On the other
hand, the level of students’ social and emotional ability is directly related to their future
marital status, health status, and moral level. For example, social and emotional abilities

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1175
play an important role in improving health-related outcomes (e.g., obesity, cardiovascu-
lar and cerebrovascular diseases), which is beneficial to their health and longevity
(OECD, 2015; Atkins et al., 2020). Perseverance, emotional stability and social skills
enable people to better transform ideas into actions, establish positive relationships with
family, friends and communities, avoid unhealthy lifestyles and dangerous behaviors,
reduce anti-social behaviors, and protects individuals from infringements of aggressive
behavior, leading to a greater positive life experience (Liu & Liang, 2021).
OECD research also indicates social and emotional skills have a positive im-
pact on personal well-being and social progress; such skills act by promoting a healthy
weight, alleviating depression, reducing problem behaviors, increasing subjective well-
being, improving life satisfaction, and increasing helpful life behaviors. Increased high-
er education, enhances the ability of individuals to translate intentions into actions, and
improves the life prospects of disadvantaged children. At present, most OECD countries
and partner economies recognize the need to strengthen the development of students’
social and emotional capabilities. Both national and local policy documents of these
countries emphasize the importance of enhancing a student’s autonomy, sense of re-
sponsibility, and ability to cooperate with others.
OECD’s Research and Promotion of Social and Emo-
tional Capabilities
Although scholars have reached a basic consensus on the definition and value of social
and emotional competence, there seems to be little on how to best measure these skills.
Based on the CASEL competency framework, nine social and emotional assessment
tools have been identified that can be used for the reference and selection of school dis-
tricts and schools (Wiglesworth, Humphrey, Kalambouka & Lendrum, 2010). A Social
Emotional Competence Questionnaire (SECQ) based on the CASEL theoretical model
has been developed that aims to assess children and adolescents (grades 3-12) based on
self-reports about themselves and others, and how they respond in home, school and
community environments (Haggerty et al., 2011; Zhou, Ee, 2012).
The OECD has been measuring the abilities of students since the 1990s using
large-scale international education evaluation projects to allow participating countries to
examine their own education quality and fairness and to develop efficiency from the
perspective of international comparison. This allows countries to stabilize and improve
education by monitoring the indicator system and to promote education reform and de-
velopment. Since the beginning of the 21st century, the OECD has included measures
of students’ non-cognitive abilities, with the goal of quantifying other aspects of per-
sonal development through assessment of students’ social, emotional and other non-
cognitive abilities.
From March 23 to 24, 2014, policy makers, including 11 education ministers
and deputy ministers, took part in an OECD informal ministerial meeting on skills for
social progress in Sao Paulo, Brazil. They agreed it was necessary to promote develop-
ment of a “complete child” with a balanced set of cognitive, social and emotional skills

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1176
so that they can better face the challenges of the 21st century (OECD, 2015). On March
10, 2015, the OECD released “Skills for Social Progress: The Power of Social and
Emotional Skills,” a report that presents the OECD’s comprehensive analysis of the role
of emotional skills, and a strategy to improve these skills. The report includes an analy-
sis of the impact of social and emotional skills on individual happiness and social pro-
gress (covering all aspects of life, including education, labor market output, health, fam-
ily life, citizen participation, and life satisfaction). The report draws four important con-
clusions: 1) sense of responsibility, social skills, and emotional stability are the most
important dimensions of social and emotional skills affecting children’s future pro-
spects; 2) early intervention in social and emotional skills can effectively improve skills
and reduce education, labor market, and social inequality; 3) within a cultural and lin-
guistic background, social and emotional skills can be reliably assessed; and 4) provid-
ing relevant information and formulating guidelines will help educate stakeholders to
promote children’s social and emotional development (OECD, 2015). On this basis, the
OECD organized and established a social and emotional skills research project team in
2016 to carry out the evaluation of social and emotional skills and to set up a steering
committee composed of internationally renowned experts that could provide guidance
and attract participating countries and regional representatives.
In December 2017, the OECD released the report, “Personality matters: Rele-
vance and assessment of personality characteristics,” that evaluated the socio-emotional
skills of students aged 10-15 years-old in some cities and countries around the world
over three years (OECD, 2017). The outcome was an approved monitoring tool of the
development of students’ social and emotional skills to explore the impact of personal,
family and school characteristics on the development of students’ social and emotional
skills. Further, the monitoring tool can be used to assess which emotional and social
skills best predict students’ later achievements. Decision makers and practitioners can
then be provided with reliable, effective and internationally comparable information on
the development of students’ social and emotional skills. In addition, policies and
measures that can be implemented for improvement can be made available.
Research Subjects
SSES is aimed at students aged 10 years and 15 years. The project team believes that
the 10-year-old student group (between 10 years and 3 months to 11 years and 2 months)
is able to express personal feelings relatively stable. This earliest age group is in the
middle stage of elementary school. The 15-year-old student group (15 years and 3
months to 16 years and 2 months) is in formal education, has not yet undergone voca-
tional education triage, and is done in cooperation with the International Student As-
sessment Project (PISA) The student groups in middle school are consistent, which is
convenient for data comparison.
Research Model

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1177
Since Goldberg first proposed the “Big Five” personality factors (openness, conscien-
tiousness, extroversion, affinity, and neuroticism) in 1971, these personality factors
have been used in large sample research. Repeated discovery until it becomes a factor
of a personality trait model recognized by the western psychology circle (Mueller &
Plug 2006). The social and emotional competence assessment framework constructed
by the OECD is based on the Big Five personality traits model, and considers five di-
mensions: 1) task performance (conscientiousness); 2) emotional control (emotional
stability); 3) collaboration (affinity); 4) openness; 5) interactions with others (extrover-
sion) (Kankaraš, 2017).
Task performance includes achievement motivation, i.e., setting high standards
for oneself and working hard to achieve these standards; self-discipline, i.e., controlling
impulse, delaying gratification and maintaining focus; conscientiousness, i.e., fulfilling
promises; and perseverance, i.e., persistence and commitment to goals. Emotional con-
trol includes stress-reduction (effectively adjusting anxiety and coping with pressure);
restraint (controlling temper and emotions); optimism (a positive attitude toward indi-
viduals and life). Interactions with people others includes vitality (staying active
throughout the day); decisiveness (controlling behavior); and being kind (willingness to
interact with others). Collaboration includes empathy (looking at problems from the
perspective of others); cooperation (getting along with others); and trust (believing that
most people have good intentions). Openness includes curiosity (a willingness to learn
and explore new things); creativity (generating new ideas or products); and inclusive-
ness (being open to diverse views). Complex skills include self-efficacy (belief in one’s
ability to complete tasks and achieve goals); critical thinking (being able to reflect on
oneself and base ideas on independent thinking and critical analysis); and metacognition
(recognizing and adjusting the thinking process and subjective experience).
Using the Big Five Personality traits, the OECD selected three to four social
and emotional abilities under each dimension, for a total of 19 skills. Each skill is de-
scribed by approximately 10 items, and a Likert five-point scale used by survey re-
spondents for each question. After the second round of on-site testing in 2018, the four
skills of perseverance, courage, metacognition and critical thinking, which had low reli-
ability and efficiency, were deleted, leaving a final version with 15 skills (Figure 1).
Through surveys of students, parents and teachers, mutual confirmation is used to
measure the development level of students’ social and emotional abilities and to relate
other variables to the development of social and emotional abilities (Chernyshenko et
al., 2018).
Research Methods
The SSES project uses a random stratified sampling method, requiring each participat-
ing country or region to randomly select schools first, and then randomly select students
who meet the age requirements from within these schools. The SSES project requires
that each participating country or region select 3,000 10-year-old and 15-year-old stu-
dents. In addition to the information from these 6000 students, information about their
parents, teachers, and schools are also needed because the information collected by the

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1178
Figure 1. The Five Dimensions and 15 Sub-Competencies in the Assessment.
SSES project includes not only information about students’ social and emotional skills,
but also information about their long-term home and school environment. The project
team developed four types of questionnaires; one for students and one for each of par-
ents, teachers, and principals closely related to the growth of the students. At the same
time, schools provided data on each student’s academic performance and school behav-
ior. Triangulation of measures was used to improve objectivity and accuracy in
measures of students’ social and emotional abilities (Kankaraš et al., 2019).
Student questionnaires included personal background information, such as stu-
dent’s learning expectations, ideal jobs, interactions with parents and friends, school life,
etc., as well as self-evaluation information on social and emotional skills and behavior.
Each selected student had a parent or guardian fill out a parent questionnaire, which
includes family background information, such as family economic and social status,
parent-child interaction information, child-child interaction information, parent’s under-
standing and practice of social and emotional skills. In addition, parents were asked to
evaluate their child’s social and emotional skills. Each selected student also had a
teacher familiar with him or her fill out the teacher questionnaire. The teacher question-
naire includes background information on the teacher, such as teaching practice, profes-
sional development, and the teacher’s understanding and practice of social and emo-
tional skills. The teacher also provided an evaluation of the student’s social and emo-
tional skills. Finally, the principal of each selected middle school filled out a principal
questionnaire. The principal questionnaire includes information on the community
where the school is located, the overall situation of teachers and students, the school’s

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1179
teaching and evaluation policies regarding social and emotional skills, and the organiza-
tion and management of the school (Fang, 2020).
After the selection of survey items in 2017, followed by the field test in 2018
and official test results in 2019, the OECD’s formal assessment of social and emotional
abilities finally settled on a student questionnaire containing 65 questions (the 15-year-
old group has 68 questions). The parent questionnaire contains 53 questions, the teacher
questionnaire contains 34 questions and the principal questionnaire contains 32 ques-
tions. It is worth noting that after the OECD integrated the data analysis of all partici-
pating countries, some items that did not meet measurement standards were deleted for
the final form of the test questionnaire (OECD, 2021). After two years of work, on Sep-
tember 7, 2021, the OECD presented the first round of evaluation results of the Global
Social and Emotional Ability Research Project.
A Survey of the Social and Emotional Abilities of
Chinese Adolescents
In the international comparative study of social and emotional skills organized by the
OECD, 10 cities in 9 countries, including the United States, Russia, Finland, South Ko-
rea, Canada, Italy, Portugal, and Turkey, participated in the project. China was also a
participating country with151 primary and secondary schools in six districts and four
county-level cities under the jurisdiction of Suzhou City participating in the assessment
project, including 3,647 10-year-old students and 3,621 15-year-old students. After
comparative analysis of the data, the project team positioned the development level of
Chinese students’ social and emotional ability development in different age stages in
the world, further explored factors affecting the development of Chinese students’ so-
cial and emotional abilities, and proposed intervention measures.
Overview of the SSES Project in China
Advancement of the SSES project is divided into three phases: 2017 is the tool devel-
opment phase (item trial); 2018 is the field test phase (field test); and 2019 is the offi-
cial evaluation phase (main study). In April 2018, China formally joined the project,
and subsequently carried out translation of various instruction manuals, localization of
assessment tools, training of assessors, and training of school coordinators, school sam-
pling, and on-site testing. In November 2018, the China Social and Emotional Ability
Project Team cooperated with the Suzhou Bureau of Education to conduct on-site tests
with 1,500 students from 30 primary and secondary schools in 10 districts and counties
of Suzhou. At the same time, 1,500 students’ parents, 858 teachers and 30 principals
filled out a questionnaire survey. From the end of 2018 to the first half of 2019, the pro-
ject team conducted follow-up surveys, data sorting and classification, and wrote field
test survey reports to prepare for the official evaluation in the second half of 2019.
Sample Selection

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1180
In the next formal testing phase, all schools in the ten districts and counties of Suzhou
participated in sampling, and random sampling was conducted at the levels of schools
and students. For school sampling, 76 schools were sampled from 387 primary schools
(10-year-old students), and 75 schools were sampled from 88 high schools and voca-
tional schools (15-year-old students). For student sampling, based on the teacher-
student association table provided by the sampled school, 50 students were randomly
selected among students enrolled at the school. After these two steps, a total of 7,550
primary and secondary school students from 151 primary and secondary schools had
been selected. In the formal testing phase, the overall participation rate of the sampled
students was as high as 96.26%, and a total of 7,268 students completed all tests, repre-
senting 150,964 elementary and middle school students in Suzhou. Among the 7,268
students in the final sample, 3,647 (50.2%) were in the 10-year-old group, 3,621 (49.8%)
were in the 15-year-old group; 3,838 (52.8%) were boys, 3,417 (47%) were girls, and
13 (0.2%) had unknown gender); 3,447 students (47.4%) were studying in schools in
the downtown area, and 2,459 students (33.8%) were studying in schools in counties
and towns. There are 1,362 students in rural schools (18.7%). Among the 15-year-old
students, 2,811 (77.6%) and 810 (22.4%) were enrolled in regular high schools and vo-
cational high schools, respectively. While carrying out the student survey, another 7,136
parents, 3,732 teachers and 151 principals participated in filling out the parent ques-
tionnaire, teacher questionnaire and principal questionnaire respectively (Zhang et al.,
2021).
Evaluation Tools
The social and emotional ability evaluation items included four types of evaluation
questionnaires: student, parent, teacher and principal questionnaires. Among them, the
student questionnaire mostly concerns students’ self-assessment of their social and
emotional abilities, but also includes items related to the student’s school and family
environment. The parent questionnaire includes information about the child’s social and
emotional abilities, the child’s growth history, the family environment, and the parents’
social and emotional abilities. The teacher questionnaire collects the teacher’s assess-
ment of the student’s social and emotional abilities and the teacher’s report on the
school’s learning environment. The principal’s questionnaire covers the broader social
background of the school and its students, and the existing resources and programs at
the school aimed at improving the learning environment.
The 2019 OECD Official Assessment of Social and Emotional Ability provid-
ed seven online assessment questionnaires at the Suzhou assessment site. There were
two student questionnaires, one for the 10-year-old group and one for the 15-year-old
group. The parent questionnaire for these two age groups is the same. The teacher ques-
tionnaire consists of two parts. The first part, completed by teachers of both age groups,
includes the teacher questionnaire survey and auxiliary test anchor questions. Every
participating teacher completed this part. The second part had two versions, one for the
10-year-old group and the other for the 15-year-old group. The teacher was asked to

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1181
complete this part for each student who “he/she knows best.” The main questionnaires
for the two age groups are the same (Zhang et al., 2021).
Variable Table of Influencing Factors
Data analysis also examines factors that affect students’ social and emotional abilities.
Factors come from the five main categories of background variables, student variables,
teacher variables, school variables, and family variables. The relationship between so-
cial, family and student variables is also examined, for a total of 30 basic measures, as
shown in Table 1.
China SSES Test Results
Data analysis results are presented in three parts. The first part uses descriptive statistics
to show the overall scores of social and emotional abilities, as well as the Big Five per-
sonality traits and its 12 sub-categories in terms of age, gender, urban and rural areas,
and school categories. The second part uses multiple regression analysis to explore the
effect of social and emotional abilities of 10-year-old and 15-year-old students on out-
come variables, such as personal life and behavior. The third part uses multiple regres-
sion analysis to examine the influencing factors of social and emotional abilities, in-
cluding the effects of background variables, student variables, teacher variables, school
variables, and family variables.
The Development Level of Chinese Students’ Social and
Emotional Abilities
 Task Abilities
Students in the 10-year-old group have higher task ability than those in the 15-year-old
group, and the monthly age within the 10-year-old and 15-year-old groups is positively
correlated with task ability. Within age groups, 10-year-old girls have higher task abil-
ity than boys, while the task ability of 15-year-old boys is higher than that of girls. Ur-
ban students have higher task abilities than rural students (Gao et al., 2021).
 Emotional Abilities
Students in the 10-year-old group generally have higher scores in the emotional regula-
tion dimension than those in the 15-year-old group. Students in the 10-year-old group
generally believed that they were very optimistic and did a good job of emotional con-
trol, but the parents of the 10-year-old group did not agree. Contrarily, the 15-year-old
students’ self-evaluation scores were lower than the scores from their parents. Students
in both age groups were below the international average for stress resistance, which also
has the lowest score among the 15 abilities. Boys perform better than girls overall when
it comes to emotional regulation, especially in terms of stress resistance. The perfor-
mance of students in urban areas is better overall than that of students in rural areas (Liu
et al., 2021).
 Collaboration

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1182
Table 1. Table of Variables Affecting Social and Emotional Abilities.
Main Variable
Basic Variable
Background
Gender; age; socio-economic status (parents' highest education, family possessions,
family equipment, family book collection)
Student
Sense of security; friendships; good habits of friends; high expectations of friends;
extensive social relationships; indoor activity time; online time; outdoor activity time;
growth mindset
Teacher
Teaching age; educational background; opportunities to participate in social-
emotional ability-related training (referred to as "training opportunities"); frequency of
participation in social-emotional ability-related training (referred to as "training fre-
quency"); teacher-student relationship; high teacher expectations, etc.
School
School belonging; school cooperation atmosphere; school competition atmosphere;
campus bullying; extracurricular activities, etc.
Family
Parenting style (understanding father/understanding mother, punitive father/punitive
mother); parent-child issues; high expectations of parents
The students in Suzhou, China self-report collaboration as quite high, especially empa-
thy, trust, and cooperation abilities, which are higher than the international average. The
self-evaluation score of the 10-year-old group is significantly higher than that of the 15-
year-old group, while the evaluation scores of parents and teachers of the two age
groups are relatively close. The collaboration ability of female students in the 10-year-
old group is higher than that of boys, while in the 15-year-old group, boy collaboration
scores are higher than that of girls. In addition, students in central urban areas are gen-
erally better than rural students in collaboration ability (Tang et al., 2021).
 Openness
For the average of the three sub-categories of openness (tolerance, curiosity, and crea-
tivity), the self-evaluation of Suzhou students is higher than the international average.
In contrast, the 15-year-old group’s self-evaluation is lower than that of the 10-year-old
group, and boys’ self-evaluation is higher than that of girls, especially in terms of crea-
tivity. This gap in creativity scores between boys and girls is even larger in the 15-year-
old group. The openness of students in central urban schools is significantly higher than
that of rural students, but the effect size is not large (Shao et al., 2021).
 Communication Ability
The overall score of Suzhou students in communication ability is higher than the world
average, indicating that the confidence of Suzhou students in themselves is higher than
the international average. The difference in self-evaluation of communication ability
between students in the 10-year-old group and the 15-year-old group is relatively large,
while the gap in parental evaluation for the two age groups is relatively small. There are
also significant differences in the communication abilities of students of different gen-
der groups. Girls in the 10-year-old group show significantly higher level of sociability
and courageousness than the boys. The vitality of boys in the 10-year-old group and 15-
year-old group are significantly higher than that of girls. Student communicative ability

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1183
in central urban schools is higher than that in county and rural areas. There is no signifi-
cant difference in the communication ability between ordinary high school and voca-
tional high school students (Huang et al., 2021).
The scores of students in all 15 social and emotional abilities are slightly higher
in the 10-year-old group than in the 15-year-old group (the standard deviation of the 10-
year-old group is 83.68-124.40, and the standard deviation of the 15-year-old group is
73.00-91.94). Within the two age groups, no significant gender differences are present
in most social and emotional abilities. However, among the 10-year-old students, girls
scored higher in most social and emotional abilities, especially in empathy, cooperation,
rapport, perseverance and tolerance, whereas among the 15-year-old students. With the
exception of tolerance, boys scored higher than girls in most social and emotional abili-
ties. The social and emotional abilities of most students are not significantly affected by
the school’s socioeconomic level for either age group. However, a general trend exists
for the scores of social and emotional abilities of students from schools with high socio-
economic levels to be slightly higher than those of students from schools with low and
medium socioeconomic areas. Students in ordinary high schools and vocational high
schools have no significant differences in social and emotional abilities, but students in
ordinary high schools generally score slightly higher in tolerance, curiosity, and creativ-
ity.
Factors Affecting the Development of Chinese Students’ So-
cial and Emotional Abilities
Elucidating the factors that affect the development of Chinese students’ social and emo-
tional abilities is an important goal of the evaluation project. In this regard, China’s as-
sessment project starts with the analysis of social background, summarizes the relation-
ship between social and emotional abilities and various influencing factors from back-
ground variables, individual student factors, family factors and school factors, and col-
lects students’ non-intellectual data through field investigations. The data on develop-
ment level are then placed in the international environment for horizontal comparison,
and finally specific educational intervention measures are proposed.
In the evaluation report of task ability, family education and school education
have a great influence on students’ task ability. Among them, in family education, dif-
ferent types of parents have different effects on students’ task ability. Understanding
mothers have a stable and positive influence on the task ability of students in both age
groups, while the influence of punitive parents is more complicated. Punitive mothers in
the 10-year-old group have a positive effect on students’ task ability, but punitive fa-
thers have a negative effect on perseverance. In the 15-year-old group, punitive fathers
have a positive influence on students’ task ability and punitive mothers have a negative
effect on students’ self-control and responsibility. In school education, teacher-student
relationship, school belonging, and school cooperation atmosphere have the greatest
impact on students’ task abilities, reflecting the key role of school environment in the
formation of students’ responsibility levels (Gao et al., 2021).

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1184
Of the many factors that affect emotional ability, more than 30 variables in the
five categories of background, student, teacher, school, and family all have consistent
and significant effects on students’ emotional regulation abilities, and most of these are
positive effects. In background variables, the higher the parents’ educational back-
ground and the greater the number of family possessions and book collections, the bet-
ter the students’ emotional regulation ability. In student variables, security, friend rela-
tionships, outdoor activity time and growth-oriented thinking have a significant positive
impact on emotional regulation, while online time has a significant negative impact on
emotional regulation. In teacher variables, the quality of the teacher-student relationship
is positively correlated with a student’s emotional regulation, and teachers’ participation
in social and emotional ability cultivation training helps the students’ ability develop-
ment. In school variables, the three variables of school atmosphere of cooperation, ex-
tra-school activities and especially, the sense of belonging to school significantly in-
crease development of students’ abilities. In family variables, understanding parents,
especially understanding fathers, have a positive effect on the development of chil-
dren’s emotional regulation ability, while parent-child problems have a negative effect
on ability development (Liu et al., 2021).
In the analysis of factors affecting collaboration ability, the 30 scales can be di-
vided into positive and negative. Most are positive factors, including family possessions,
family collection of books, sense of security, friendship, good friends, indoor activity
time, outdoor activity time, understanding mothers, understanding fathers, high expecta-
tions of parents, teacher-student relationship, school belonging, school atmosphere of
cooperation, and off-campus activities. Negative factors for collaboration include online
time, parent-child problems (Tang et al., 2021).
The openness of students is also affected by student, teacher, school and family
factors. For background variables, parents’ highest education level, family possessions,
and family’s collection of books have a significant positive impact on the openness of
both 10-year-old and 15-year-old groups. Among student variables, security, friendship,
good habits, outdoor activities, time- and growth-oriented thinking have a significant
positive impact on the openness of students. One age group difference is that “wide-
spread social friendship” has a negative impact on creativity in 10-year-old students,
while it has a positive impact on creativity in 15-year-old students. Teacher education
and teacher-student relationship have a significant positive impact on openness for both
groups of students. Among school variables, the sense of belonging to school, school
atmosphere of cooperation, school atmosphere of competition, and off-campus activities
all have significant positive effects on openness. Among family variables, parenting
style and parental expectations have a significant impact on students’ openness. Stu-
dents in both age groups with understanding parents have a greater openness. In the 10-
year-old group, punitive mothers also have a positive impact on students’ openness.
Parent-child difficulties have a significant negative impact on openness (Shao et al.,
2021).
Students’ communicative ability is also affected by numerous variables. In stu-
dent variables, sense of security, friendships, friends with good habits and personal out-

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1185
door activity time significantly increase communication abilities of 10-year-old and 15-
year-old students, while time spent online has a significant negative effect on the com-
munication ability of students. The teacher-student relationship has a significant posi-
tive effect on the communication ability of both 10 and 15-year-old students. The sense
of belonging to school and extracurricular activities significantly affect students’ com-
municative ability in a positive way. Parental rearing styles have a significant positive
impact, while parent-child problems have a significant negative impact, on students’
communication skills (Huang et al., 2021).
From the general analysis results, the sense of belonging to school, cooperative
learning atmosphere, friendships, and sense of security are positively correlated with the
social and emotional abilities of most students. High scores in school belonging are
closely related to social and emotional abilities. Parent-child issues and greater partici-
pation in daily online activities are negatively correlated with all social and emotional
abilities.
The Relationship between Students’ Social and Emotional
Abilities and Personal Life and Behavior
In addition to the basic level assessment, the Chinese assessment project team analyzed
the correlation between 15 social and emotional abilities and the personal life character-
istics and behavioral performance of students in the 10-year-old and 15-year-old groups.
Characteristics included academic performance (language, mathematics and art), psy-
chological well-being (current psychological well-being, life satisfaction and exam anx-
iety), and involved in classroom activities, smoking and 10 other behavioral indicators.
Life satisfaction, current psychological well-being, and exam anxiety are similarly af-
fected by a student’s age and gender. Older students, especially older girls, showed
lower life satisfaction and lower current psychological well-being, and higher test anxi-
ety. In terms of related abilities, optimism is most closely related to life satisfaction and
current psychological well-being, followed by vitality and trust. Exam anxiety is most
influenced by anti-stress and optimism abilities of students (Yuan et al., 2021).
To measure behavior performance, the project team set up 10 and 14 behavior
indicators in the questionnaire surveys of students, parents, and teachers for each age
group, such as whether they are “honest” and “do housework,” or “have difficulty con-
centrating.” For the 15-year-old age group, additional behavior indicators were included,
such as “handling the extra change”, “playing truant”, “and smoking” and “drinking.”
All 15 social and emotional abilities are negatively correlated with students’ negative
behaviors. For example, inattention and insomnia are negatively correlated with most
social and emotional abilities. Especially in the 15-year-old group, all 15 social and
emotional abilities are weakly correlated with bad behaviors such as absenteeism,
smoking, and drinking, while positive behavior indicators, such as observing rules and
participating in classroom activities, have moderate to strong correlations with most
social and emotional abilities (Yuan et al., 2021).

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1186
Conclusions and Enlightenment
China has begun to pay attention to improving students’ non-cognitive abilities such as
collaboration and emotional abilities. In June 2013, the Ministry of Education issued
“Opinions of the Ministry of Education on Promoting the Reform of Comprehensive
Evaluation of Education Quality in Primary and Secondary Schools,” which noted that
it is necessary to “effectively reverse the tendency of evaluating the quality of primary
and secondary schools solely based on students’ academic test scores and school en-
rollment rates, and promote the overall development of students.” Healthy Growth, with
key indicators such as personality quality, emotional behavior control, interpersonal
communication and curiosity and thirst for knowledge, included in the annex “Compre-
hensive Evaluation Index Framework for Primary and Secondary Education Quality
(Trial)” are all social and emotional skills. The main components of the survey have
strong similarities with the corresponding indicators of the OECD’s social and emotion-
al skills (Ministry of Education of China, 2013).
In September 2016, the research report, “Core Competence of Chinese Student
Development,” was released. It clearly stated that students should have the necessary
qualities and key abilities to adapt to lifelong learning and lifelong development. These
key abilities are divided into three aspects: cultural foundation, independent develop-
ment, and social participation. It is comprehensively expressed as the six qualities of
humanistic background, scientific spirit, learning to learn, healthy living, responsibility,
and practical innovation, which are further refined into 18 basic qualities such as hu-
manistic feelings, aesthetic appeal, rational thinking, social responsibility, national iden-
tity, and labor awareness. In the document, non-cognitive ability is introduced into ped-
agogy research and education evaluation system, and development of non-cognitive
abilities in young people is emphasized in basic education in China (Core Literacy Re-
search Group, 2016).
However, according to the latest data from the International Student Assess-
ment Project (PISA) released in December 2019, although Chinese teenagers ranked
first in the world in the three cognitive abilities tests of reading, mathematics and sci-
ence, they showed a low sense of belonging to the school, low levels of satisfaction
with schools, lack of autonomy and self-consciousness for self-planning (Du, 2019),
there is still much room for improvement in the non-cognitive abilities of Chinese stu-
dents (Zhang, 2020).
The evaluation of social and emotional abilities carried out this time is a re-
sponse to China’s long-standing problems of emphasizing cognitive abilities and ne-
glecting non-cognitive abilities: the cultivation of Chinese youth’s social and emotional
abilities is of great significance to the promotion of China’s educational reform. This is
not only the presentation of the SSES evaluation results, but also some enlightenment
based on the analysis of the China Social and Emotional Ability Evaluation Report.
Social and Emotional Abilities can be Improved with
Intervention

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1187
The measurement results of social emotional skills only illustrate a state, and ultimately
point to specific intervention methods. Social and emotional abilities are different from
cognitive abilities, and they are more malleable. From the perspective of life course,
adolescents are very sensitive to external interventions from family, school, etc. Some
important non-cognitive abilities such as achievement motivation, self-discipline and
sense of responsibility are moldable in the adolescence. During this period, through
effective educational intervention and systematic learning, the development of chil-
dren’s social and emotional abilities can be promoted, and the children’s happiness and
achievement motivation can be improved.
The “Perry Preschool Education Project” is the best example of success with
non-cognitive interventions. The project included 123 children aged 3 to 4-years with
an intellectual development level below 85 points in a comparative experiment that
conducted educational interventions on social and emotional abilities of 58 children in
the experimental group (children were randomly assigned to experimental or control
group), teaching them how to be friendly with others and conducting weekly home vis-
its to improve the parent-child relationship; the remaining 65 children in the control
group received no educational intervention. Subsequently, the two groups of children
were followed up until they reached adulthood. The study found that educational inter-
vention had no impact on the cognitive abilities of these children, but greatly improved
their social and emotional abilities, leading them to have happier marriages, more har-
monious family relationships, better health, a higher quality of life and lower crime
rates (Berrueta-Clement, 1984).
In China, in 2012, the Department of Teacher Work of the Ministry of Educa-
tion of China and UNICEF cooperated on the “Social and Emotional Learning and
School Management Improvement Project.” The project took place in 250 project
schools in five provinces (cities, districts) in western China and implemented pilot pro-
jects aimed at improving students’ social and emotional abilities. Through the coopera-
tion of school, family and community education, China is promoting the social and
emotional learning of children and young people, so that students can learn self-esteem
and self-management, will have social awareness and good interpersonal communica-
tion skills, can understand the emotions of others and have empathy, can form positive
interpersonal relationships and creatively solve problems and can make responsible de-
cisions in a variety of different situations (Mao et al., 2018). The project is an overall
intervention that includes thematic courses, teaching reforms, changes in the school
environment, and home-school cooperation. Further, the project provides an interven-
tion template that can be used as a reference for improving the social and emotional
abilities of Chinese young people.
In 2018, the China Education Innovation Research Institute of Beijing Normal
University released the “21st Century Core Literacy 5C Model Research Report” (in
Chinese), which listed communication and cooperation as one of the five core literacy
components of young people in the 21st century. Within this component, communica-
tion and teamwork focused on reflecting individual social skills, communication em-
phasized respect, understanding, empathy and cooperation emphasized the necessity of

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1188
persistence and compromise under the premise of achieving common goals (Xu et al.,
2020; Kang et al., 2020). Driven by that report, the research and intervention practice
for improving Chinese adolescents’ non-cognitive abilities has been further developed.
Cultivation of Students’ Social and Emotional Abilities
is a Systematic Project
The results of the SSES evaluation point to four aspects in the cultivation of social and
emotional abilities: students, parents, teachers and schools. Many successful interven-
tion programs in the past have shown the same characteristics. First, establish a good,
close and supportive relationship between parents, teachers and children, and provide
guidance. Second, ensure home, school, and workplace consistency with the quality of
the community’s learning environment. Third, provide skills training for children and
teachers using orderly, active, focused and clear learning practices. Fourth, establish a
connection project between children and adolescents, and ensure previous inputs are
tracked and supplemented (OECD, 2015). The cultivation of social and emotional abili-
ties must be regarded as an ecosystem, with multiple levels including students, teachers,
parents, and communities.
At the nation level, many countries incorporate social and emotional skills
learning along with academic skills learning into their education policies. Schools
should be encouraged to adjust their curricula, focusing on character education and rela-
tionship education. For example, since the United States Congress approved the “Part-
nership in Character Education Program” in 1994, funding has been provided to state
and local educational institutions to support the development of character education (US
Department of Education, 2005). The same is true in South Korea; in the national cur-
riculum revised in 2009, creativity and character education were the focus of reform,
and “creative experience learning activities” were introduced to strengthen students’
creativity and character education in primary and secondary school curricula (National
Youth Policy Institution, 2009). In 2019, the United Kingdom’s Department of Educa-
tion issued a statutory guideline on relationship education, requiring that relationship
education and health education is included in the compulsory courses of primary and
secondary schools starting from September 2020, to help students be adequately pre-
pared for future life (UK Department for Education, 2019).
In recent years, China has gradually realized the importance of non-cognitive
abilities in curriculum reform and has promoted the cultivation of non-cognitive abili-
ties, focusing on the training and assessment of students’ non-cognitive abilities in
terms of curriculum and evaluation. In this way, the education system pays attention to
well-rounded development of students.
In addition, the development of social and emotional abilities must be synerget-
ic. The OECD evaluation results show that schools, teachers, families, and communities
all play an important role in improving the social and emotional capabilities of individ-
uals. Methods that can improve social and emotional skills include optimizing the fami-
ly, school and community environments, creating a family atmosphere that is conducive

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1189
to improving social and emotional abilities, enhancing students’ sense of belonging to
the school, improving teacher training regarding social and emotional abilities. The
teachers’ own social and emotional abilities can be used to directly influence students,
constructing a new type of teacher-student relationship. Acknowledging the subjectivity
of families, communities, and students, respecting the wishes of students, paying atten-
tion to the emotions of stakeholders, forming a joint force for education, and striving to
create an ecosystem full of emotional care are all further ways in which social and emo-
tional skills might be improved.
The Evaluation of Social and Emotional Abilities Re-
quires More Localized Measurement Indicators
As a soft skill, social and emotional abilities cannot be measured through traditional
academic level tests in the same way as cognitive abilities, but instead rely mostly on
self-reporting and observer reporting methods. The self-reporting method is the subjec-
tive report of emotional cognition, feeling and experience from the perspective of the
experience. To avoid the subjectivity of a single perspective, such data are typically
confirmed using other observers’ reports. Another method of evaluation is to base eval-
uation on a specific theoretical model, determining the dimensions and indicators of
evaluation, formulating evaluation tool scales, collecting data on students’ social and
emotional behavior, and evaluating students’ social and emotional abilities through ex-
periments and data.
Social and emotional abilities attach importance to performance-based and
strengths-based evaluations and focus on students’ strengths and growth thinking. The
method used in the SSES test is to build an evaluation dimension based on the Big Five
personality traits model. At the same time, it absorbs the evidence from the previous
methods. In addition to students, the SSES collects relevant questionnaire information
from parents, teachers, and schools, providing a check of data to ensure objective and
accurate evaluation results.
Before now, limited by a lack of evaluation methods, the effectiveness of social
and emotional abilities has not been effectively tested. Although some domestic schol-
ars have tried to use foreign verified evaluation tools, such as the East Asia-Pacific ear-
ly child development scales (EAP-ECDS) developed by the Asia-Pacific Early Child-
hood Network (Rao et al., 2014)and the caregiver-reported early development index
(CREDI) for children aged 0-3 years developed by Professor Dana Charles McCoy of
Harvard University in the United States(McCoy et al., 2018）. The CREDI scales eval-
uate all aspects of child development and were introduced to China (Zhang, et al 2018),
but due to the differences between Chinese and Western cultural backgrounds and edu-
cational systems, the effectiveness of its evaluation has been questioned. In the context
of cultivating social and emotional abilities to promote the overall development of stu-
dents, a lack of evaluation tools are a key factor restricting development of social and
emotional abilities in our country. Therefore, it is urgent to build Chinese localized
evaluation indicators (Zhang & Liu, 2021). Although the SSES test still uses the inter-

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1190
national measurement tools provided by the OECD, in terms of specific factors, more
consideration is given to localization, and the design of the questionnaire can be better
adapted by participating countries. Each participating country can add or modify ques-
tionnaire items. For example, in the Chinese test, the socio-economic status variables
are not directly provided in the OECD Youth Social and Emotional Ability Research
Database. China lists the highest education level of parents, family possessions, family
equipment, and family book collection. Related basic variables are incorporated into
background variables to consider the impact of background factors of Chinese families
on students’ social and emotional abilities.
Although we agree with the results of the SSES test, based on the representa-
tiveness and objectivity of the test results, we still have a couple of reservations about
the SSES test. First, in terms of sample selection, can a sample of a city accurately rep-
resent all Chinese youth? Second, do international measurement tools suit Chinese stu-
dents in a different cultural context? Can China build up localized evaluation indicators
of measurement tools to promote the overall development of its students?
In summary, the construction of China’s social and emotional ability measure-
ment indicators requires the joint efforts of researchers in China, must follow the prin-
ciples of science and operability, carry out a large number of empirical studies, and
conduct multi-level and dynamic social and emotional ability indicators. Localized
monitoring and measurement will form a localized scientific evaluation system to pro-
mote the well-rounded development of students.
References
Adhitya, D., Mulyaningsih, T., & Samudro, B.R.
(2019). The role of Cognitive and Non-
Cognitive Skills on Labour Market Out-
comes in Indonesia. Jurnal Ekonomi Malay-
sia, 53(1):3-16. DOI:
http://dx.doi.org/10.17576/JEM-2019-5301-
1
Alzahrani, M., Alharbi, M., & Alodwani, A.
(2019). The effect of social-emotional com-
petence on children academic achievement
and behavioral development. International
Education Studies, 12(12):141-149. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5539/ies.v12n12p141
Atkins R., Turner, A., Chandola T., & Sutton M.
(2020). Going beyond the mean in examin-
ing relationships of adolescent non-cognitive
skills with health-related quality of life and
biomarkers in later-life. Economics & Hu-
man Biology. 39:100923. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ehb.2020.100923
Berrueta-Clement, J.R. (1984). Changed Lives:
The Effects of the Perry Preschool Program
on Youths through Age 19. Monographs of
the High/Scope Educational Research Foun-
dation, Number Eight. Monograph Series,
High/Scope Foundation, 600 North River
Street, Ypsilanti, MI 48197.
Bowles, S. & Gintis, H. (2002). Schooling in
capitalist America revisited. Sociology of
Education, 75(1):1-18. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.2307/3090251

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1191
CASEL. (March 01, 2003). Safe and Sound: An
Educational Leader’s Guide to Evidence-
Based Social and Emotional Learning (SEL)
Programs. Retrieved August 17, 2021, from
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED482011.p
df
Chernyshenko, O.S., Kankaraš, M., & Drasgow,
F. (2018). Social and emotional skills for
student success and well-being: Conceptual
framework for the OECD study on social
and emotional skills. ISSN: 19939019
(online) DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1787/19939019
Core Literacy Research Group. (2016). Chinese
students develop core literacy. Journal of the
Chinese Society of Education, 37(10):1-3.
[Chinese]
http://www.cnki.com.cn/Article/CJFDTotal-
ZJYX201610003.htm
Department of Education and Skills. (2012). A
Framework for Junior Cycle. Retrieved Sep-
tember 11, 2021, from
https://assets.gov.ie/24477/47baa8cfe8164f3
89e970538883d71d7.pdf
Du, W. (December 20, 2019 ). What educational
enlightenment does the PISA test bring to
educational evaluation? Modern Education
Daily, 12-18. [Chinese] Retrieved Septem-
ber 11, 2021, from
http://studio.nxeduyun.com/index.php?r=stu
dio/post/view&sid=924&id=196720
Durlak, J.A., Weissberg, R.P., Dymnicki, A.B.,
Taylor, R.D., & Schellinger, K.B. (2011).
The impact of enhancing students’ social
and emotional learning: A meta-analysis of
school-based universal interventions. Child
Development, 82(1):405-432. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-
8624.2010.01564.x
Elias, M.J., & Haynes, N.M. (2008). Social
competence, social support, and academic
achievement in minority, low-income, urban
elementary school children. School Psychol-
ogy Quarterly, 23(4):474-495. DOI:
https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/1045-
3830.23.4.474
Elias, M.J., Zins, J.E., Weissberg, R.P., Frey,
K.S., Greenberg, M.T., Haynes, N.M., Kess-
ler, R., Schwab-Stone, M.E., & Shriver, T.P.
(1997). Promoting Social and Emotional
Learning: Guidelines for Educators. Alexan-
dria: ASCD.
Fang, L. (2020). Status quo and characteristics
of OECD social and emotional skills as-
sessment project. Shanghai Journal of Edu-
cational Evaluation, 9(5):44-49. [Chinese]
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.13794/j.cnki.shjee.2020.00
72
Frydenberg, E., Martin, A. J., & Collie, R. J.
(2017). Social and emotional learning in
Australia and the Asia-Pacific. Social and
emotional learning in the Australasian con-
text. Melbourne, Australia: Springer Social
Sciences.
Gao, X., Chen, H., Wu, J., & Huang, Z. (2021).
Task performance: Report on the study on
social and emotional skills of Chinese ado-
lescence (I). Journal of East China Normal
University (Educational Sciences), 39(9):33-
46. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2021.09.002
Gold, S. (2009). Measuring social competence,
task competence and self-protection in an
organisational context (Doctoral dissertation,
University of Newcastle).
http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/44576
Haggerty, K., Elgin, J., & Woolley, A. (2011).
Social-emotional learning assessment
measures for middle school youth. Social
Development Research Group. University of
Washington: Raikes Foundation. Retrieved
September 11, 2021, from
https://schoolguide.casel.org/uploads/sites/2/
2018/12/DAP-Raikes-Foundation-
Review.pdf
Hanushek, E. A. (2013). Economic growth in
developing countries: The role of human
capital. Economics of Education Review,
37:204-212. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.econedurev.2013.04
.005
Heckman, J.J., & Kautz, T. (2012). Hard evi-
dence on soft skills. Labour Economics,
19(4):451-464. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.labeco.2012.05.014
Heckman, J.J., Stixrud, J., & Urzua, S. (2006).
The effects of cognitive and noncognitive
abilities on labor market outcomes and so-
cial behavior. Journal of Labor Economics,

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1192
24(3):411-482. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1086/504455
Huang, G., & Xie, Y. (2017). The Influence of
Cognitive Ability and Non-cognitive Ability
on Youth Labor Income Return. China
Youth Study, 29(2):56-64+97. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.19633/j.cnki.11-
2579/d.2017.02.009
Huang, Z. (2020). Social and emotional compe-
tence: key factors affecting success and hap-
piness. Global Education, 49(6):102-112.
[Chinese]
http://www.cnki.com.cn/Article/CJFDTotal-
WGJN202006009.htm
Huang, Z., Wang, Q., Chen, H., & Gao, X.
(2021). Engaging with others: The report on
the study on social and emotional skills of
Chinese adolescents (V). Journal of East
China Normal University (Educational Sci-
ences), 39(9):93-108. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2021.09.006
Huy, Q.N. (1999). Emotional capability, emo-
tional intelligence, and radical change.
Academy of Management Review, 24(2):325-
345. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5465/amr.1999.1893939
Kang, C., Xu, G., Wei, R., Liu, J., Zheng, Y., &
Liu, Y., Gan, Q., & Ma, L. (2020). Open-
mindedness: Report on the study on social
and emotional skills of Chinese adolescence
(IV). Journal of East China Normal Univer-
sity (Educational Sciences), 39(9):77-82.
[Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2020.02.007
Kankaraš, M. (2017). Personality matters: Rele-
vance and assessment of personality charac-
teristics. ISSN: 19939019 (online)
https://doi.org/10.1787/19939019
Kankaraš, M., Feron, E., & Renbarger, R. (2019).
Assessing students’ social and emotional
skills through triangulation of assessment
methods. ISSN: 19939019 (online)
https://doi.org/10.1787/19939019
Lendrum, A., & Humphrey, N. (2010). Imple-
menting social and emotional aspects of
learning (SEAL) in secondary schools in
England: Issues and implications. Manches-
ter: University of Manchester.
Liu, D. (2017). How Trait Emotional Intelli-
gence Affects Students’ Academic
Achievement: A Case Study of Primary
School Mathematics. Journal of Educational
Science of Hunan Normal University,
24(6):44-50. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.19503/j.cnki.1671-
6124.2017.06.007
Liu, Z., & Liang, C. (2021). Taking the cultiva-
tion of students’ social and emotional abili-
ties as a powerful starting point for the inte-
gration of the five educations. Journal of the
Chinese Society of Education, 42(2):1-5+11.
[Chinese]
https://kns.cnki.net/kcms/detail/detail.aspx?d
bcode=CJFD&dbname=CJFDLAST2021&fi
lename=ZJYX202102009&uniplatform=NZ
KPT&v=gJzpcD%25mmd2FFP30EHkgJkT
vxhsRR%25mmd2B10WF1BvjKqLp6Fu%2
5mmd2B7c1%25mmd2FQOmhYZG21rUnf
8oscnn
Liu, Z., Zhu, R., Cui, H., & Huang, Z. (2021).
Emotional regulation: Report on the study
on social and emotional skills of Chinese
adolescence (II). Journal of East China
Normal University (Educational Sciences),
39(9):47-61. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2021.09.003
Mao, Y., Du, Y., Yi, K., & Wen, S. (2018).
School improvement based on the cultiva-
tion of students’ social and emotional abili-
ties-the exploration and practice of the Min-
istry of Education-UNICEF “Social Emo-
tional Learning” project. Primary and Sec-
ondary School Management, 32(11):31-33.
[Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3969/j.issn.1002-
2384.2018.11.009
McCoy, D.C., Waldman, M., Team, C.F., &
Fink, G. (2018). Measuring early childhood
development at a global scale: Evidence
from the Caregiver-Reported early develop-
ment instruments. Early Childhood Research
Quarterly, 45:58-68. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecresq.2018.05.002
Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic
of China, MOE. (June 3, 2013). Opinions of
the Ministry of Education on Promoting the
Reform of Comprehensive Evaluation of
Educational Quality in Primary and Second-

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1193
ary Schools. [Chinese] Retrieved September
14, 2021, from
http://www.moe.gov.cn/srcsite/A06/s3321/2
01306/t20130608_153185.html
Mueller, G. & E. Plug. 2006. Estimating the
effect of personality on male-female earn-
ings. Industrial and Labor Relations Review,
60(1):3-22. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1177%2F00197939060600
0101
Mýtna Kureková, L., Beblavý, M., Haita, C., &
Thum, A.E. (2016). Employers’ skill prefer-
ences across Europe: between cognitive and
non-cognitive skills. Journal of Education
and Work, 29(6):662-687. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1080/13639080.2015.1024
641
National Youth Policy Institution. (2009). Intro-
duction to creative activities, Ministry of
Education. Retrieved September 11, 2021,
from
https://www.nypi.re.kr/atchfile/binaryAtchfil
e.do?vchkcode=sAkYJ98fR1kw
OECD (2021). Beyond Academic Learning:
First Results from the Survey of Social and
Emotional Skills, OECD Publishing, Paris,
Retrieved September 11, 2021, from
https://doi.org/10.1787/92a11084-en
OECD. (2015). Skills for Social Progress: The
Power of Social and Emotional Skills,
OECD Skills Studies, OECD Publishing.
Retrieved September 11, 2021, from
https://www.oecd.org/education/skills-for-
social-progress-9789264226159-en.htm
OECD. (2017). Social and Emotional Skills:
Well-being, Connectedness and Success. Re-
trieved September 10, 2021, from
http://www.oecd.org/education/ceri/thestudy
onsocialandemotionalskills.htm
OECD. (September 7, 2021). OECD Survey on
Social and Emotional Skills Technical Re-
port. Retrieved September 10, 2021, from
http://www.oecd.org/education/ceri/thestudy
onsocialandemotionalskills.htm
Osher, D., Kidron, Y., Brackett, M., Dymnicki,
A., Jones, S., & Weissberg, R.P. (2016).
Advancing the Science and Practice of So-
cial and Emotional Learning: Looking Back
and Moving Forward. Review of Research in
Education, 40(1):644-681. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3102%2F0091732X16673
595
Payton J., Resnik, H.,Weissberg, R. P., Durlak,
J.A., Dymnicki A.B., &Taylor, R. D., et al.
(2010). Collaborative for Academic, Social
and Emotional Learning (CASEL). Springer
US.
http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summar
y?doi=10.1.1.548.3408
Rao, N., Sun, J., Ng, M., Becher, Y., Lee, D., Ip,
P., & Bacon-Shone, J. (2014). Validation,
finalization and adoption of the East Asia-
Pacific early child development scales
(EAP-ECDS). New York: UNICEF.
http://www.arnec.net/wp-
content/uploads/2015/07/EAP-ECDS-Final-
Report1.pdf
Succi, C., & Canovi, M. (2020). Soft skills to
enhance graduate employability: comparing
students and employers’ perceptions. Studies
in Higher Education, 45(9):1834-1847. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2019.1585
420
Tan, J.P.L., Koh, E., Chan, M., Costes-Onishi, P.,
& Hung, D. (February, 2017). Advancing
21st century competencies in Singapore. Na-
tional Institute of Education, Nanyang Tech-
nological University, Singapore. Retrieved
September 10, 2021, from
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/31
7279438_Advancing_21st_Century_Compet
encies_in_Singapore
Tang, Y., Zheng, J., Sun, X., & Huang, Z.
(2021). Tang, Y., Zheng, J., Sun, X., &
Huang, Z. (2021) Collaboration: Report on
the study on social and emotional skills of
Chinese adolescence (III). Journal of East
China Normal University (Educational Sci-
ences), 39(9):62-76. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2021.09.004
Turner, J. H., & Stets, J. E. (2005). The sociolo-
gy of emotions. Cambridge University Press.
UK Department for Education. (April 5, 2019).
Relationships education, relationships and
sex education (RSE) and health education:
FAQs. Retrieved September 11, 2021, from
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/relati
onships-education-relationships-and-sex-
education-rse-and-health-education-faqs

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1194
UNESCO. (April 05, 2019)._ Social and Emo-
tional Skills and the Education 2030 agenda
[EB/OL]. Retrieved September 10, 2021,
from https://en.unesco.org/events/social-and-
emotional-skills-and-education-2030-agenda
US Department of Education. (2005, May 31).
Character Education. Our Shared Responsi-
bility. Retrieved September 11, 2021, from
http:
https://www2.ed.gov/admins/lead/character/
brochure.html
Vaillant, G. (2012). Triumphs of Experience:
The Men of the Harvard Grant Study. Cam-
bridge, MA and London, England: Harvard
University Press. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674067
424
Wigelsworth M., Humphrey N., Kalambouka A.,
& Lendrum A. (2010). A review of key is-
sues in the measurement of children’s social
and emotional skills. Educational Psycholo-
gy in Practice, 26(2):173-186. DOI:
https://doi.org/10.1080/02667361003768526
World Economic Forum. (2016, March 10).
New vision for education: Fostering social
and emotional learning through technology.
Geneva: World Economic Forum. Retrieved
September 11, 2021, from
https://www.weforum.org/reports/new-
vision-for-education-fostering-social-and-
emotional-learning-through-technology
World Economic Forum. (2016, March). New
vision for education: Fostering social and
emotional learning through technology. Ge-
neva: World Economic Forum. Retrieved
September 11, 2021, from
http://hdl.voced.edu.au/10707/443447
Xu, G., Wei, R., Liu, J., Li, J., Kang, C., Ma, L.,
Gan, Q., & Liu, Y. (2020). Huang, Z., Wang,
Q., Chen, H., & Gao, X. (2021). Engaging
with others: The report on the study on so-
cial and emotional skills of Chinese adoles-
cents (V). Journal of East China Normal
University (Educational Sciences), 39(9):83-
96. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2020.02.008
Yuan, Z., Huang, Z., Li, J., & Zhang, J. (2021).
Report on the Development Level of Chi-
nese Adolescents’ Social and Emotional
Ability. Journal of East China Normal Uni-
versity (Educational Sciences), 39(9):1-32.
[Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2021.09.001
Zhang, J., & Liu, D. (2021). Three Questions on
the Evaluation of Social and Emotional
Ability. Journal of the Chinese Society of
Education, 42(2):18-24. [Chinese]
https://kns.cnki.net/kcms/detail/detail.aspx?d
bcode=CJFD&dbname=CJFDLAST2021&fi
lename=ZJYX202102012&uniplatform=NZ
KPT&v=gJzpcD%25mmd2FFP31nYs5nyy7
yPVRIIGpGq0APwzRB%25mmd2BmFHF9
mmUwA27io1Wu0CHNCt3ila
Zhang, J., Tang, Y., Guo, J., & Shao, Z. (2021).
Technical Report on the Assessment of So-
cial and Emotional Ability of Chinese Ado-
lescents. Journal of East China Normal Uni-
versity (Educational Sciences), 39(9):109-
126. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.16382/j.cnki.1000-
5560.2021.09.007
Zhang, X. (2020). Non-cognitive abilities stimu-
late positive growth. China Education Daily,
07-03.
https://news.ruc.edu.cn/archives/282383
Zhang, Y., Zhao, J., Shan, W., Young, M.E., He,
Y., Mao, H., Qu, J., Zhao, Z., & Jiang, F.
(2018). Early childhood development as-
sessment tool and its development and ap-
plication in China. Chinese Journal of Pedi-
atrics, 56(2):84-87. [Chinese] DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3760/cma.j.issn.0578-
1310.2018.02.002
Zhou M.M., & Ee J. (2012). Development and
Validation of Social Emotional Competence
Questionnaire (SECQ). Emotional Educa-
tion, 4(2):27-42.
https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar//handle/1
23456789/6140
Zhou, Q., Main, A., & Wang, Y. (2010). The
relations of temperamental effortful control
and anger/frustration to Chinese children’s
academic achievement and social adjustment:
A longitudinal study. Journal of Educational
Psychology, 102(1): 180. DOI:
https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/a001590
8

Zhao et al. China Report on the Global Youth Survey of Social and Emotional Skills by the OECD.
BECE, Vol.9, No. 1, 2021 1195
Received: 18 September 2021
Revised: 22 September 2021
Accepted: 23 September 2021