The assessment of emotional awareness in children: validation of the levels of emotional awareness scale for children

The Levels of Emotional Awareness Scale (LEAS) is a widely used scenario-based instrument that has been developed for the measurement of emotional awareness in adults. Although the LEAS has been validated in numerous studies, published validity research on the recently developed child version (LEAS-C) is scarce. The objective of the present study was to evaluate the construct validity of the Dutch LEAS-C in a sample of 318 children, aged 10 to 17 years. Outcomes revealed novel structural evidence in favor of alternative design-driven modeling. Further, the pattern of relationships with ability- and trait-oriented emotional intelligence, intelligence, personality, social and emotional impairment, and gender was generally consistent with previous theorizing and adult studies on the LEAS. Reasons for absence of age differences are discussed. In conclusion, this study corroborates the construct validity of the LEAS-C and highlights the importance of fully exploring the LEAS-C in its potential. Directions for future research are proposed