The purpose of the study is to examine children’s peer ties, and socio-emotional interaction in small group settings and how these are related together. One of the aims of this longitudinal study is to examine the transitivity, mutuality, and stability of preschool age children’s peer relationships over one academic year. Another aim is to observe children’s prosocial and problem behaviors in small group settings around tablet computers. It is studied how gender and closeness of friendships influence on young children’s relationships and interactions.

Participants of the study included 16 children from a southwestern Finnish preschool. Interview data were collected from the children at five separate time points (total 80 interviews), by using sociometric nomination techniques. Video recordings were gathered around computer sessions and later coded to analyse children’s socio-emotional behavior and interactions with their peers. Social network analysis methods were used to investigate the stability and cohesion of the peer relationships, gathered through interviews. Social network analysis was also employed to analyze the density and centrality of the interactions among peers. Further, video-recorded interactions were analyzed to examine what kind of prosocial and problem behaviors there were in small group situations.

The study contributes to the extant literature by describing how children’s friendship ties get stabilized during the early childhood. Based on the results, gender has stronger influence than the age of the children. The daily pedagogical arrangements had some influence on peer relationships. The results showed a wide variety in how prosocial and problem behavior took place in small group settings. In all, prosocial behavior was four times more typical than problem behavior, and there were more initiating than responding behaviors. Unexpectedly, a positive correlation between children’s peer preference and problem behavior was found. Some possible explanations for this were given. A practical and concise peer interaction observation tool (PIOT) was developed to follow children’s social and emotional skills in peer interactions.