Abstract
In early care and education settings, children who display challenging behaviors tend to have higher rates of conflict with their teachers than children without such problems. This proof-of-concept study examines the extent to which early childhood teacher’s classroom management self-efficacy is associated with conflictual teacher–child relationships with children who have been screened for and exhibit elevated levels of externalizing behaviors (i.e., focal children). In addition, we examine whether this association varies by a child’s ordinal level of challenging behavior relative to their classroom peers who also exhibit elevated levels of challenging behaviors. This study included 312 focal children (66% male), identified as at risk of Emotional and Behavioral Disorders (EBD), and 125 classrooms in which teachers completed surveys to assess teacher–child conflict, classroom management self-efficacy, and child challenging behavior. Findings revealed that in classrooms with three focal children, a disordinal interaction was present. The relation between teacher self-efficacy and teacher–child conflict differed as a function of child ordinal behavior rank. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of this work for research and practice.