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Background. Parents’ perceptions of their children’s school readiness play a significant role in shaping their psychological readiness and successful adaptation to school. The nature of a preschooler’s preparation for this new social stage can determine their future attitude toward learning. Despite extensive research on psychological readiness, parental views on this phenomenon remain understudied.

Objective. To study and conduct a comparative analysis of the perceptions of parents of preschoolers and first-graders regarding their children’s readiness for school.

Sample. The study was conducted in Baku among 74 Russian-speaking parents of preschoolers and first-graders aged 27 to 50 years (M=37; SD=5).

Methods. The study utilized the “Identifying Parents’ Perceptions of Psychological Readiness for School” method by M.V. Klimakova, Yu.A. Kochetova, and A.E. Sakadanova. The Student’s t-test, Mann-Whitney U-test, frequency analysis, and one-way ANOVA were used to process quantitative data.

Results. Parents’ perceptions of their children’s readiness for school did not differ statistically between those of preschoolers and first-graders. Differences in perceptions were identified based on parents’ subjective assessments of their child’s academic performance and the type of preschool preparation. No relationship was found between parents’ perceptions and their socio-demographic characteristics (age, gender, education level, number of children in the family).

Conclusions. Starting school does not lead to a change in parents’ perceptions of their child’s readiness. Parents who rate their child’s academic performance as “excellent” place a greater emphasis on motivational readiness than parents who rate it as “satisfactory.” Parents whose children attended a preschool program are less likely to focus on their child’s mastery of the school curriculum.

Background. The family environment plays a decisive role in shaping a child’s cultural orientations, including play activity. However, parents’ perceptions of play may not align with its subjective meaning for the child. In this context, it is essential to understand how adults notice, interpret, and evaluate their children’s play, as they are the ones who create the conditions for the development of this activity.

Objective. To identify the characteristics of parental perceptions of play preferences among toddlers and preschoolers, depending on the family’s sociocultural status (parents’ education level and family structure) and the child’s gender and age.

Sample. The study involved 42.530 parents (aged 18–56) of children aged 2 to 7 years from various regions of the Russian Federation, including 41.234 women and 1,296 men.

Methods. A parental questionnaire survey was conducted as part of the study. A questionnaire designed to study parents’ perceptions of children’s gaming preferences was used to collect data. It was developed under the supervision of V.S. Sobkin at the Center for Sociology of Education of the Russian Academy of Education in 1997 and modified in 2025. Respondents were asked to sel ect up to five types of play their child preferred fr om a list of twelve categories. Additional sociodemographic data about the family were also collected. Data analysis employed methods of mathematical statistics, including frequency analysis, Pearson’s chi-square (c²) test, and exploratory factor analysis (principal component method with Varimax rotation), using SPSS Statistics 27.

Results. The findings revealed differences in how parents perceive the play preferences of preschool-aged boys and girls, depending on family structure and parental education level. Two bipolar factors emerged in parental perception of children’s play types: “Creative Self-Expression vs. Spatial Exploration” and “Independent Rule-Following vs. Adult Supervision,” along with one unipolar factor: “Child’s Investigative Stance.”

Conclusions. The data highlight specific patterns in how parents perceive their children’s play. These perceptions are shaped by parental gender stereotypes: creative and emotionally expressive forms of activity are more frequently attributed to girls, while physically active and constructive types of play are associated with boys. This polarization appears as early as toddlerhood and persists throughout the preschool years. Moreover, parents’ ability to recognize manifestations of initiative, imagination, and investigative interest in their child’s play is linked to their level of education.

Background. Time spent with family is a significant factor influencing the child’s successful development, including gender socialization. Mothers and fathers probably prefer different activities when spending time together with children of different genders. Considering that different types of activities have a heterogeneous effect on a child’s personality, the choice of different joint activities can play a significant role in their development. But in modern psychology, family leisure activities in the aspect of parent-child relationships have been little studied by domestic authors.

Objectives. The study aims to identify gender characteristics of joint leisure time of parents with their preschool children.

Sample. The study involved 42 864 parents of preschool-age children aged 18 to 56 years: 41 551 women and 1 313 men from different regions of the Russian Federation.

Methods. The study was conducted on the basis of the author’s questionnaire aimed at studying the parents’ perception of various aspects of preschool children’s lives. Data processing was carried out using frequency and factor analysis.

Results. Study results showed differences in leisure activities of fathers and mothers with their boys and girls. Two key bipolar factors of parents’ preferences for types of joint leisure were identified: “Practically oriented forms of activity — Playful forms of activity” and “Artistic, aesthetic activity — “Cognitive” activity”.

Conclusions. The obtained data allow us to record the features of family leisure with children. Firstly, modern parents strive to spend time with their children, choosing traditional types of family pastime. Secondly, the features of family leisure activities are gender-specific: mothers are focused on practical benefits, while fathers prefer play. In addition, parents with girls and boys choose different directions of activities. Thirdly, important contribution to full-fledged leisure activities with a preschooler is made by family completeness: in single-parent families, the frequency of play forms of child-parent interaction decreases.

Background. There is the is one of the most important in pedagogy and psychology problem of relationships between preschoolers. The nature of the relationship between children at this age has a significant impact on the process of development and socialization; understanding the differences in ideas about peers in older preschool children with different sociometric status reveals the features of their interaction.

Objectives. The study identified the characteristics of the idea of a peer in older preschool children with different sociometric status.

Sample. The study involved 140 preschoolers aged 6-7 years, including 69 girls and 71 boys, who had been attending state preschool educational institutions for at least two years. Consent was obtained from all preschoolers’ parents of to conduct the psychological study.

Methods. The following methods were used: “Dva domika” (“Two Houses”) by T.D. Martsinkovskaya; “Rasskaz o druge” (“A Story about a Friend”) by E.O. Smirnova, V.M. Kholmogorova; “Neokonchennyye situatsii” (“Unfinished Situations”) by A.M. Shchetinina, L.V. Kirs; “Le Test-Film” (“Film Test”) by R. Gille.

Results. The results were obtained on the differences in the ideas about peers in older preschool children with different sociometric status. Thus, preschoolers with high and average sociometric status have a positive idea of peers, open and safe for communication. When children with low sociometric status imagine peers more negatively and are wary of them, they are less inclined to establish close relationships with other children and may experience communication difficulties.

Conclusions. There is a relationship between sociometric status in a peer group and the idea of a peer in children of early to school age. The obtained results emphasize the importance of sociometric status and the need to take into account the position of a preschooler in a group when building individual work.

Relevance. This article is devoted to the problem of comparative analysis of preschoolers’ drawings on the theme “My family”, brought up in a full or incomplete family. This topic is extremely relevant not only because of the increase in divorces in Russia and the related difficulties of raising and developing young children, but also from the point of view of the data collection method. Typically, surveys of parents and other caring adults are used in such studies, while the “voice of a child” remains unaccounted for. The purpose of this work is to explore the possibilities of using children’s drawings to diagnose the peculiarity of the social situation of development in a modern family and the emotional well–being of a child in the family.

Research methodology and progress. The projective technique “Family Drawing” as modified by the authors was used in the work. The study involved 44 children from 4 years 9 months to 7 years, average age 5 years 10 months; 18 boys and 26 girls (41% and 59%).

The result of the study made it possible to confirm the invariance of the significance of various parameters of the children’s drawing on the theme “My family” over the past 25 years. Three key bipolar factors were identified for evaluating children’s family drawings: “Structured relationships in the family – Adult dominance”, “Inclusion in the family structure – Detachment from the family” and “Loneliness – Positive emotional connection with the father”.

Conclusions. These factors make it possible to record the peculiarities of the emotional well-being of modern boys and girls raised in full and incomplete families. Firstly, the girls’ drawings clearly show positive emotional well-being, identification with the mother and orientation towards traditional gender-role relationships in the family, while the boys’ drawings are distinguished by the dominance of the parental position of adults and the child’s identification with the family as a special social group. Secondly, the emotional well-being of children from single-parent families is clearly worse than that of children from full families, and boys from single-parent families find themselves in the most difficult social situation of development.