Explaining Friendship Formation and Friendship Stability: The Role of Children’s and Friends’ Aggression and Victimization

This study examined variation in friendship formation and friendship stability as a function of children’s and their friends’ victimization, overt aggression, and relational aggression. Participants were 605 pre- and early adolescents in fifth through eighth grades (M age = 12.05) assessed twice over a three-month period. Scores for stability and acquisition of same-sex reciprocated friendships were derived from unlimited friendship nominations. Peer nominations provided scores for child and friend victimization and aggression. Only victimized children experienced difficulty forming new friendships, evidence of their persistent social problems. Dissimilarity between friends on relational aggression (all children) and victimization (girls only) predicted friendship termination, however; overtly aggressive children had difficulty maintaining friendships regardless of their friends’ aggression. These findings point to the importance of considering the relational context (characteristics of children and their friends) and gender when assessing friendship stability

Knowing who likes who: The early developmental basis of coalition understanding

Group biases based on broad category membership appear early in human development. However, like many other primates humans inhabit social worlds also characterised by small groups of social coalitions which are not demarcated by visible signs or social markers. A critical cognitive challenge for a young child is thus how to extract information concerning coalition structure when coalitions are dynamic and may lack stable and outwardly visible cues to membership. Therefore, the ability to decode behavioural cues of affiliations present in everyday social interactions between individuals would have conferred powerful selective advantages during our evolution. This would suggest that such an ability may emerge early in life, however, little research has investigated the developmental origins of such processing. The present paper will review recent empirical research which indicates that in the first 2 years of life infants achieve a host of social-cognitive abilities that make them well adapted to processing coalition-affiliations of others. We suggest that such an approach can be applied to better understand the origins of intergroup attitudes and biases. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd

Other-Sex Friendships in Late Adolescence: Risky Associations for Substance Use and Sexual Debut?

Adolescents’ friendships with other-sex peers serve important developmental functions, but they may also facilitate engagement in problem behavior. This study examines the unique contributions of other-sex friendships and friends’ behavior to alcohol use, smoking, and initiation of sexual intercourse among late adolescent girls and boys. A total of 320 adolescents (53% girls; 33% racial/ethnic minorities) provided sociometric nominations of friendships annually in grades 10–12. Friendship networks were derived using social network analysis in each grade. Adolescents and their friends also reported on their alcohol use, smoking, and sexual debut at each assessment. After controlling for demographics, previous problem behavior, and friends’ behavior, other-sex friendships in 10th grade were associated with initiation of smoking among girls over the following year, and other-sex friendships in 11th grade were linked with lower levels of subsequent alcohol use among boys. Additionally, friends’ smoking and sexual experience in 10th grade predicted the same behaviors for all adolescents over the following year. Other-sex friendships thus appear to serve as a risk context for adolescent girls’ smoking and a protective context for adolescent boys’ drinking. Promoting mixed-gender activities and friendships among older high school students may be helpful in reducing males’ alcohol use, but may need to incorporate additional components to prevent increases in females’ smoking

Does Father Know Best? A Formal Model of the Paternal Influence on Childhood Social Anxiety

We explore paternal social anxiety as a specific risk factor for childhood social anxiety in a rational optimization model. In the course of human evolution, fathers specialized in external protection (e.g., confronting the external world) while mothers specialized in internal protection (e.g., providing comfort and food). Thus, children may instinctively be more influenced by the information signaled by paternal versus maternal behavior with respect to potential external threats. As a result, if fathers exhibit social anxiety, children interpret it as a strong negative signal about the external social world and rationally adjust their beliefs, thus becoming stressed. Under the assumption that paternal signals on social threats are more influential, a rational cognitive inference leads children of socially anxious fathers to develop social anxiety, unlike children of socially anxious mothers. We show in the model that mothers cannot easily compensate for anxious paternal behavior, but choose to increase maternal care to maintain the child’s wellbeing. We discuss research directions to test the proposed model as well as implications for the prevention and treatment of child social anxiety

Explaining Why Some Popular Youth Are Better Liked Than Others: Prosocial and Aggressive Behaviour

The present study sought to determine whether behavioural styles (i.e., how an individual typically acts) account for variability in liking and disliking of popular preadolescents and early adolescents (i.e., individuals high in social rank). Based on previous findings, it was hypothesized that popular youth who scored high in prosocial behaviour would be better liked and less disliked than aggressive popular youth. Data were collected in 2008 and 2009 from a large sample (N = 1033) of elementary school students. The Revised Class Play measure was used to solicit classmate nominations for popularity, liking, disliking, prosocial behaviour, and overt and relational aggression. Focal participants were 153 students (58 boys, 95 girls) who scored > 1 SD above the mean on peer-nominated popularity. A two-step cluster analysis revealed three behavioural clusters of popular youth: prosocial (N = 52; n girls = 38), relationally aggressive (N = 74; n girls = 43), and highly (overtly and relationally) aggressive (N = 27; n girls = 14). Significant variability in liking and disliking was associated with behaviour, unqualified by gender, and effect sizes were large, accounting for 19% and 34% of the variance respectively. Prosocial popular youth were most liked and least disliked, highly aggressive youth were most disliked, and relationally aggressive and highly aggressive youth were moderately well-liked. While results suggest that the majority of popular youth use aggression to achieve or maintain social rank, high levels of liking afforded to prosocial popular youth signify the importance of enabling youth to achieve social rank via prosocial or other peer-valued behaviour. Future research should aim to understand why aggressive popular youth are moderately liked

Are First Impressions of Unknown Children and Early Adolescents Affected by the Facial Attractiveness of Their Best Friend?

This study assessed the effects of a best friend’s facial attractiveness on first impressions of medium-attractive children and early adolescents. Younger (N = 114, 48 boys and 66 girls, Mage = 8.16 years) and older (N = 168, 83 boys and 85 girls, Mage = 12.32 years) participants rated photos of unknown medium-attractive younger (6–9 years) and older (10–16 years) boys and girls (the targets) who were paired with an attractive or unattractive same-gender best friend. First-impression scores were consolidated ratings of targets on six characteristics reflecting social and academic competence (has a lot of friends, fun to be with, popular, good leader, kind to others, smart in school). First impressions of older but not younger targets were more positive when targets were paired with an attractive than with an unattractive friend. Further research is needed to determine whether having an attractive friend represents a social advantage primarily after puberty

The Implications of Social Status on Well-being in Adolescence

Social status is a multi-faceted construct with complex implications for the well-being of youth. Recently, Ferguson and Ryan (2019) reported that lower well-being in early adolescence is associated with both low and high popularity, and low and high liking by peers. The present study aimed to replicate these findings and extend them to preadolescents. Longitudinal analyses were also conducted to test the putative causal relationship between social status and well-being. Participants were 645 students in Grades 4 to 6 (n = 270 boys and 358 girls), and 388 students from Grades 7 to 8 (n = 165 boys and 218 girls) from 8 elementary schools. Peer nominations of liking and popularity were solicited, and participants reported on their loneliness, depression, and self-esteem in the fall and spring of an academic year. Only linear relations between liking, popularity, and well-being emerged for early adolescents, with higher status scores associated with better functioning. However, a significant quadratic relation between popularity and well-being emerged for preadolescents. Notably, the most popular preadolescents reported lower self-esteem and greater depression and loneliness than their moderately popular peers. After controlling for well-being in the fall, popularity and liking were not significant predictors of well-being in the spring for either age group. These findings suggest that the well-being of popular preadolescents are at a higher risk than their moderately popular peers, as they forego important developmental needs; popularity in early adolescence might not be inevitably taxing, but may depend on the stability of their social environments

Peer Clique Participation of Victimized Children: Characteristics and Implications for Victimization Over a School Year

This study examined aspects of peer clique participation that mitigated victimization by peers over a school year. Participants were 1,033 children age 8–14 years (Mage = 11.81; 444 boys and 589 girls), including 128 (66 boys) victimized children. Cliques (N = 162) and clique participation were assessed by using the Social Cognitive Map, friendship and behavioral nominations, and observed clique interactions. Almost all victimized children (93%) were clique members. On average, their cliques were more mixed-gender, loosely tied, and peripheral in the peer network, and they were more marginal clique members and treated more negatively during clique interactions than were nonvictims. Variation in clique experience revealed that victimization was mitigated over the school year by greater centrality and friendship within cliques and greater clique aggression, and exacerbated by greater clique victimization and age. These findings suggest that allegiance, affection, and power may deter attacks and motivate cliquemates’ defense of victims