Lecture 6 - Friendship

Question 1

When are friends important

Answer 1

2 y/o -> 10% time with peers

School -> 30% time with peers

Greater preference for peer interaction (Ellis et al., 1981)

School years

Increasingly concerned about acceptance by the peer group

More unsupervised peer interaction

Big influence

Realise having more preference to peers

Through gossip - how to be accepted

Learn about social norms and expectations -> develops social skills and adaptation to friendships

Social hierarchys

Links with mental health, well-being, school success

Links to feelings of selfworth

Recipricol relationship -> try out new things

Doesnt matter number friendships -> just one strong good friendship needed

But if have low friendship quality with best friend -> feel effects of more reciprocated friendships

Question 2

Friend versus peer

Answer 2

Friend = mutual liking

Peer = another in the same social group

Question 3

Friendship research methods

Answer 3

Observation

Peer (sociometric) nominations

Reciprocal nominations

Revised Class Play (Reputation Measure)

Rating Scales

Sociometric ratings = how much do you like them, how much do you like playing with them

Friendship Quality = pick best friend, do they offer help, will they tell you if something wrong etc.

Paired comparisons of nominations/ratings

Social network analyses

Question 4

Sociometric diagram

Answer 4

3 groups, joined with links

All boys on left, all girls on right, mixed in middle

Sex segregation in class in year 6 groups

Like nominations -> who they like to play with

Indication

Indication of those not liked Anthony, Amanda, Trevor and Cory -> rejected

Green -> great source of influence, could help rejected, more leadership

Orange -> contreversion, high number like and dislike, often exsiting ideas to do, but also causing trouble

Red -> more neglected, just not thought of, not top three linked or disliked of many people at all

Friendship groups - all reciprocated

Start to notice reasons for people rejected- shy, angry and disrupted

Question 5

Measuring peer relations

Answer 5

Few like and few dislike nominations -> Neglected

Many like and few dislike -> Popular

Few like and many dislike -> Rejected

Many like and many dislike -> Controversual

Question 6

Soiciometric status

Answer 6

Popular children:

Good social skills

Not typically aggressive

In adolescence, they do begin using more relational aggression.

Pay attention and respond to that, good empathy, good emotion regulation

Rejected children:

Aggressive-rejected children (40-50% of rejected children)

Withdrawn-rejected children (10-25% of rejected children)

Interpret benign situations as intentional, and have difficulty coming up with solutions for difficult social situations.

Difficult to maintain relationships due to interpretiting situation as personal attack when not

Neglected children:

Less sociable and disruptive than average children

Controversial children:

Have characteristics of both the popular and rejected children

Socially active and often group leaders

Question 7

Examples of social-cognitive skills

Answer 7

Cooperation

Negotiation

Mental state awareness

Emotional awareness

Friendship and gossip help to learn and understand this
Less likely to critisise friends but sometimes this is good to tell you possible wrong doings

Question 8

Defining friendship

Answer 8

Defining Friendship A voluntar y and rec iproca l relat ionship between 2 indi v idua l s

Diatic frienships -> young age just one
Develop to larger group with different people for different things

Question 9

Early Friendship development

Answer 9

3-7: Intimacy = children’s physical location

Conflicts arise over toys and space

4-9: Friendships are one-way: exist because fulfil some function that the self wants

A close friend is someone they know likes and dislikes of

Question 10

Later friendship development

Answer 10

6-12:

Able to reflect on joint experiences

Concerned with coordinating and approximating likes and dislikes

Fairweather friendships (Fairweather - arguement happens, everything over and no more friendship, may still like each other, just cant be friends)

9-15 :

Intimate and mutually shared relationships

Mutual understanding and concern –share personal problems

12- adulthood:

Accepts independence and dependence

Can be friends with multiple people -> multiple strong connections, understand that cannot fulfil with just one person, but can still go back to them when needed (12+)

Question 11

How different ages define a friend

Answer 11

1. 11-12 years - understand eachother, self-disclosure, cooperation and recipricol done for
2. Preschool - those most similar, in proximity to you
3. 9-10 years - start to share values and rules and beliefs of good/ bad, sensitive to others and inequalities, start to take care of eachother
4. 6-8 years - common interest, activities they share, proximety, rewards give one and other

Question 12

Selecting friends

Answer 12

PROXIMITY

Young children have friends who are close in proximity

Older children accept more distance

SAME AGE

Early & Middle childhood = same-age friends

SIMILARITY

Young children like similarity of location or features

Older children select similarity on the basis of personality features, common interests & attitudes, etc.

Question 13

Friendship in infancy

Answer 13

Infants have peer preferences (Howes & colleagues)

12- to 18-months: more smiling, reaching, touching specific peers

12- to 24-months: 3 times more likely to comfort preferred peers

20 months: selectively initiate interactions (and play) with some peers over others

Question 14

Friends in early childhood

Answer 14

Reciprocated friendships

Young mixed-sex friendships become more gender segregated

Children begin to recognize that some peers are more dominant than others – reflected in conflict situations

More sympathetic
Less conflict
Engage in more pretend play

Developing social skills
More likely to be with same sex- society expectation? more likely to be similar? more likely to have same interest?
Fighting-> more likely to give in to same sex friend when arguing
Recognise dominant in friendship from early on

Question 15

Sex cleavage

Answer 15

Sex segregation occurs early on:

Infants prefer to look at same-sex images

2 = boys more likely respond to play with boy than girl

Childhood, >90% peer time spent with same-sex

Adolescence, preference for same-sex interactions declines -> cross-sex friendships do exist (McDougall & Hymel, 2007)

Question 16

Ethnicity and friendship

Answer 16

Minority children tend to be more accepting of cross-race friendships (Leman & Lamm, 2008)

Cross-ethnicity- all better listening

Question 17

Friend vs. non-friend interactions

Answer 17

With friends:

Greater cooperation & coordination

More pretend play

More conflict, but also more likely to resolve conflict in controlled ways

Question 18

Similarity between friends - 11-15 y/o

Answer 18

11- to 15-year-olds

Friends behaviour more similar than non-friends

Socially accepted friends more alike on nominations of having friends, being liked, and being a victim

Friends reported more similar depression levels

Gender differences:

Girls: friends more similar in cooperation, offers help, and liked most nominations

Boys: friends more similar in shyness and victimization nominations

Question 19

Gender differences

Answer 19

Girls = larger social networks

Girls social networks were more ethnically diverse

Girls had 62% of reciprocated friendships being cross-ethnic, boys had 54%

Sex appears to be more important than ethnicity

Cross-sex dyads comprised of 7% of friendships

Cross-ethnic dyads comprised of 59% of friendships (Lee, Howes, & Chamberlain, 2007)

Question 20

Emergence of cliques

Answer 20

Cliques are friendship groups that children will form or join, but members do not always see themselves as close friends. They have shared similarities (e.g., academic motivation, aggressiveness, bullying, shyness, popularity, cooperativeness, adherence to conventional values, etc.)

In middle childhood

3-9 children in the group (often same sex & race)

Usually stable for only a few weeks

Cliques function as:

Group of peers to socialize with

Validation of features the group has in common

Provide sense of belonging

Adolescence

More than one clique

Greater stability of cliques

Important to conform to group dress & behaviour

Crowds become more important than what clique one belongs to

Crowds are groups of individuals whose reputations fits with stereotypes (e.g., ‘freaks’, ‘geeks’,’ losers’, ‘jocks’) Often does not choose their association with a crowd voluntarily. Assigned by peer group and may spend little time with the crowd.

Question 21

Parental role in children’s peer relations

Answer 21

Parent beliefs

Coaching behaviour - Mothers may coach in prosocial behaviour

Modelling behaviour

Children demonstrate similar conversational styles as they have experienced at home

Long-term implications for child’s behaviour

Question 22

Definition of bullying

Answer 22

The abuse of physical and psychological power for the purpose of intentionally and repeatedly creating a negative atmosphere of severe anxiety, intimidation, and chronic fear in victims

Negative actions are:

Physical contact

Words

Making faces or obscene gestures

Intentional exclusion from a group

Question 23

Multidimensional approach to bullying

Answer 23

Question 24

Who bullies

Answer 24

60% of bullied girls were bullied by boys

15-20% of bullied girls were bullied by both sexes

80% of bullied boys were bullied by boys

BUT, victims of bullying also bully

Question 25

Bully characteristics

Answer 25

More positive attitude towards aggressive behaviours than other children

Conduct problems

Social problems

Generally are characterized by impulsivity and a strong need to dominate others, and have little empathy for their victims

3 main motives:

Power and dominance

Hostility toward their environment

To gain some reward

Question 26

Victim characteristics

Answer 26

Internalising problems: including more anxious and insecure; lower self-esteem, more likely to be depressed

Social problems

Have greater difficulty adjusting to school

But, some also have externalizing problems

Conduct problems

Proactive versus reactive aggression

Question 27

Stability in bullying

Answer 27

Kindergarten - 20.5% of children were victimized - Only 9% victims consistently victimized.

Sourander et al. (2000) examined bullying at age 8 and again at age 16 and found that:

Boys had greater stability in bullying and victimization than did girls.

30% of bullies and 30% of victims had been referred to mental health services

BUT only 18% of bullies and 15% of victims went

Question 28

Friends as protective factors

Answer 28

Increases victimization

Children without a best friend had increases in internalizing and externalizing behaviours

Too much time spent with best friends had increases in internalizing problems when victimized.

Decreases victimization

Having a best friend predicted decreases in victimization

Security, companionship, and conflict did not predict changes in victimization

Protection was related to decreases

Question 29

Protective factors for those with reactive aggression

Answer 29

Reactive children: aversive & provocative?!

Protective factors against victimization:

Prosocial friends?

Siblings?

Age

Why/How might they protect?! Offer new strategies

More sociable / popular
Older sigblings
Older- stick up, less seen/ important

Question 30

Similarity of friends in adolescence

Answer 30

Friendships were made on similarity of dimensions that matter, such as

Attitudes to school and school achievement

Normative behaviour (e.g., drug use, drinking, antisocial behaviour)

What’s normative varies by:

Sex. Difference in similarity of sexual behaviour and attitudes

Ethnicity. Differences in similarity of academic orientation

Girls- prefer less positive to sexual openess
Boys- prefer more positive to secual openess

Largge importance of reputation -> different groups have different opinions on good

What do i want to be known as?