Reciprocal friendship, reciprocal rejection and socio‐emotional adjustment: the social experiences of children with learning disorders over a one‐year period

Abstract

ABSTRACT Several aspects of the social experiences (i.e. loneliness, sense of coherence, friendship qualities, reciprocal friendship and reciprocal rejection) of students with learning disorders (LD) were examined over a period of one academic year, in comparison to those of students without learning disorders (NLD). The sample consisted of 213 students: 94 students LD (53 boys and 41 girls) and 119 NLD students (66 boys and 53 girls) drawn from 2nd to 6th grades (students' mean age was 9.77, SD = 1.36). Students with LD reported, both at the beginning and end of the school year, higher levels of loneliness and lower levels of coherence than did their NLD peers. Subject‐peer relation patterns did change over the course of the school year. Within the LD group, decrease in the number of reciprocal friendships and increase of reciprocal rejections were evidenced in the course of the school year, while opposite trends were noted for the NLD group. In both groups, loneliness at the end of the year was predicted by friendship qualities and by sense of coherence at the beginning of the year. Only in the LD group, reciprocal rejection was positively related to loneliness and was negatively related to sense of coherence. The discussion emphasizes the importance of examining the dynamics of peer relations, and its association to socio‐emotional adjustment of students with LD.