Friendship Processes Research Articles

The contribution of extracurricular activities to adolescent friendships: new insights through social network analysis.

Extracurricular activities are settings that are theorized to help adolescents maintain existing friendships and develop new friendships. The overarching goal of the current investigation was to examine whether coparticipating in school-based extracurricular activities supported adolescents' school-based friendships. We used social network methods and data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to examine whether dyadic friendship ties were more likely to exist among activity coparticipants while controlling for alternative friendship processes, namely dyadic homophily (e.g., demographic and behavioral similarities) and network-level processes (e.g., triadic closure). Results provide strong evidence that activities were associated with current friendships and promoted the formation of new friendships. These associations varied based on school level (i.e., middle vs. high school) and activity type (i.e., sports, academic, arts). Results of this study provide new insight into the complex relations between activities and friendship that can inform theories of their developmental outcomes.

Presence in Relationship: A New Construct for Understanding Adolescent Friendships and Psychological Health

This article introduces the construct of “presence in relationship” along with a 25-item measure for its quantitative assessment. This construct expands upon the construct of “voice” as an indication of one’s experiences of self in relationships. Whereas voice focuses on the act of speaking out (saying what one thinks and feels) in relationships, presence in relationship further reflects the extent to which an individual feels connected to his or her self (is self-aware), connected to others (truly known and understood by others), and confident (trusting that one will be accepted and valued by others) within the context of interpersonal relationships. Results from the study of two samples of ethnically diverse middle school (N = 113; 59 males, 54 females) and high school (N = 176; 86 males, 90 females) students in New York City indicate that the Presence in Relationship Scale (PIRS) demonstrates good reliability and provides insight into adolescents’ friendship processes and sense of well-being. Because it includes indicators of the experience of self in relationships, as well as behavioral indicators, presence in relationship may be especially useful for understanding relationships and associated mental health outcomes in boys (and girls) who tend to place less emphasis on voice as a primary way of determining of closeness in relationships.

Bridging Cultures: Understanding the Construction of Relational Identity in Intercultural Friendship

This research aims to uncover the strategies/activities that shape the construction of relational identity through analyzing the turning points occurring during the process of intercultural friendship. Forty-five interviews were conducted with members in 15 intercultural friendship dyads. The results reveal that seven types of activities were identified: (1) positivities/providing assistance; (2) rituals, activities, rules, and roles; (3) self-disclosure; (4) networking; (5) exploring cultures and languages; (6) emphasizing similarities and exploring differences; and (7) conflict/conflict management. The strategies of exploring cultures and languages and of conflict/conflict management were thoroughly discussed to advance our understanding of the development and maintenance in intercultural friendship.

A dynamic model of friendly association networks

We propose a dynamic model of the formation and maintenance of large friendly association networks (FANs), which incorporates a theoretically based actor model and is implemented via computer simulation. We apply the dynamic model to 18 FANs, some with over 900 members, documented by James Coleman. Structural measures for these networks show them to share some, but not all, structural characteristics of other large networks. With appropriate settings of its parameters, the dynamic model generates networks with structural measures that fit closely those of the Coleman networks, which suggests the model provides a plausible explanation for their structure. The parameter settings in turn have implications for characteristics of friendship processes and the individuals in the empirical networks.

Keeping and Making Friends: Italian Children's Transition from Preschool to Elementary School

In this paper we investigate friendship processes in a group of Italian children in their last year of preschool and during their transition to one of four first grade classrooms. We found that in the preschool the children and their teachers collectively had produced a highly integrated community that was evident in the lack of status differentiation in the peer culture. Despite some gender separation in the children's play contacts, this division was not nearly as highly developed as found in previous studies in the United States. In the first grade classrooms and peer cultures we saw similarities, extensions, and divergences in peer relations and friendship processes in relation to the preschool. We discuss the implications of these findings for friendship processes among youths and adults; we make a general argument for an interpretive approach to friendship that stresses how agency and temporal and structural factors are interrelated in the development and maintenance of friendships.

When it is more than a job: close relationships between home health aides and older clients.

A qualitative study was conducted to investigate the types of relationships that were formed between older clients and their home health aides and to identify structural characteristics and interactive processes that facilitated various types of relationships. Using semistructured interviews, members of 16 families and their home health aides described the relationships that developed between clients and aides and the conditions and contexts that facilitated or inhibited close relationship development. Data were coded and analyzed using a multistage process. Most relationships between aides and older clients were described as friendship or like one of the family, with friendship occurring most often. Several structural conditions and numerous interactive friendship processes were identified. The cognitive process of boundary setting discriminated between friendships and family-like relationships. Results show support for socioemotional selectivity theory and highlight the benefits of close relationships for older homebound adults and their home health aides.

?Guess what I just heard!?: Indirect aggression among teenage girls in Australia

Traditionally males have been regarded as the more aggressive sex. However, recent research in several countries has challenged this notion by considering different forms of aggression. This paper provides an overview of a qualitative investigation of teenage girls' indirect forms of aggression (e.g., exclusion from the group, spreading false stories). Focus groups and pair and individual interviews were used to collect data from adolescent girls and their teachers in two schools. The study provides some clear insights into the nature of teenage girls' indirect aggression. The predominant indirectly aggressive behaviors include talking about others and excluding peers from the group. Key explanations for these behaviors concern a desire to create excitement and a range of friendship and group processes centered on girls' needs for close personal relationships and to be a part of the peer group. The girls described the devastating effects of indirect aggression, particularly on girls with certain characteristics that predispose them to victimization. The girls were pessimistic about the potential of interventions, although peer mediation processes may be a way forward. Aggr. Behav. 26:67–83, 2000. © 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Implementing the Adams and Blieszner Conceptual Model: Predicting Interactive Friendship Processes of Older Adults

There is a paucity of information about the dynamics of friendships among older adults. To address this gap, the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships (11) published an integrative conceptual framework for friendship research (Adams & Blieszner, 1994). Briefly outlined, it proposes that individual characteristics, as expressed through a behavioral motif, affect friendship patterns, and that friendship patterns vary by structural and cultural context. The purpose of this research is to advance to the next theoretical step and provide a partial operationalization of the model. This study surveyed 282 older adults, using random sampling techniques, to examine the relationships of older relocated adults. Multiple regression analyses were used to determine the relationship of personal attributes, patterns of daily life, and context to interactive friendship processes. Overt behavioral processes and frequency of contact were best explained by the model. Sex and class were related to interactive processes. However, the framework was less effective in predicting covert affective and cognitive processes. The friendships of older adults were influenced by sex, class and propinquity.

Learning to be Friends

Although the socially constructed character of childhood is now well established, the methodological challenges this raises remain so far relatively unremarked. Drawing on a recent period of fieldwork, carried out among English schoolchildren aged between 4 and 9 years old, this article explores the contribution of participant observation as a research method to the study of childhood. Two key aspects are discussed. Taking children's friendships as its focus, the article argues, first, that participant observation permits a more comprehensive understanding of the process of friendship making than traditional sociometric techniques. Second, it shows that, for the researcher, the remembered experiences of participation and observation allow for a continued reflexive critique to be made of the data, a learning process which patterns the path through which children's friendships are themselves constructed.

Friendship Quality as a Predictor of Young Children's Early School Adjustment

The purpose of this study was to develop a method for assessing young children's perceptions of classroom friendships and to determine whether these perceptions were associated with their adjustment during the transition to grade school. Subscales tapping 5 friendship processes (e.g., validation, aid, disclosure of negative affect, exclusivity, conflict) were extracted from a 24-item friendship interview that was individually administered to 82 kindergarten children (M age = 5.61) who possessed a reciprocated and stable "best" friend in their classroom. Children's reports of the investigated friendship processes were found to be reliable, and processes such as perceived validation and conflict predicted children's satisfaction with their friendships, and the stability of these relationships. Perceived conflict in friendships was associated with multiple forms of school maladjustment for boys, including higher levels of school loneliness and avoidance and lower levels of school liking and engagement. For both boys and girls, validation and aid forecasted gains in perceived support from classmates, and aid also predicted improvements in children's school attitudes. Perceived exclusivity in friendships was associated with lower levels of achievement. These findings, and others reported in this article, are consistent with the hypothesis that the relational features of children's classroom friendships yield psychological benefits or costs (e.g., provisions) that, in turn, affect their development and adjustment.

Stages of Friendship Growth in Preadolescence as Related to Attachment History

A process model of friendship formation in preadolescence is proposed in this article, and the continuity of early parent-child relationships (quality of attachment) with later friendship processes and peer competence is explored. Thirty-two preadolescents, subjects in a longitudinal study of attachment and subsequent social development, were observed in 4-week summer day camps. Those who had been securely attached with their caregivers as infants revealed a higher level of peer competence than did those with anxious attachment histories. However, preadolescents of both types of attachment reported and were observed to form friendships. In-depth case studies of four friendship pairs of preadolescents with different attachment histories suggested that there are corresponding differences in the quality and growth processes of those pairs of friendships. A three-stage model of preadolescent friendship growth is proposed, based on relationship dimensions and reflective of earlier relational patterns.

An Integrative Conceptual Framework for Friendship Research

In light of the increase in the number and rigor of studies on adult friendship and the tendency of kin and neighbor relationships to have become more structurally similar to friendship, this is a crucial juncture at which to pause and assess what we know and do not know about adult friendship, to begin a needed theoretical synthesis, to identify gaps in the literature and to produce guidelines for future research. The purpose of this article is to present an integrative conceptual framework, incorporating both sociological and psychological perspectives, for use in these endeavors. The framework posits that the social structural and psychological aspects of individual characteristics operate together to shape behavioral motifs which, in turn, influence friendship patterns (dyadic and network structure and phases). Furthermore, dyadic and network structure and phases affect one another through interactive friendship processes. The elements of this integrative framework and the relationships among them vary by structural and cultural context.

Discussion, Debate, and Friendship Processes: Peer Discourse in U.S. and Italian Nursery Schools

Discussion, Debate, and Friendship Processes: Peer Discourse in U.S. and Italian Nursery Schools

COMPETENT PARENTS, COMPLEX LIVES

This study builds on earlier ethnography of friendship processes among children attending a Head Start program in a large city in the Midwest. Here, through intensive interviews and ethnographic observations of a small sample of the Head Start children's families, the researchers examine the values and concerns of lower-class Black mothers regarding their children's education. Earlier studies have shown that Black parents of all income levels place great value on education and have high expectations for their children's academic careers. The present research goes beyond these studies by directly addressing the strategies that parents employ in acting on these values. The article describes an impressive array of strategies that the study's respondents use to encourage their children's academic achievement and to promote the development of values that will keep them enthusiastic about schooling. The theoretical implications of the findings are then addressed. In particular, the discussion highlights the need for an extension of Kohn's well-known arguments concerning the relationship between social class and conformity. Finally, the researchers stress that longitudinal ethnography is a crucial method for developing theoretical understandings of family socialization processes and children's educational experiences.

Analyzing Topical Oral Biographies of Old People

In order to gain understanding of friendship in the context of individuals' lives, over 60 chronologically old informants were asked to relate their biographies to an interviewer using friendship as the constant referent. The strengths and weaknesses for the data obtained in this way are discussed and three frameworks for analysis are specfied. These data have the potential to provide insight into cultural aspects of friendship in American society, the process of friendship through the life course, and social actors' organization of their friendships. The "topical oral biographies method" is suggested as a way to pursue research questions about the relationship between individuals and societies.