A Conceptual Basis in Social Learning Theory (original) (raw)

Friendship and Peer Rejection as Predictors of Adult Adjustment

New Directions for Child and Adolescent Development, 2001

The idea that success in peer relations represents a critical aspect of social competence in childhood and adolescence has been supported by a welldeveloped research base over the past thirty years . The majority of this research has focused on children' s popularity or status in their peer group, typically the other students in their school classroom or grade level. However, a separate body of work has considered the features, characteristics, and developmental significance of children's dyadic relationships with friends. As the chapters in this volume emphasize, both popularity (or avoiding rejection) in the larger peer group and establishment of close friendships are important developmental tasks for children and adolescents. Although many of the skills and competencies that lead to positive adjustment in the larger peer group are also those that forecast success in friendships, these two types of peer relations are not identical in their characteristic features or in the effects they have on children' s social and emotional well-being .

Preadolescent Friendship and Peer Rejection as Predictors of Adult Adjustment

Child Development, 1998

Although peer-rejected children appear to be at risk for later difficulties, the contribution of preadolescent friendship to adaptive adjustment lacks an empirical foundation. In this 12 year follow-up investigation, 30 young adults who had a stable, reciprocal best friend in fifth grade and 30 who had been chumless completed measures of adjustment in multiple domains. Friendship and peer rejection were found to have unique implications for adaptive development. Lower levels of preadolescent peer rejection uniquely predicted overall life status adjustment, whereas friended preadolescents had higher levels of general self-worth in adulthood even after controlling for perceived competence in preadolescence. In contrast, peer rejection and the absence of friendship were both associated with psychopathological symptoms in adulthood, although neither was uniquely predictive of symptomatology.

Peer relations and later personal adjustment: Are low-accepted children at risk?

Psychological Bulletin, 1987

In this review, we examine the oft-made claim that peer-relationship difficulties in childhood predict serious adjustment problems in later life. The article begins with a framework for conceptualizing and assessing children's peer difficulties and with a discussion of conceptual and methodological issues in longitudinal risk research. Following this, three indexes of problematic peer relationships (acceptance, aggressiveness, and shyness/withdrawal) are evaluated as predictors of three later outcomes (dropping out of school, criminality, and psychcpathology). The relation between peer difficulties and later maladjustment is examined in terms of both the consistency and strength of prediction. A review and analysis of the literature indicates general support for the hypothesis that children with poor peer adjustment are at risk for later life difficulties. Support is clearest for the outcomes of dropping out and criminality. It is also clearest for low acceptance and aggressiveness as predictors, whereas a link between shyness/withdrawal and later maladjustment has not yet been adequately tested. The article concludes with a critical discussion of the implicit models that have guided past research in this area and a set of recommendations for the next generation of research on the risk hypothesis.

Peer Relations and Social Competence in Childhood

Developmental Social Neuroscience and Childhood Brain Insult, 2012

H istorically, it has been commonplace to assume that adaptive and maladaptive social development during childhood and adolescence emanates from the parenting and parentchild relationship experiences that children have had from the earliest years of their lives. The roles of parenting and parent-child relationship experiences were described in the psychoanalytic writings of Freud (1933); the social learning theory and research of such scholars as Sears, Maccoby, and Levin (1957) and Bandura and Walters (1963); and the seminal perspectives of attachment theory developed by Bowlby (1958). Clearly, parents do play a role in the development of adaptive and maladaptive development. So too do genetic and biological factors. Nevertheless, it is the case that from the very earliest years of life, children come into social contact with other familial (siblings, grandparents) and extrafamilial (caregivers, teachers, coaches, peers) sources of developmental influence. And with increasing age, the amount of time spent in the company of these nonparental influences increases significantly. Thus, in the present chapter, our primary focus is on the interactions and relationships that children and young adolescents experience with their peers.

Social skills, social support, and psychosocial adjustment

Personality and Individual Differences, 1993

This study examined the interrelations of a standardized, multidimensional measure of social skills and various self-report measures related to the psychosocial adjustment of college students. One hundred and thirty-six undergraduates were administered the Social Skills Inventory, the Revised UCLA Loneliness Scale, an adaptation of the Dimensions of Social Support Scale, the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, and self-report measures of participation in college activities, college satisfaction, and a general life satisfaction measure. Correlational analyses revealed that possession of social skills was positively correlated with perceived social support and with most of the measures of psychosocial adjustment. Regression analysis indicated that social skills combined with perceived social support predicted certain aspects of adjustment in college students, particularly satisfaction with college, satisfaction with life in general, and reduced perceptions of loneliness.