Peer Interaction/Friendships

In an effort to effectively understand children and their development, researchers and psychologists have dedicated tremendous energy toward the study of peer relationships. Friendships are vital to children because they serve as emotional resources for having fun and adapting to stress, expand cognitive resources for problem solving, provide the context for developing social skills, and are the forerunner of all other relationships. During the typical school day, children's peers and friends often become their only sources of companionship, security, and stability. Friends provide one another with recreation, advice, trust, encouragement, support, and other important needs.

Unfortunately, some children have great difficulty developing positive relationships with others. These children lack the social skills that others are developing and fail to have their affective needs fulfilled. This impairs the children's emotional well-being, their selfefficacy, their interrelations with others, and their ability to focus in the classroom. The social and behavioral problems that emerge seem to further the cycle of rejections and make it even more difficult for children to escape from their poor status among peers. In an effort to provide interventions for students who struggle with peer relationships, researchers have developed a method for defining sociometric status among peers. Peer nominations provide a calculated method of determining the degree to which students are “liked” or “disliked” by others in their peer group.

Generally, children are classified according to a sociometric category that their nominations elicit. Popular children are seen as being well liked or “cool,” and they are seldom disliked. These children are usually easy to spot within a social setting because they show higher levels of sociability, greater cognitive skills, and low levels of aggression. Generally, popular children attract attention because they are seen as being “fun.” Approximately 15% of children are labeled as popular. Controversial children are those who are “liked” by some and “disliked” by others. These students often get attention in the classroom from either acting like a class clown or from bullying behavior. They generally have a crowd of followers that find them entertaining or idolizing, but they also have a number of enemies who see them as absurd or mean. Neglected children are those who go unnoticed within the classroom. They are neither well liked nor disliked. Teachers often see these students as “perfect angels” because they are often shy and polite within the structured classroom. In reality, these students are often at risk for depression or other maladies because they seldom have the opportunity to engage with others.

The category that has received the most attention from educators and researchers are students who are rejected by their peers. These children frequently have a high number of “liked least” nominations and almost no “liked most” nominations. Generally, about 15% of elementary school children are classified as being strongly disliked or rejected by their peers. Research has proven that these students are at the greatest risk for demonstrating disruptive behaviors, loneliness, academic failure, anxiety, and lower self-esteem.

Understanding and identifying peer relationship problems is important because they are often a symptom of and a precursor to a variety of psychological and social difficulties. By learning to identify those children who are rejected by their peers or who struggle socially, educators and other adults will be better able to provide measures that will help them to interact effectively with peers and address the root of the child's peer relationship problems.

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