2-083 - Factors associated with friendships formation, maintenance and dissolution over time

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Given their developmental significance, several aspects of friendships have captured researchers’ attention. Indeed, the presence/absence of friendships, friends’ characteristics and the features of friendships have all been found to contribute independently to adolescents’ psychosocial adjustment (Bagwell & Schmidt, 2011). However, friendships should also be considered on a temporal continuum. Some friendships are stable and last for years, some end temporarily or permanently, and others are newly-formed. Hence, friendships evolve through a temporal perspective. Yet, the changing nature of friendships has been largely neglected by researchers. Moreover, the factors associated with the maintenance or the termination of friendships remains largely unknown.

The three presentations of this symposium investigate specifically the maintenance and dissolution of adolescents’ friendships using longitudinal designs and examine the individual and dyadic factors that could account for these processes over time. The first paper identifies the trajectories of year-to-year maintenance of close friendships from ages 12-to-22 and examines individual predictors of membership in these trajectories. The second paper focuses on friendship dissolution from Grade 7 to 12 using discrete-time survival analyses and tests a series of individual and dyadic predictors. The third paper investigates the impact of changes (loses, gains) in best-friendship involvement on young adolescents’ psycho-social functioning across a school grade transition. These longitudinal studies used innovative methodologies to study friendship maintance and dissolution (group-based trajectories, survival analysis, logistic regression) and include culturally diverse samples (French Canadian and US). The papers will be evaluated and discussed by a senior scholar who will also mention intervention implications.

Sub Unit

• Social Relationships

Chair

• Francois Poulin, Universite du Quebec a Montreal

Discussant

• Mara Brendgen, University of Quebec at Montreal

Individual Presentations

• Stability and changes in close friendships from adolescence to adulthood - Presenting Author: Francois Poulin, Universite du Quebec a Montreal; Anne-Sophie Denault, Universite Laval

• How Fluid Best-Friendship Involvement Patterns after A School Grade Transition Impact Adjustment Outcomes - Presenting Author: Julie C Bowker, University at Buffalo, SUNY; Rebecca G. Etkin, University at Buffalo, SUNY; Miriam T Stotsky, SUNY University at Buffalo

• Differences in Internalizing Symptoms Anticipate Adolescent Friendship Dissolution - Presenting Author: Brett Laursen, Florida Atlantic University; Fanny-Alexandra Guimond, Florida Atlantic University; Amy C. Hartl, Florida Atlantic University; Antonius H. N. Cillessen, Developmental Psychology, Behavioural Science Institute, Radboud University