Poster #221 - High School Peer Relational Victimization Predicts Negative Emotional Adjustment in College

• In Event: 3-206 - Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: PS 13 Section - Social Relationships

Integrative Statement

Peer victimization in middle and high school is associated with many negative outcomes such as anxiety (Crawford & Manassis, 2011), depression (Barchia & Bussey, 2010), and loneliness (Woodhouse, Dykas, & Cassidy, 2011). This maladaptive adjustment profile is problematic because, among other things, it suggests that victims may be reticent to seek social support precisely when they most need it (Barchia & Bussey, 2010). Moreover, adjustment outcomes such as fear of negative evaluation along with social avoidance and distress can be used as proxies to represent social-cognitive factors that can prevent individuals from seeking help when they are in distress. Social-cognitive factors have been shown to play protective roles to prevent the negative outcome of depression in middle school and high school students (Barchia & Bussey, 2010). However, most research to date has looked only at concurrent adjustment while students were still in middle school (Barchia & Bussey, 2010; Crawford & Manassis, 2011), high school (Barchia & Bussey, 2010; Woodhouse, Dykas, & Cassidy, 2011) or college (Dahlen, Czar, Prather, & Dyess, 2013). It is important to examine whether peer victimization during high school, especially in non-physical forms where there have been fewer studies, continues to impact adjustment outcomes into emerging adulthood.

The current study examines whether previous peer relational victimization affects current levels of social anxiety, loneliness, depression, fear of negative evaluation, along with social avoidance and distress in a college sample aged 19 – 29. Retrospective reports of high school peer relational victimization were gathered along with current reports of peer victimization and the aforementioned college outcome variables. The sample consists of 273 undergraduates of which 79% were female. The sample was 79% Caucasian, 10% African-American, and 5% Latino.

Five hierarchical regression models were completed examining the outcome variables. In each regression the first step controlled for gender, the second step controlled for college level peer relational victimization, and the third step contained retrospective high school reports of peer relational victimization. Findings presented in table 1 indicate that high school peer relational victimization accounted for 5% of unique variance for social anxiety (see Model 1), 2% of unique variance for depression (Model 2), and 1% of unique variance for loneliness (Model 3). In Table 2, high school peer relational victimization accounted for 8% of unique variance for fear of negative evaluation (Model 4) and 2% of unique variance for social avoidance and distress (Model 5). Examination of the betas indicate that high school peer relational victimization is a significant positive predictor of college adjustment even after controlling for gender and college level peer relational victimization.

These results show that high school peer relational victimization significantly affects college adjustment even when controlling for college level peer relational victimization. The pattern of findings hold across all negative outcomes (i.e., social anxiety, loneliness, depression, fear of negative evaluation, social avoidance and distress) for these emerging adults, years after the victimization occurred. Findings are discussed along with implications for professional intervention.

Authors

• Heather Rachelle Giles, University of Nebraska at Omaha
  Presenting Author

• Stephanie Albers, University of Nebraska at Omaha
  Non-Presenting Author

• Juan F. Casas, University of Nebraska at Omaha
  Non-Presenting Author

• Kathryn Woerner, University of Nebraska at Lincoln
  Non-Presenting Author