The Effects and Influences of Childhood and Adolescent Popularity

The Effects and Influences of Childhood and Adolescent Popularity

Popularity is a driving social factor among children and adolescents. Someone who is popular is either well approved among his or her peers or is acknowledged as having a high social status among other students. According to Cillessen & Rose (2005), in the past, the majority of the attention of social psychologists was focused on low social status children, and the reason behind their rejection among peers. Recently, there has been a shift in the focus of research towards high status students and into the factors attributed to their social success. Popularity has a connection to certain social goals and often serves as reinforcement for some aggressive behaviors. This paper will make the distinction between two separate types of popular students, and will also address and determine the many factors that influence popularity including parental aspects, socioeconomic status, age, and gender. Finally this paper will investigate the connection between popularity and delinquent behaviors such as drug experimentation and bullying.

As psychologists analyzed popular students, they were able to distinguish between two high status youth. The first are the sociometrically popular. This youth displays characteristics of friendliness, kindness, and sociability, and has low levels of aggression (Cillessen & Rose, 2005). This person is likeable and well accepted among his peers (Caravita & Cillessen, 2011). On the contrary, there is the perceived popular student. This child is rated as visible among his or her peers, and often displays signs of aggression and even bullying to achieve his or her social goals. Cillessen and Rose (2005) explain the difference between these two high status youth with the examples of Tim and Jason:

Tim is well liked by his peers. He is genuinely nice to others and helps out when needed.... Tim tends to avoid even verbal confrontations when possible, preferring instead to find prosocial ways of solving conflicts. Compared with Tim, Jason is better known by his classmates but he is not necessarily well liked.... Jason can be very nice to other kids but can also intimidate them when provoked or angry... (p. 102)

In this case, Tim is the sociometrically popular student. He achieves his social goals through kindness and problem solving; whereas, Jason is the perceived popular student, and will manipulate others and use acts of force to achieve his goals. As this paper continues, it is important to note the differences between these two types of popularity.

Gaining high social status acts as a form of adaption in youths' environment, and is a means to achieve social goals (Allen, Porter, McFarland, Marsh, & McElhaney, 2005). There are two separate goals that youth can hope to achieve among their peers. The first are communal goals. These are well intentioned goals that aim to maintain good friendships with those around students. On the other hand, agentic goals are goals aimed at achieving higher status and more attention among peers (Caravita & Cillessen, 2011). As expected, agentic goals have been linked to acts such as bullying and higher levels of aggression, and similarly, those who held more agentic goals were more likely to perceived popular rather than sociometrically popular. A study by Caravita and Cillessen attempted to make the connection between these goals and perceived and sociometric popularity. They hypothesized there would be a positive correlation between communal goals and sociometric popularity, and a positive correlation between agentic goals and perceived popularity. Their study of three elementary schools and two middle schools in Italy proved both of these correlations. One methodological flaw with this study, however, is that it is longitudinal and therefore, has no way of proving actual causality, and further analysis would be needed to make such connections. Despite said flaws, the study holds as a reliable source to prove the correlation between social goals and popularity.

Popularity varies greatly depending on demographics. The first demographic examined is age, and its influence on youth's status. Firstly, the importance of popularity varies on age. Caravita & Cillessen (2011) report that as children move from elementary school to secondary school, and shift from childhood to adolescence; they place an increasing importance on popularity. Furthermore, children, as they grow older, become both more agentic and more communal. This shows that as youth grow older, they begin to become more social and defined, and will either follow the path of sociometric popularity or perceived popularity.

Caravita and Cillessen (2011) also examined gender factors in regards to popularity. They found that boys tended to be more agentic than girls, and as a result, boys were more often perceived popular than girls. As expected, because boys were more often agentic, they were also more likely to participate in bullying and aggressive behaviors. It should be noted, however, that each gender is more likely to bully in a different way. Overt bullying is related to physical violence and the use of harmful words to intimidate and harm peers. Relational bullying, on the other hand, is aimed at manipulating the relationships of peers and includes ignoring others, gossiping, or the act spreading rumors (Cillessen and Rose, 2005). It was found that agentic boys tended to be more overt in their bullying, and agentic girls used more relational tactics in order to achieve their social goals (Caravita and Cillessen, 2011). There were also similarities among genders. Both boys and girls showed a positive correlation between agentic goals and perceived popularity, and similarly, there was a decrease in bullying among the sociometrically popular for both genders.

Popularity is also strongly related to the relationship a child has with his or her parents at home. Because youth mirror so much of what they know from their parents, it is logical that parental interaction would have an effect on youths' friendships. Two learning theories support this notion according to Cui, Conger, Bryant, and Elder (2002), the first being the social learning theory according to Bandura. This theory argues that children will show affection and handle disagreements in the manner their parents do. If the child was handled with strong affection in childhood, then in turn, the child will have intimate and meaningful friendships through his or her life. However, if the child is shown little affection and is rarely comforted, he or she will display these same gestures in future relationships. Attachment theory also supports parental influence on future relationships. According to this theory, children form ideas of how their parents treat