Friends in School

Friends in School

Patterns of Selection and Influence in Secondary Schools
1983, Pages 63-69
Friends in School

4 - Commentary: Theoretical Perspectives on Peer Association

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This chapter discusses theoretical perspectives on peer association. Adolescence is a period in life when friendship and peer relations move to center stage in the developmental drama. Both psychological and social structural forces contribute to the young person's need and aptitude for friendship. The biopsychological changes of puberty disrupt childhood adaptation and defenses, stirring and opening the personality and launching the child on the search for a workable, acceptable identity. Peer interaction and peer norms have particular force at this time because the young person is in the process of detaching from parents and seeking new principles by which to guide behavior and to define and structure the forming identity. The fact that friendship and the role of friends are in the process of formation in this period may expose the aspects of the process that are obscured in the more settled relationships of adults. In late adolescence, when identity is limned more clearly, the youngster can tolerate greater individuality in the friend without feeling self-definition challenged or endangered by it. Loyalty is still an important part of the relationship, but it is now defined less rigidly, without so great an emphasis on similarity of tastes and attitudes.

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