Expectations and perceptions at school transitions: The role of peer status and aggression

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Abstract

This study integrated research on aggression, peer status, and social and academic functioning across the middle- and high-school transitions. We examined how peer status and aggression are related to adolescents' expectations about their academic and social functioning in a new school system before the transition into that system, and their perceived academic and social functioning after the transition. Social preference, perceived popularity, overt and relational aggression, and social and academic expectations were assessed in Grades 5 and 8; identical peer status and aggression constructs and perceived social and academic functioning were assessed in Grades 6 and 9. Results indicated moderate correlations between adolescents' social and academic expectations and perceived functioning across both school transitions. Girls reported higher social and academic functioning than boys did in most cases. Perceived popularity was consistently positively associated with academic and social expectations for middle and high school, whereas social preference was associated with perceived social functioning in both middle school and high school. The link between aggression and outcome variables varied by age and was moderated by gender and peer status.

Introduction

The current study investigates peer status and aggression around two school transitions — the transition from elementary to middle school, and from middle school to high school. In previous research, the relationship between status and aggression at these same school transitions has been examined (e.g., Cillessen & Mayeux, 2004). In the current paper, we extend these findings by examining how status and aggression are related to adolescents' expectations regarding their academic and social functioning in a new school system, and their perceptions of their academic and social functioning after the transition into that new system.

The transition to a new school system is a developmental milestone (Brown, 1990). Navigating a new building, new teachers, new class subjects, higher academic expectations, a new peer group, and perhaps even a different busing system are just a few of the challenges adolescents face, often co-occurring with rapid individual change. From a contextual perspective on peer relations (Sheridan, Buhs, & Warnes, 2003), the new social context and types of relationships in particular of a new school pose a challenging adaptive task for children and adolescents. Thus, school transitions may be difficult because of the stress of losing old peer groups and friendships, and the anxiety about forming new ones (Brown, 1990). Due to the nature of neighborhood districting practices in many larger school systems, children who attend all six years of primary school together are often separated at the transition to middle school. They may advance to middle school with some of their social networks intact, but it is common for new middle schoolers to face a sea of unfamiliar faces, and relatively few familiar ones. Challenges to social and academic functioning also occur at the transition to high school when the social system is even larger and opportunities for individual attention and support from teachers are fewer (Harter, Whitesell, & Kowalski, 1992).

Given these strains and stressors, it is not surprising that problem behaviors often occur at school transitions. Fulk (2003) discussed the way in which school transitions may exacerbate previously existing academic problems. In the social domain, Pellegrini et al. demonstrated increased in physical aggression after school transitions, especially for boys (Pellegrini and Bartini, 2001, Pellegrini and Long, 2002). These short-term responses compound long-term risk as they may decrease coping skills, thereby making students vulnerable to further social and academic problems in a downward moving spiral.

The observed increases in student aggression following school transitions (Pellegrini and Bartini, 2001, Pellegrini and Long, 2002) are particularly noteworthy. Why do school transitions lead adolescents to act more aggressively? Research (e.g., Eccles & Midgley, 1990) has suggested that the characteristics of the school setting often create a mismatch with the adolescent's developing skills and needs. For instance, while the school context becomes more controlling, adolescents are seeking higher levels of autonomy. The need to establish a sense of self-determination may explain why some adolescents choose aggressive or disruptive behaviors to assert themselves in the early months following the transition to middle or high school.

However, the increase in aggression at school transitions may not only occur as an inappropriate response to the stress of the new school environment. It may also have to do with concerns about peer status and the goal of reestablishing one's status in the new peer system. As Pellegrini et al. suggested, the increase of aggression at school transitions may be explained by adolescents' insecurities about their position in the new social hierarchy (Pellegrini and Bartini, 2001, Pellegrini and Long, 2002). They hypothesized that an initial increase in aggression at the beginning of middle school serves to reestablish dominance over peers in the new school context, and that the subsequent decline allows boys to maintain affiliative ties with peers once dominance has been established. In addition to physical aggression, relational aggression may serve similar functions at school transitions. Given the strong link between relational aggression and perceived popularity, especially for girls, it can be expected that adolescents would also use this behavior to obtain prominence in a new social context. Perhaps adolescent girls increase their levels of relationally aggressive behaviors as a means of reasserting their dominance in the new school.

Thus, aggression at school transitions (whether physical or relational) may occur more strategically in response to adolescents' transitions into a new peer context, rather than as a response to the stress of the transition. While physically or relationally behaviors may serve to maintain or improve social standing among peers following school transitions, evidence also suggests that being either perpetrator or victim of such behavior is associated with poorer academic and social adjustment (e.g., Schwartz, 2000, Schwartz et al., 2006). Schwartz et al. (2006) found particularly problematic academic adjustment among aggressive adolescents who were also perceived popular, suggesting that the combination of status and aggression is a significant risk factor. Understanding the interplay of aggression and status in adolescents' school adjustment is important not only for research purposes but also for practical ones. Identifying youth at risk for social and academic problems in school and helping them to improve their outcomes are important goals for educators and school administrators alike. In light of these concerns, it is critical to examine the dynamics of peer status and aggression in schools. These concerns apply to both physical aggression (Farmer, 2000) and relational aggression (Merrell, Buchanan, & Tran, 2006).

Previous research has indicated a complex relationship between peer status and aggression among children and adolescents. Although a robust positive association between overt and relational aggression and peer rejection has been found in many studies (see Dodge, Coie, & Lynam, 2006), there is mounting evidence that the association of aggression with measures of peer status is complex. Contemporary researchers are finding that both overt and relational forms of aggression are sometimes associated with high status among peers (e.g., Cillessen and Mayeux, 2004, Hawley, 2003, Rodkin et al., 2000, Rose et al., 2004) in addition to their association with rejection (e.g., Newcomb et al., 1993, Underwood, 2003).

Why the discrepant findings? One explanation has to do with the meaning of “peer status.” An important recent discovery in the literature is that the link between aggression and peer status varies according to how the researcher conceptualizes and measures peer status in the first place. Well into the 1990s, most research on the aggression-status link focused on sociometric popularity, or being well-accepted and liked by the peer group (e.g., Coie, Dodge, & Coppotelli, 1982). Studies consistently showed that aggressive children were generally not well-liked by their peers (e.g., Newcomb et al., 1993).

More recently, a different conceptualization of peer status has been identified that correlates very differently with aggression among youth. Unlike sociometric popularity, which is an index of liking among the peer group, perceived popularity is more an index of social impact, visibility, and reputation. Youth who are perceived popular are nominated by peers as the “most popular” members of the classroom or grade, and typically enjoy high levels of reputational status among their peers (Cillessen and Mayeux, 2004, Prinstein and Cillessen, 2003, Rodkin et al., 2000). Perceived popular boys are often described as athletic, cool, and as good leaders, but not as particularly kind or trustworthy (Parkhurst and Hopmeyer, 1998, Rodkin et al., 2000). Perhaps most importantly, perceived popularity is positively associated with both overt and relational aggression (Cillessen & Rose, 2005).

Thus, overt and relational aggression are associated with both sociometric and perceived popularity among youth, but in different directions: being well-liked is associated with low levels of both forms of aggression, and being perceived as popular is associated with high levels of aggression. These specific associations are further moderated by gender. The positive link between relational aggression and perceived popularity is stronger for girls than for boys, just as the association between overt aggression and perceived popularity is stronger for boys than for girls (Cillessen & Mayeux, 2004).

The association between aggression and peer status is also partly dependent on the developmental period under investigation. The strength of the negative association between relational aggression and social preference becomes stronger across adolescence, while the negative association between overt aggression and social preference becomes weaker (Cillessen & Mayeux, 2004). The relationship between status and aggression has also been found to vary depending on whether the study focuses on a school transition, such as from elementary school to middle school. For example, Cillessen and Mayeux (2004) found that perceived popularity predicted an increase in overt aggression for both boys and girls across the transition from elementary to middle school, and again from middle to high school. This trend was surprising given the generally low association between overt aggression and perceived popularity for girls.

Previous research has demonstrated a link between positive peer relationships and academic engagement (e.g., Juvonen and Wentzel, 1996, Ladd et al., 1997), as well as between peer status and academic achievement (Buhs et al., 2006, Rodkin et al., 2000, Zettergren, 2003). Overall, the outlook is positive for children with high academic achievement and higher academic self-concept: they are at decreased risk for externalizing behaviors such as overt aggression, and typically enjoy positive relationships with peers. However, these studies have conceptualized high peer status as social preference or likeability, without considering more dominance-based forms of status such as perceived popularity. They have also not included other forms of aggression, such as relational aggression, that may also be associated with academic competence or self-concept.

In addition to academic functioning, social functioning is also strongly associated with aggression and peer status. There is abundant evidence (reviewed above) that overt and relational aggression and peer status are related in important ways. Further, research has shown that status and aggression are also associated with other indicators of social functioning, such as friendships. For example, both overtly and relationally aggressive children and adolescents have been shown to have mutual friendships (Grotpeter and Crick, 1996, Poulin and Boivin, 2000, Rys and Bear, 1997), although the quality of those friendships may be compromised compared to the friendships of non-aggressive youth (Rose, Swenson, & Carlson, 2004). High levels of peer status can be a buffer against the potential problems with social functioning that often accompany aggression. Rose and colleagues found that relationally aggressive perceived-popular adolescents were less likely to have high-conflict friendships than their low-status (but still relationally aggressive) peers (Rose et al., 2004, Rose et al., 2004).

In sum, overt and relational aggression are consistently associated with peer status throughout the literature on peer relationships, with the direction of the association depending on the type of high status (social preference, perceived popularity) under investigation. Further, aggression and peer status together are associated with academic functioning and other aspects of social functioning in childhood and adolescence, with well-accepted and non-aggressive peers having higher academic and social adjustment (e.g., higher academic achievement and self-concept, higher quality friendships). In the current study, we were interested in examining the dynamics of these associations around school transitions.

In the current study, we examined two forms of peer status (social preference and perceived popularity) and two forms of aggression (overt and relational), before and after two school transitions: from elementary to middle school (Grades 5 to 6) and from middle to high school (Grades 8 to 9). Our goal was to extend our understanding of these transitions by investigating how peer status and aggression are related to two general measures of adjustment, social and academic functioning. Because we were interested in how aggression and status are linked to adolescents' assessments of their own functioning across the transitions, we focused on adolescents' pre-transition expectations of their future adjustment to the new school setting, and their post-transition perceptions of their functioning in the new school. Specifically, we assessed aggression, peer status, and expectations of post-transition academic and social functioning in Grades 5 and 8. We then assessed peer status, aggression, and perceptions of concurrent academic and social functioning in Grades 6 and 9.

This study has three primary research questions. For each question, gender was also examined as a moderator variable. First, we were interested in the associations between adolescents' expectations for their academic and social functioning before the transitions into middle and high school and their perceptions of their functioning in middle and high school. We expected a moderate correlation between pre-transition expectations and post-transition perceptions. Gender differences were explored; although they might vary in strength, we expected these associations to hold for both genders.

Second, we investigated the associations between the two forms of peer status and aggression in Grades 5 and 8 and concurrent expectations for academic and social expectations functioning the next year (after the school transition). Thus, we examined whether peer status and aggression before a school transition were associated with adolescents' expectations for social and academic success in the new school. Because high-status adolescents are used to positive treatment and high regard by many of their peers, we hypothesized that both social preference and perceived popularity would be positively associated with social expectations. We expected this to be true for girls and boys alike. We also expected both forms of high status to be positively associated with academic expectations, although we expected this association to be stronger for social preference. Previous research has found a positive association between academic adjustment and social preference (e.g., Zettergren, 2003). The limited evidence available suggests that perceived popular youth (boys in particular) may not be as academically inclined as their well-liked counterparts (Rodkin et al., 2000). Thus, for this association, we anticipated significant moderation by gender, such that perceived popular girls would be more likely than perceived popular boys to expect high future academic achievement.

We expected both overt and relational aggression to be positively associated with social expectations. Previous research has shown that aggressive children tend to underestimate how low their status is among their peers (e.g., Zakriski & Coie, 1996). Further, during adolescence, overt aggression is less strongly associated with rejection than in childhood (e.g., Cillessen & Mayeux, 2004). Thus, overtly aggressive adolescents may either not have social functioning problems in the first place, or they may not accurately perceive their social difficulties if they do have them. Gender was not expected to moderate the relationship between overt aggression and social expectations. Relational aggression was expected to be positively associated with social expectations because of its strong link to perceived popularity, especially among girls. Relational aggression has also been linked to having more exclusive and intimate friendships (Grotpeter & Crick, 1996). Thus, the association between relational aggression and social expectations was expected to be stronger for girls than for boys.

In line with previous findings of a link between overt aggression and low academic engagement (e.g., Ladd et al., 1997), we anticipated a negative relationship between overt aggression and academic expectations. We expected this relationship to be stronger for boys than for girls. The links between relational aggression and academic expectations were exploratory, so no specific predictions were made.

Our third and final research question regarded the concurrent associations between pre-transition peer status and aggression (in Grades 5 and 8) and post-transition perceptions of academic and social functioning after the transitions to middle school and high school (in Grades 6 and 9, respectively). This set of analyses focused on adolescents' assessments of their own functioning in the new school context. We anticipated that the role of peer status and aggression in adolescents' school transitions would be further demonstrated by similar associations with post-transition perceptions as were found for pre-transition expectations.

Section snippets

Participants

Participants were recruited through the public school system of a medium-sized city as part of a larger longitudinal study. According to the guidelines of the school administration (who wished to maximize participation), passive consent procedures were used. In each year of the study, parents were sent a letter detailing the study procedures and purposes. They were asked to sign and return a written form to the school if they did not wish for their child to participate. Less than 1% of the

Results

To investigate our main study questions, we ran three sets of analyses. First, we computed correlations between pre-transition academic/social expectations and post-transition academic/social perceptions. Second, to measure the associations between status and aggression and academic and social expectations and perceptions, correlations between these main study variables were examined. Third, regression analysis was used to examine the predictive effects of status and aggression constructs on

Discussion

The dynamics of peer status and aggression remains an important issue in developmental and educational psychology today. We began this paper by reviewing existing evidence on the association between social status and aggression, and particularly the conditions under which aggression is related to indicators of high status (such as perceived popularity or dominance) rather than peer rejection. One of these conditions is the change of peer group composition that occurs during school transitions.

Conclusion

Together, the results from this study confirm the importance of examining the role of aggression and status in the peer group at school transitions. Previous research focused on the degree to which adolescents try to reestablish status or dominance in the peer group when they move to a new school system. The current study demonstrated further implications for adolescents' social and academic functioning. The current study also demonstrated important developmental differences between the

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    The research reported in this paper was supported by a faculty grant from the University of Connecticut Research Foundation to the first author. We are grateful to the children, parents, and school administrators who made this project possible. Portions of this research were presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research in Child Development, Boston, MA, March, 2007.

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