Child Development, November/December 2005, Volume 76, Number 6, Pages 1161 – 1171
Prospective Relations Among Victimization, Rejection, Friendlessness, and
Children’s Self- and Peer-Perceptions
Christina Salmivalli
Jenny Isaacs
University of Turku
University of Turku and Yeshiva University
This study investigated the prospective links between three forms of peer adversities (i.e., victimization, rejection, and lack of reciprocated friendships) and children’s perceptions of themselves and of their peers. The
sample consisted of 212 children (107 boys and 105 girls, 11 – 13 years) recruited from four primary schools and
followed up for a period of one year. The results showed that a negative self-perception was a risk factor for the
development of all forms of peer adversities. Of the three forms of peer adversities assessed, victimization and
rejection had an influence on children’s peer perceptions. None of the peer adversities predicted changes in selfperceptions. The results partially support a transactional model between children and their environments.
Transactional theories of child development emphasize the reciprocal influences of a child and his or
her environment. Child characteristics help to construct and shape the social context, which in turn
influences the child’s continued development
(Caspi, Bem, & Elder, 1989; Sameroff & MacKenzie,
2003; Scarr & McCartney, 1983; Sroufe & Rutter, 1984;
see also Ladd, 2003, for a review regarding different
child by environment models). Although parents are
often thought to be the primary contributors to their
children’s development, their influence, relative to
peers, decreases as children enter middle childhood
and adolescence. Thus, the peer group plays an
increasingly large role in influencing children’s
cognitions, behavior, and overall personality characteristics (Harris, 1995). Under a transactional
model, there is a dynamic chain of influence in
which experiences within the peer group are thought
to shape, and be shaped by, children’s perceptions
and dispositions (Caldwell, Rudolph, Troop-Gordon,
& Kim, 2004; Ladd & Troop-Gordon, 2003). The focus
of this study is to examine the influence of children’s
self- and peer-perceptions on experiences of adver-
This study is part of the ongoing project ‘‘Relational schemata,
social goals, and social adjustment in childhood and in adolescence,’’ funded by the Academy of Finland (project 202554/68884),
Emil Aaltonen Foundation, and Oskar Öflund Foundation. We are
grateful for the thoughtful comments provided by Ernest Hodges
regarding the manuscript. We extend our thanks to the participating students and their parents, the teachers who made the data
collection possible, and the research assistants working in the
project.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Christina Salmivalli, Department of Psychology, University of
Turku, FIN-20014 Turku, Finland. Electronic mail may be sent to
[email protected].
sity in the peer context and the subsequent influence
of peer adversities on children’s self- and peer-perceptions.
Peer Adversities
Children’s negative peer experiences such as victimization, rejection, and friendlessness have received considerable attention in the developmental
literature. Although there is ample evidence that
negative peer experiences are associated with adjustment problems (Hawker & Boulton, 2000; Ladd,
Kochenderfer, & Coleman, 1997; Parker & Asher,
1987), it is also evident that different forms of peer
adversities tend to co-occur. Rejection is one of the
strongest correlates of victimization (Bukowski &
Sippola, 2001; DeRosier & Thomas, 2003; Perry, Kusel, & Perry, 1988), and both rejected and victimized
children often lack both reciprocal friendships (Ladd
& Troop-Gordon, 2003; Parker & Asher, 1993) and a
network of affiliative relations within the classroom
(Boivin & Hymel, 1997). Until very recently, however, researchers have tended to study different
forms of peer adversities independently from each
other. Although some studies have concentrated on
victimization (Egan & Perry, 1998; Kochenderfer &
Ladd, 1996; Olweus, 1991) or peer rejection (Dodge
et al., 2003; Prinstein & LaGreca, 2004), others have
been more interested in children’s reciprocal friendships or lack thereof (Berndt, Hawkins, & Jiao, 1999;
Vaughn et al., 2000).
The co-occurrence of peer adversities evokes a
need to investigate them collectively, in order to gain
r 2005 by the Society for Research in Child Development, Inc.
All rights reserved. 0009-3920/2005/7606-0003
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Salmivalli and Isaacs
a deeper understanding of their unique influences
on development. Assessing several forms of adversities in the same study also helps illustrate how
these difficulties develop over time and mutually
influence each other. For example, Boivin and Hymel
(1997) found that rejection was concurrently associated with both victimization and lack of affiliations.
In two of the few studies that used longitudinal designs to examine the relations among different peer
adversities, both Hodges and Perry (1999) and Ladd
and Troop-Gordon (2003) found that rejection was
predictive of later victimization, and victimization
reciprocally influenced later peer rejection. According to Ladd and Troop-Gordon (2003), friendlessness
was predicted by rejection, but it did not contribute
to the development of other forms of peer adversities. These findings suggest that some peer relationship problems may mutually influence one
another and others may serve as consequences,
rather than antecedents.
This study (a) used a longitudinal design, (b) included three overlapping but yet distinct forms of
peer adversities (victimization, rejection, and
friendlessness), and (c) considered reciprocal associations between not only different types of peer
problems but also their role in children’s developing
perceptions of self and peers.
Self- and Peer-Perceptions and Peer Adversities
Social information processing models (Crick &
Dodge, 1994) and social cognitive models (Baldwin,
1992; Bandura, 1986) posit that children enter peer
situations with a database of prior interactions and
the relational schemas or knowledge structures created from these interactions. Working within this
framework, children use these schemas and perceptions to guide their behavior. The positive or negative valence of the interactions that follow may then
further shape their perceptions.
Self-perceptions
Self-perceptions have been investigated through a
set of overlapping concepts that have been measured
in various ways. One common method is to look at
perceived social self-concept. Another way of operationalizing self-perceptions is through measures of
general self-esteem. The former refers to perceptions
of social competency or acceptance in the peer
group, whereas the latter represents a more global
view of one’s worth as a person, frequently referred
to as self-worth.
Negative self-perceptions tend to be associated
with submissive (Salmivalli, Ojanen, Haanpää, &
Peets, 2005) and social disengaged (Caldwell et al.,
2004) styles of interacting, conceivably impeding the
development of positive relationships and fostering
adverse treatment by peers. On the other hand, peer
adversities can be thought to influence the child’s
developing self-perceptions. Negative attitudes and
negative treatment by significant others, including
peers, might lead to self-blame (Graham & Juvonen,
2001) and feelings of inferiority, as children incorporate the judgments of others into their selfappraisals (Harter, 1999).
Correlational evidence indicates that positive relationships with peers are associated with subjective
well-being and feelings of self-worth (Harter, 1993;
Hartup & Stevens, 1997). Both social self-concept and
global self-worth are concurrently associated with
victimization (Hawker & Boulton, 2000). Regarding
associations with other peer adversities, Mannarino
(1978) found an association between friendlessness
and general self-worth. According to Boivin and
Hymel (1997), who assessed several peer adversities
simultaneously, only victimization and rejection had
unique associations with perceived social acceptance: the number of affiliative relationships in the
classroom did not have any additive influence.
Despite a dearth of longitudinal evaluations of
children’s self-perceptions, there is some evidence
that in early childhood positive views of the self are
associated with later higher social status (Verschueren, Buyck, & Marcoen, 2001). In addition, Bagwell,
Newcomb, and Bukowski (1998) found that friendlessness in middle childhood predicted decreases in
perceptions of social competence and general selfworth in adulthood.
Regarding reciprocal models for the association of
peer adversities with negative self-perceptions, Egan
and Perry (1998) found a longitudinal reciprocal relation between victimization and perceived social
competence. However, global self-worth failed to
emerge as an antecedent or consequence of victimization. According to Caldwell et al. (2004), negative
social self-perceptions (as assessed by a composite of
social competence and self-worth in the peer group)
predicted social disengagement, which contributed
to peer adversities. The reverse pattern was also
supported with peer adversities predicting later disengagement and subsequent negative social selfperceptions.
Results from these studies support the notion that
peer adversities are associated with children’s selfperceptions. However, Card (2003) concluded, in his
meta-analysis, that at least victimization seems to
Peer Adversities and Self- and Peer-Perceptions
contribute more to a child’s social rather than global
self-perception. Indeed, longitudinal associations
between adversities (especially victimization) and
self-perceptions tend to be more robust when focusing on self-perceptions that are embedded within
the context of the peer group. Adolescents’ perceptions of self-worth have been shown to vary across
different relational contexts (Harter, Waters, &
Whitesell, 1998). If negative peer experiences influence self-worth, it is conceivable that the strongest
influences are observed on self-worth in the peer
context. Also, the way children feel about themselves
in the peer context is probably most predictive of
peer difficulties that will follow. In this study, we use
the concept of self-perception to refer to children’s
overall feelings of self-worth in the peer context and
examine it as both an antecedent and a consequence
of peer adversities, an approach that has been
scarcely taken in the past.
Peer-Perceptions
During social interchanges, children make observations and inferences not only about themselves but
also about their peers. It is conceivable that a negative view of peers enhances the risk for peer difficulties, by fostering hostile attributions of intent and,
consequently, aggressive behavior (Dodge & Coie,
1987; Orobio de Castro, Veerman, Koops, Vosch, &
Monshouwer, 2002) or by undermining the child’s
communal goals and thus leading to shy and withdrawn behavior in the peer group (Salmivalli et al.,
2005). In addition, the experience of peer difficulties
may foster the perceptions of peers as unsupportive
and uncaring.
Some studies have found associations between
children’s generalized beliefs of peers and their social adjustment. For instance, low-status children
tend to harbor less favorable beliefs about their
school peers than high-status children (Rabiner,
Keane, & MacKinnon-Lewis, 1993). Although there
is some longitudinal evidence that negative peer
beliefs are both an antecedent and consequence of
peer rejection (MacKinnon-Lewis, Rabiner, & Starnes, 1999), the interplay between peer adversities
and the development of generalized negative peer
perceptions has so far been understudied. As recently pointed out by Ladd and Troop-Gordon (2003,
p. 1345), ‘‘We know almost nothing about whether
chronic participation in adverse peer relationships is
associated with children’s generalized beliefs about
peers, and whether negative peer beliefs heighten
children’s risk for maladjustment.’’ Thus, an important objective of this study was to illustrate the po-
1163
tential role of peer perceptions both as an antecedent
of peer adversities and as a consequence of experiencing such adversities.
Self- and Peer-Perceptions
The concurrent studies that considered children’s
self- and peer-perceptions simultaneously indicate
that children’s self-perceptions and their perceptions
of peers are related: children with positive views of
themselves tend to see their peers in a favorable light
as well (Rudolph, Hammen, & Burge, 1995; Salmivalli et al., 2005). In addition, both self- and peerperceptions are associated with social rejection and
other forms of maladjustment (e.g., depression) that
may have serious social repercussions (Rudolph &
Clark, 2001; Rudolph et al., 1995).
To our knowledge, only one longitudinal study
examined self- and peer-perceptions simultaneously.
According to the study by Ladd and Troop-Gordon
(2003), a history of rejection during the first 3 school
years was both directly and indirectly (through
concurrent victimization) associated with a negative
social self-concept among fourth-grade children.
Moreover, chronic friendlessness had an influence on
both social self-concept and generalized peer beliefs.
The initial levels of self- and peer-perception were
not assessed, however, which makes any inferences
about causal links between peer adversities and selfand peer-perceptions difficult. The possibility that
children who were exposed to chronic peer adversities had a negative social self-concept or a negative
view of peers to begin with cannot be ruled out by
the design.
The Present Study
The primary purpose of this longitudinal study was
to investigate the degree to which children’s selfand peer perceptions contribute to the development
of peer adversities and, in turn, the degree to which
peer adversities further fuel declines in self- and peer
perceptions. The predictive links from both self- and
peer-perception to all three forms of peer adversities
(i.e., victimization, rejection, and friendlessness)
were tested. In addition, we examined the predictive
links from all three peer adversities to subsequent
self- and peer-perceptions.
The second aim was to examine the prospective
and possibly reciprocal relations between victimization, rejection, and friendlessness, to find out how
different peer adversities develop and possibly exacerbate each other over time. The hypothesis, based
on previous research (e.g., Boivin & Hymel, 1997;
1164
Salmivalli and Isaacs
Buhs & Ladd, 2001; Hodges & Perry, 1999; Ladd &
Troop-Gordon, 2003), was that rejection predicts both
friendlessness and victimization. The other predictive
paths (i.e., from friendlessness to victimization and
rejection; from victimization to friendlessness and rejection) were tested in an explorative manner as well.
In summary, the proposed model takes a transactional approach toward understanding the evolution of children’s perceptions of themselves and
peers by examining the potential mutual influence of
factors in the child and his or her social world.
Hence, children interact with the social environment,
transforming and being transformed by their experiences (Sroufe & Rutter, 1984).
Method
Participants
The 212 participants of this study were a subsample of 311 children recruited from four lower
elementary schools in southwest Finland for a longitudinal investigation. In the Finnish school system,
lower elementary school refers to Grades 1 – 6. At the
time of first assessment (T1), participants were in
Grades 5 and 6, with ages ranging from 11 to 13 years
(105 girls and 107 boys, 104 fifth graders and 108
sixth graders).
The schools were located in a medium-size town
with approximately 175,000 inhabitants. The average
class size was 25 students. Although no information
was available concerning individual socioeconomic
status levels, because of the Finnish comprehensive
school system the students represented all social
classes, with no notable between-school socioeconomic differences. The sample was racially homogeneous: more than 95% of the population in the
region is European and 91 – 92% of the comprehensive school students are of Finnish origin. Passive
consent forms were sent to parents; only 2 students’
parents refused permission for their children to
participate.
Attrition
In the Finnish school system, students disperse to
various different schools when passing from the
lower to the upper elementary school after Grade 6.
Fifty-nine percent of our original sample of 311
children went through this transition between Time 2
(T2) and Time 3 (T3) assessments, and some of them
were difficult to locate for the third assessment. At
the time of the third assessment, 255 children (82%)
were still involved in the longitudinal study. Com-
plete data sets on the variables utilized in this study
were available for 212 of them (for instance, data on
friendship reciprocity were not available for students
whose friend[s] were not present for one or more
assessments). These 212 students comprise the participants of the present study.
Attrition analyses showed that the children
without complete data sets at all three time points
did not differ from those who were in the final
sample on measures of self-perception, peer-perception, victimization, or number of reciprocal
friendship nominations at T1, but they were more
rejected at T1 than children in the final study sample,
t(309) 5 3.02, po.01. However, a closer examination
revealed that this was true only of boys.
Procedure
The students were assessed on three occasions.
The first two assessments took place during the same
spring term, 4 months apart, and third assessments
was conducted 8 months after the second one, in the
following spring term. Data concerning self- and
peer-perceptions were collected at the first and the
third assessment, in order to study their role as antecedents and/or consequences of peer adversities
(victimization, rejection, and friendlessness), whereas information concerning peer adversities was collected at each assessment.
Data collection took place during school hours.
The confidentiality of the study was emphasized to
the students. The instructions for all questionnaires
were read aloud by two trained research assistants,
and they were printed in the questionnaires as well.
Children completed the pen-and-paper questionnaires independently at their desks in classrooms,
under the supervision of the two research assistants.
The order of all measures was counterbalanced
across classrooms.
Measures
Victimization. Victimization was assessed by a
peer-report questionnaire. Lists with the names of all
children in a classroom were presented to participants, who marked with an ‘‘X’’ the names of their
classmates who fitted the descriptions presented to
them. The items used to measure victimization were:
gets pushed around and is harassed; gets called
names and is mocked; is left outside the group.
Proportion scores were calculated for each item by
dividing the number of nominations received by the
total number of potential nominators. Scale scores
were then computed by summing the proportion
Peer Adversities and Self- and Peer-Perceptions
scores for the three items, producing scale scores that
could range from 0 to 3. The internal consistency was
good (Cronbach’s as were .87, .90, and .92 at the three
assessments).
Peer rejection. Children were asked to nominate
three classmates they liked most and three classmates
they liked least. The like-least nominations that children received from classmates, standardized within
classrooms, were used as the index of peer rejection.
Friendlessness. Friendships were denoted by reciprocal like-most choices in the sociometric task
described above (e.g., Bukowski & Hoza, 1989). As
children were allowed to make up to three nominations, the maximum number of reciprocal choices
was three. Friendlessness was coded as a dichotomous variable. Only children who did not receive
any reciprocal nominations were considered friendless. The percentages of friendless children varied
from 8.4% to 14.3% across the three assessments.
Self-perceptions. Children’s perceptions of themselves in the peer group context were assessed with
the 10 items of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (e.g.,
‘‘I feel that I have a number of good qualities,’’ ‘‘I feel
that I am a person of worth, at least on an equal
plane with others;’’ Rosenberg, 1965), with an instruction to ‘‘report the way you feel about yourself
when around your peers.’’ The scale was thus adapted
to the relational context of peers, following Harter
et al. (1998), whose findings support the validity of
context-specific measures of global self-worth.
The Rosenberg scale was chosen because it is a wellknown measure of global self-worth with good psychometric properties (Winters, Myers, & Proud, 2002)
and a Finnish translation has been validated (e.g.,
Pakriev, Poutanen, & Salokangas, 2002). It has been
extensively used in middle childhood, preadolescent,
and adolescent samples (e.g., Abela & Payne, 2003;
Salmivalli, Kaukiainen, Kaistaniemi, & Lagerspetz,
1999; Yeh & Lempers, 2004).
Children evaluated on a Likert scale, ranging from 0
(no, not at all) to 3 (yes, completely), the extent to which
they felt in the way described in the item. The responses were coded so that higher scores indicated a
more positive perception of oneself. The individual
scores were calculated by averaging across the 10 items.
Internal consistency was high in the present sample
(as were .80 and .82 at T1 and T3, respectively).
Peer perceptions. The peer perceptions assessment
(Salmivalli et al., 2005) consisted of 13 items describing positive and negative qualities of children’s
age-mates, such as ‘‘they can really be relied on,’’
‘‘they are hostile,’’ or ‘‘they really care about what
happens to me.’’ Like similar inventories previously
used by Rabiner et al. (1993) and Ladd and Troop-
1165
Gordon (2003), this measure included items about
peers’ supportiveness, kindness, and trustworthiness versus their unsupportiveness, hostility, and
untrustworthiness.
Children provided Likert-scale responses, ranging
from 0 (no, not at all) to 3 (yes, completely), to rate the
extent to which each item was true of their peers.
They were instructed to think about their age-mates
in general, not just their closest friends or the peers
they hang around with. Again, responses were coded
so that higher item scores indicated a more positive
perception of peers. The scores were averaged across
items. The internal consistency of the scale was good
(as were .90 and .89 at T1 and T3, respectively).
There was support for self- and peer perceptions
being separate constructs. In a factor analysis (principal axis factoring, varimax rotation) the items of
these scales clearly loaded on two separate factors.
For the peer perceptions scale, all factor loadings
ranged from .36 to .69, with the mean loading across
the 13 items being .62. For the self-perceptions scale,
the factor loadings ranged from .32 to .69, with an
average of .52. The cross-loadings (i.e. peer perceptions items loading on self-perceptions factor or vice
versa) were all small, with an average of .16.
Results
Descriptive Statistics
The means, standard deviations, and bivariate correlations of the study variables are presented in Table
1. Self- and peer perceptions were moderately stable
and correlated significantly with each other. Victimization and rejection were highly stable and friendlessness demonstrated modest stability. All the peer
adversities were interrelated; the highest correlations
were observed between victimization and rejection.
Peer Adversities and Perceptions of Self and Peers:
Predictive Links
To investigate the prospective relations between
children’s peer adversities and their perceptions of
themselves and their peers, a longitudinal path
model for observed variables was constructed using
Mplus 3.0 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998 – 2004). The
maximum likelihood method was used to estimate
the paths. Chi-square test, CFI, and RMSEA were
used as indices of model fit.
Specifying the Model
The initial model tested included paths indicating
the stability of self- and peer perceptions, and the
1166
Salmivalli and Isaacs
Grade 5/6
Grade 6/7
self(1)
self(3)
vic(1)
vic(2)
vic(3)
rej(1)
rej(2)
rej(3)
fri(1)
fri(2)
fri(3)
peer(3)
peer(1)
Figure 1. The final model, w2(36) 5 65.67, p 5 .00; CFI 5 .97;
RMSEA 5 .06.
Self 5 self-perception;
peer 5 peer-perception;
vic 5 victimization; rej 5 rejection; fri 5 friendlessness. The numbers in parentheses refer to the assessment points. wpo.10, po.05,
po.01, po.001.
stability of each peer adversity over time. Next, there
were paths from self- and peer perceptions at T1 to
all forms of peer adversities at T2, and from peer
adversities at T2 to self- and peer perceptions at T3.
These paths represented the transactional hypothesis
that negative self- or peer perceptions contribute to
the development of peer adversities, and such difficulties, in turn, influence how a child views oneself
or peers. Paths from T1 rejection to T2 victimization
and friendlessness, as well as from T2 rejection to T3
victimization and friendlessness, were also included,
in line with our expectation that rejection might
contribute to other forms of peer adversities later on.
The model fit the data adequately, w2(31) 5 58.33,
p 5 .00, CFI 5 .97, RMSEA 5 .06. It was modified to
increase parsimony and to improve overall coherence and clarity of interpretation. Several paths were
omitted, including paths from T1 peer perceptions to
T2 peer adversities, paths from T2 peer adversities to
T3 self-perceptions, and paths from T2 friendlessness
to T3 friendlessness and T3 peer perceptions. The fit
of the final, reduced model including only significant
paths (Figure 1) was good, w2 (36) 5 65.67, p 5 .00,
CFI 5 .97, RMSEA 5 .06.
Not visible in Figure 1 are the paths indicating the
intercorrelations among T1 variables (see Table 1)
and the estimation of the within-wave residual correlations between all study variables at T2 and T3. At
T2, there was a significant residual correlation between victimization and rejection (r 5.08). At T3,
there were residual correlations between self- and
peer perceptions (r 5.38), between self-perceptions
and victimization (r 5 .09), and between peer
perceptions and all forms of peer adversities (rs
ranging from .12 to .21). Moreover, there were significant residual correlations between T3 rejection
and victimization (r 5.18) and between T3 rejection
and friendlessness (r 5.29).
As can be seen from Figure 1, both self-perceptions and peer perceptions were moderately stable
during the 12-month follow-up period. As already
suggested by the bivariate correlations (Table 1), rejection and victimization were highly stable but
friendlessness showed less stability. As hypothesized, rejection prospectively predicted both victimization and friendlessness (both from T1 to T2 and
from T2 to T3).
Negative self-perceptions were predictive of victimization, rejection, and friendlessness. A negative
view of peers, on the other hand, seemed to be
a consequence rather than an antecedent of peer
Table 1
Means, Standard Deviations, and Bivariate Correlations Between the Study Variables
Variable
M (SD)
1. T1 Self-perception
2.12
2. T1 Peer perception 2.23
3. T1 Victimization
0.16
4. T1 Rejection
0.12
5. T1 Friendlessness
0.07
6. T2 Victimization
0.16
7. T2 Rejection
0.15
8. T2 Friendlessness
0.14
9. T3 Self-perception
2.20
10. T3 Peer perception 2.20
11. T3 Victimization
0.15
12. T3 Rejection
0.06
13. T3 Friendlessness
0.08
Note. N 5 212.
po.05. po.01. po.001.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
(.47)
(.54) .48
(.25) .15 .16
(.86) .16 .25 .52
(.26) .03
.00
.42 .34
(.28) .21
.13
.80 .49 .39
(.82) .25 .26 .45 .66 .33 .49
(.35) .20 .23
.27 .26 .31 .24 .26
(.45) .40
.19
.06
.06
.02
.03
.02
.04
.20 .26 .07
.46
(.50) .24 .38 .24 .31 .08
(.29) .28 .20
.62 .48 .27 .68 .45 .29 .15 .39
(.95) .23 .17
.31 .55 .27 .25 .67 .24 .09
.30 .44
(.27) .13
.05
.25
.28
.26
.23
.29
.18
.05
.20 .34 .18
Peer Adversities and Self- and Peer-Perceptions
adversities. Both victimization and rejection (but not
friendlessness) at T2 contributed to increasingly
negative peer perceptions over time. None of the
T2 peer adversities influenced T3 self-perceptions,
however.
Finally, all possible paths from friendlessness to
later rejection and victimization, and from victimization to rejection and friendlessness were added in
the model, to test them in an explorative manner.
None of the predictive paths from friendlessness or
victimization to other forms of peer adversities were
significant.
Testing Indirect Effects
The model presented in Figure 1 suggests that
children’s self-perceptions ultimately influence their
perceptions of peers, indirectly through victimization and rejection. We next tested the size and significance of these indirect effects. The total indirect
effect of self-perception on peer perception via peer
adversities was significant (b 5 .03, z 5 2.54, po.05).
Looking at the specific indirect effects traveling
through victimization and rejection, it was found
that only the latter one was significant (b 5 .03,
z 5 2.01, po.05).
Multigroup Model Test
As some previous studies suggest that males and
females might respond differently to interpersonal
adversities (e.g., Baldwin, Granzberg, Pippus, &
Pritchard, 2003; Grills & Ollendick, 2002) and place
differential importance on interpersonal relatedness
(Finnegan, Hodges, & Perry, 1998), a multigroup
model test was conducted to investigate whether the
predictive paths presented in Figure 1 were similar
for girls and boys. This was performed by comparing
a model where all paths were constrained to be equal
across gender with a model allowing different
path parameters for girls and boys. Improvement
in model fit using an unconstrained model did
not reach conventional levels of significance,
Dw2(15) 5 24.81, p4.05, suggesting that, for the
overall model, the predictive relations are similar for
both boys and girls.
Although the chi-square difference test was only
marginally significant, we did specify separate
models for boys and girls. Because of the reduced
sample sizes of gender-specific models, the low
numbers of friendless children (the frequencies of
friendless girls varied from 7 to 18 and of friendless
boys from 8 to 12 students at the three assessments),
and the explorative manner of model specification
1167
separately by gender, the findings from these models
are not discussed here. However, the models are
available from the first author.
Discussion
According to transactional models of development
(Caspi et al., 1989; Sameroff & MacKenzie, 2003;
Sroufe & Rutter, 1984), children partly shape their
own social environments, which in turn have an
impact on their subsequent development. In this
study, we hypothesized that negative self- and peerperceptions increase the risk for adverse peer
experiences, and these experiences further modify
children’s perceptions.
To test this hypothesis, we examined the prospective relations between three forms of peer
adversitiesFvictimization, rejection, and friendlessnessFand children’s self-perceptions and their
perceptions of peers in a longitudinal sample with
three waves of data. The predictive paths from selfand peer perceptions to three forms of peer adversities were tested, along with the paths from peer
adversities to self- and peer perceptions. The longitudinal relations between the three forms of peer
adversities were of further interest. Support for a
transactional view of child development was found
in that children’s perceptions influenced their social
experiences with peers and these experiences had
effects on their later perceptions.
A negative self-perception had a more remarkable
role as an antecedent of peer adversities than as their
consequence. Consistent with results from previous
investigations (e.g., Egan & Perry, 1998), it was found
that a negative self-perception puts children at risk
for victimization. This study extends prior research
by showing that a negative self-perception increases
the likelihood of other forms of peer adversities as
well. Feeling worthless and incompetent in the peer
group context had unique influences on victimization, rejection, and friendlessness, despite the fact
that the three forms of peer adversities were interrelated.
Negative self-perceptions may lead to increasing
levels of victimization because negative self-perceptions are associated with depression, hopelessness,
and less assertive and agentic styles of interacting
(Baumeister, Campbell, Krueger, & Vohs, 2003;
Salmivalli et al., 2005). It is conceivable that such selfperceptions lead to behaviors that signal vulnerability and submissiveness, making children with low
self-worth perceived as easy targets of peer abuse
and ridicule. Signs of suffering and submission are
expected and valued by the aggressors (Boldizar,
1168
Salmivalli and Isaacs
Perry, & Perry, 1989), and such responses invite and
reinforce aggressive behavior toward the victims
(Schwartz, Dodge, & Coie, 1993). The processes
through which negative self-perceptions lead to rejection and friendlessness are less clear. One possibility is that these predictive relations are mediated
by social disengagement or withdrawn behavior.
Self-perception is both directly and indirectly
(through lack of agentic goals) associated with
withdrawal (Salmivalli et al., 2005), which is a
known predictor of peer rejection, especially from
middle childhood on (Boivin, Hymel, & Hodges,
2001). Furthermore, withdrawn children are probably less likely to approach peers to initiate friendships, or they might be shy to respond to initiatives
of others. Such processes need to be examined in
future studies.
Although negative peer perceptions were associated concurrently with all forms of peer adversities,
they did not have an independent influence on the
development of peer adversities over time. However,
rejection and, to a lesser extent, victimization each
independently contributed to increasingly negative
peer perceptions. The more children were rejected or
victimized, the more they started to view their peers
as hostile, untrustworthy, and unsupportive.
Friendlessness did not, beyond victimization and
rejection, have such consequences.
Quite unexpectedly, changes in children’s selfperceptions were not influenced by peer adversities.
Although the negative influence of peer adversitiesFespecially victimizationFon self-esteem is often referred to in scientific as well as in popular
writings, many of the empirical studies addressing
this issue have been cross-sectional (see Hawker &
Boulton, 2000), have failed to control for initial levels
of self-worth (Olweus, 1994), or included items
capturing constructs other than self-worth, such as
perceived social competence or social acceptance
(e.g., Caldwell et al., 2004; Ladd & Troop-Gordon,
2003). Overall, the predictive link between victimization and a negative view of self is less than conclusive (Card, 2003). One might also argue that
because self-perceptions seem to be somewhat more
stable than perceptions of peers, there is less variance
to be explained after controlling for stability. Perhaps
changes in self-perceptions take more time to occur,
whereas peer-perceptions are more readily changed
as a result of negative peer experiences. A longitudinal study with a longer time frame would help
clarify whether peer adversities eventually lead to
decreases in self-worth as well.
What exactly does it mean, from the point of view
of further adjustment, that children’s peer-percep-
tions and not self-perceptions were influenced by
the negative peer relations? On the one hand, it
might be more adaptive to think that peers are
unsupportive and hostile than to infer that there
is something wrong with you as a person if peers
treat you badly. On the other hand, it has been
shown (Salmivalli et al., 2005) that a negative view
of peers is associated with reactive aggression, possibly by enhancing the child’s tendency to make
hostile attributions in ambiguous situations with
peers (e.g., Dodge & Coie, 1987; Orobio de Castro et
al., 2002). Negative peer beliefs have also been found
to be associated with feelings of loneliness (Ladd &
Troop-Gordon, 2003) and depression (Rudolph &
Clark, 2001). Although more research is needed,
there is already initial evidence of generalized negative peer perceptions being a risk for social maladjustment.
Overall, our findings indicate that the quality of
children’s self-perceptions ultimately influences
their perceptions of peers. This effect is indirect,
largely attributable to the path traveling through
rejection. A child with a negative view of self is at
risk for peer problems, which in turn make him or
her develop an increasingly negative view of peers
over time. This is consistent with mediated child by
environment models described by Ladd (2003), in
which initial child dispositions influence the types of
relationships they form with peers, and these relationships eventually have an impact on later adjustment.
Rejection was found to predict increases in both
victimization and friendlessness, in addition to being
highly stable itself. This is in accordance with the
findings Hodges and Perry (1999), who showed that
peer rejection, but not number of friends, contributed
to gains in victimization over time, and of Boivin and
Hymel (1997), who found that rejection predicted
variance in both victimization and affiliative relations within classrooms. Similarly, Ladd and TroopGordon (2003) found support for the model that,
among young children, chronic rejection by peers
leads to later rejection, victimization, and friendlessness. This study thus confirmed prior evidence
showing that peer rejection increases the risk for
multiple forms of peer adversities.
Limitations to this study include the differing
time intervals between the assessments: the time
period between T1 and T2 was shorter (4 months)
than that between T2 and T3 (8 months). Admittedly,
a more ideal design would have been one with several assessments with equal time periods between
them. On the other hand, we were able to validate
most of the associations found from T1 to T2 and also
Peer Adversities and Self- and Peer-Perceptions
across the longer time interval from T2 to T3, despite
the differing time intervals.
In this study, friendships were denoted by reciprocal like-most choices. There have been arguments
for asking children who their friends are, rather than
using like-most choices as the basis for identifying
friendship pairs (e.g., Parker & Asher, 1993). Others
have argued, however, that reciprocal like-most
choices are valid indicators of friendships (Bukowski
& Hoza, 1989). Mutual liking is seen as a key factor in
friendships and it strongly differentiates friend from
nonfriend pairs (Newcomb & Bagwell, 1995). Despite the different wordings used, there is wide
agreement that the reciprocity of choice is the most
important methodological criterion when identifying
children’s friends (see Asher, Parker, & Walker, 1996).
The predictive relationships between peer adversities and perceptions about self and others may still
be more complex than suggested by this study.
Several factors might moderate the links between
peer adversities and self- and peer-perceptions. For
instance, a child’s attributions of the reasons for his
or her peer difficulties (Graham & Juvonen, 1998), or
coping strategies (e.g., Kochenderfer-Ladd & Skinner, 2002) might act as moderators.
It is possible that friendlessness, too, moderates
the influences of other forms of peer adversities
rather than being a risk factor in itself. It has been
found, for instance, that having a reciprocated friend
protects children from the negative influences of
victimization (Hodges, Boivin, & Vitaro, 1999). Or
perhaps the identity of the child’s friends, as well as
the quality of relationship with them, is more predictive of changes in self- and peer-perceptions than
merely having a friend or not (e.g., Hartup, 1996;
Parker & Asher, 1993). For instance, conflict-ridden
or coercive friendships may have a more negative
effect on the child’s overall view of peers than not
having a reciprocated friend at all.
In conclusion, this study contributes to existing
literature in several important ways. So far there has
been a lack of studiesFespecially longitudinal
onesFincluding different forms of peer adversities
and comparing their relative contributions with
outcome variables of interest. By simultaneously
examining multiple forms of peer adversities, we
were able to test the unique influences of different,
yet interrelated, negative peer experiences. The same
can be said about self- and peer-perceptions. By including both self- and peer-perceptions among the
variables assessed, one can distinguish how much
each construct contributes to the development of
peer adversities or is influenced by them, after accounting for the shared variance between the two.
1169
This was a considerable strength of the present
study.
Overall, our findings showed that negative selfperceptions predict a wide range of peer problems
and negative perceptions of peers appear to partially
be a consequence of peer problems. Indeed, we
found some support for a transactional model of
child development, thus adding to our understanding of the dynamic interplay between children and
their social environments.
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