Suchergebnisse

The pervasive emotional and cognitive experience of loneliness has been linked to rejection experiences and emotional sensitivity, such as rejection sensitivity (RS), defined as the tendency to anxiously expect and overreact to rejection. Moreover, RS is founded on attachment theory and has been described as a correlate of anxiety and avoidance of intimacy in close relationships. The aims of this study of 639 preadolescents (Grades 5 to 7) were to test whether the association between relationship stressors and loneliness is indirect due to the mediational role of RS, and whether the association between RS and loneliness is indirect via anxiety and avoidance of peer intimacy. As expected, regression results showed that adolescents who reported heightened perceptions of parental rejection and victimisation by peers had greater RS, which in turn was associated with adolescents' greater feelings of loneliness. Also, as predicted, adolescents with heightened RS reported more avoidance and anxiety about peer intimacy. Although anxiety about intimacy mediated the association between RS and loneliness for both boys and girls, avoidance mediated between girls', but not boys', RS and loneliness. The findings highlight the interrelations between multiple forms of emotional sensitivities, and the importance of parent-child relationships, peer victimisation, and emotional sensitivity for explaining loneliness.

Relational aggression is defined as behaviours intended to harm others by damaging their relationships. Drawing from two theoretical perspectives, the social process model and the peer socialisation model, we tested how relational aggression and victimisation could influence each other over time, and examined peer status and gender as moderators of these bidirectional associations. We hypothesised that aggression would lead to increasing victimisation and victimisation to increasing aggression, and that the association from aggression to later victimisation would be weaker for more popular and preferred youth, especially girls. Participants were 328 Australian early adolescents (172 boys, 156 girls) in Grades 5, 6 or 7, who nominated classmates who were aggressive, victimised, popular, and preferred. Results showed support for the role of status and gender in the bidirectional associations between aggression and victimisation. Relational aggression was associated with more T2 relational victimisation only among adolescents who were low in popularity and among girls with low social preference. Victimisation was associated with T2 aggressive behaviour among more popular girls. Relational victimisation was also associated with less T2 aggression among popular boys. Findings highlight the complexities introduced by gender and social status for the unfolding of early adolescent relational aggression and victimisation.