Predicting Having a Best Friend in Young Children: Individual Characteristics and Friendship Features

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Predicting Having a Best Friendin Young Children: IndividualCharacteristics and FriendshipFeaturesAnne M. Sebanc a , Kathryn T. Kearns a , Maria D. Hernandez a

& Katie B. Galvin aa Whittier CollegePublished online: 07 Aug 2010.

To cite this article: Anne M. Sebanc , Kathryn T. Kearns , Maria D. Hernandez & Katie B.Galvin (2007) Predicting Having a Best Friend in Young Children: Individual Characteristicsand Friendship Features, The Journal of Genetic Psychology: Research and Theory on HumanDevelopment, 168:1, 81-96

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81

Predicting Having a Best Friend in Young Children: Individual Characteristics and

Friendship Features

ANNE M. SEBANCKATHRYN T. KEARNS

MARIA D. HERNANDEZKATIE B. GALVIN

Whittier College

ABSTRACT. In this study, the authors investigated the characteristics that predict best friend status in young children. One hundred and twenty-four preschool, kindergarten, and first-grade children identified their “best friend” and up to four “other friends” in their class. Teachers completed a questionnaire about each friendship to determine positive and negative features of the relationships. First, the authors used individual characteristics to predict if a child had a best friend. The variables age, gender, and peer acceptance predicted that a child would have a best friend. Second, positive friendship features positively pre-dicted best friendships in analyses of all friendship pairs. Best friendships are meaningful relationships to children even at this young age and offer children more positive experi-ences than do other friendships.

Keywords: friendships, peer relationships, young children

BEST FRIENDSHIPS are special relationships in childhood. Sullivan (1953) believed that children only learn empathy and perspective taking when they make a close chum, or best friend, in middle childhood. Research on children in middle childhood and adolescence confirms that best friendships seem to be more influential and are of higher quality than other friendships. School-age children report more caring, companionship, intimacy, and exclusivity in their best friend-ships than in their other friendships (Cleary, Ray, LoBello, & Zachar, 2002). In addition, Berndt and Keefe (1995) found that when early adolescents ranked their best friendships, they evaluated “very best” friends more positively than second-choice best friends, who were evaluated more positively than third-choice best friends. Berndt and Keefe also found that if children’s very best friendships had more positive features, their school involvement increased over the school year. The higher quality in best friends is unsurprising since children may use quality as the criteria to determine their best friend.

The Journal of Genetic Psychology, 2007, 168(1), 81–95Copyright © 2007 Heldref Publications

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82 The Journal of Genetic Psychology

Young children may not be able to describe their friendships as well as older children can. Young children define friends only as peers with whom they play, whereas older children also define friends in terms of emotional reciproci-ties, such as trust and loyalty (Bigelow, 1977). Furthermore, whereas preschool children, when asked why they are friends with a particular child, answer that it is because they play together, older children focus on particular personality characteristics of the friend (Selman, 1980). In these classic studies, Bigelow and Selman measured differences in children’s expectations of friendships rather than differences in children’s behavior with friends. Children as young as kindergar-ten age have been asked to report on their best friendships (Ladd, Kochenderfer, & Coleman, 1996) but other studies comparing younger and older children’s friendship perceptions suggest important limitations in young children’s reports. Children in grades 2 and 3 completing self reports made fewer distinctions between best and other classroom friends than did children in grades 5 and 6, even though both rated best friendships as more positive (Meurling, Ray, & LoBello, 1999). When interviewed, children in middle childhood made fewer distinctions between conflict and support when compared to adolescents and similarly dif-ferentiated between friends and acquaintances less (Berndt & Perry, 1986). This research implies that young children do not distinguish between best friends, other friends, and acquaintances as much as older children do.

Although young children may not be able to discuss the features of their friendships, they still have many of the provisions of friendships described by older children. Most children begin to identify friends in preschool, and these choices are confirmed by teachers’ reports of friendships (Hartup, Laursen, Stewart, & Eastenson, 1988). Young children’s reports of friends tend to be their most frequent and positive playmates (Howes & Phillipsen, 1992), and research-ers consistently find that young children’s friendships involve empathy (Costin & Jones, 1992). Park (1992) found that preschoolers also missed their best friend when the friend moved away, according to mothers. This was especially true if the children were older and the friendships involved positive affect. Preschoolers play in more cooperative ways and resolve conflicts more fairly with friends than with other peers (LaFreniere & Charlesworth, 1987; Hartup, et al., 1988, respectively).

This study was supported by a Whittier College Research Grant to the first author. The author was also supported by NSF grant BCS-0417286 while writing this manuscript. Por-tions of these data were presented at the Society for Research in Child Development, April 2003, in Tampa, FL, as well as at the International Society for the Study of Behavioral Development in Gent, Belgium, July 2004.

The authors thank the children and teachers who participated in the study; Tracy Gleason, Susan Pierce, Jodie Ehrlich, Kristin Friedersdorf, Margarita Duran, Desiree Ramirez, and Jessica Santoyo for comments on earlier versions of this manuscript; and the undergraduate researchers who helped with data collection and coding.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Anne M. Sebanc, Department of Education and Child Development, Whittier College, Whittier, CA, 90601 USA; [email protected] (e-mail).

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Sebanc, Kearns, Hernandez, & Galvin 83

These studies paint a picture of friendships in early childhood that are based on shared play and time together as well as on emotional connection.

Perhaps studying friendship features in ways that do not depend on self-reports would show that young children’s best friendships are different from their other friendships, just as older children’s best friendships differ from their other friendships. In their study of adolescents’ behavior with friends, Brendgen, Markiewicz, Doyle, and Bukowski (2001) showed that girls were more responsive to their higher ranked friends than to other friends and that boys were more likely both to self-disclose with and to criticize their higher ranked friends than their other friends. Although this study of adolescents’ behavior with best friends may not apply to young children, it does suggest that measures of friends’ behavior predict best friend status. Measures of young children’s behavior with friends may also predict best friend status.

Several researchers have measured friendship features of young children using outsiders as reporters. Ladd (1990), however, is the only one to compare best and other friendships using parents as reporters of stability. Ladd found that parents reported kindergarteners’ close friendships to have a duration of 25.5 months compared with secondary friendships that lasted 15.4 months. Both teachers (Sebanc, 2003) and researchers (Park, Lay, & Ramsay, 1993) have suc-cessfully and reliably rated a variety of friendship features of young children. Focusing on the behavior of friends, in the current study we asked teachers about the features of young children’s friendships to predict best friendship status.

Best friendship status may be predicted by relationship features of the friend-ship dyad or by the individual characteristics of the children in the relationship. Research with older children suggests that relationship features, especially positive friendship features and stability, predict children’s best friends (Berndt & Keefe, 1995; Cleary et al., 2002). Though not yet empirically tested, best friend status in young children may have more to do with social skills and maturity rather than with features of the relationship. Howes (1988) found that being more responsive and reciprocal with peers differentiated preschool children who had friends from those who did not. Peer acceptance may predict best friend status because well-liked children have a higher probability that their friendship choices will be reciprocated than do children who are not well liked (Parker & Asher, 1993). Being physically aggressive may make a child less likely to have friends (Snyder, Horsch, & Childs, 1997). In addition, gender probably plays a role in best friend status. Between the ages of four and six, boys have more friends and interact in bigger groups than do girls (Benenson, 1994). Girls and boys at this age are also more likely to befriend same-sex peers (Graham & Cohen, 1997; Howes & Phillipsen, 1992). No previous research has shown that either girls or boys are more likely to have best friends, but boys may have more best friends because of their larger group sizes.

Individual characteristics, such as prosocial behavior, peer acceptance, aggres-sion, and gender, all seem to predict having a friend. As yet, there is no empirical evidence showing that these characteristics will predict which individuals also have a best friend, but the same social skills are likely involved in forming or maintaining a

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best friendship. Best friendships may be more influential than other friendships, but researchers have rarely looked at both best and other friendships in the same study of young children. The main contribution of our study is that we determine whether best friendship status in young children has similar predictors to those in older children.

In this study, we considered best friend status to be both an individual char-acteristic (whether a child had a best friend) and a relationship feature (whether the two friends considered it a best friendship). This required two sets of analyses because in one, the unit of analysis was each individual child, and in the other, it was the pair of friends. From the first analysis, we analyzed to what degree age, gender, peer acceptance, peer rejection, prosocial behavior, and aggression related to having a best friend. From the second analysis using the pair of friends, we investigated whether features of the relationship, such as gender configura-tion, stability, and positive and negative friendship features predicted whether that pair of children would be best friends. Friendship quality and stability are inherently dyadic phenomena, being products of the unique interaction between the individuals in the relationship and not located in either individual (Park et al., 1993; Vaughn, Colvin, Azria, Caya, & Krzysik, 2001;). In the dyadic analyses, children were represented in multiple friendships, for example, with a best friend and then with one or two other friends. Researchers have suggested that individu-als’ friendships are only modestly correlated with each other and can be treated as independent units of analyses (Vaughn et al.).

The following hypotheses guided our research. First, we hypothesized that hav-ing a best friend would be predicted positively by age, peer acceptance, and prosocial behavior, and potentially negatively by peer rejection and aggression. We believed some of these variables would predict having a best friend because they predict having a friend; we conducted additional analyses to determine if these variables predict best friend status uniquely. Second, we hypothesized that looking at pairs of friends, rather than at individual children, would show best friend status to be posi-tively predicted by positive friendship features, gender configuration, and stability. It is notable that in previous studies, researchers have evaluated best friends as being (a) more positive with each other than with other friends but (b) not less negative. Meurling et al (1999) found that although children have equal amounts of conflict with best friends and other classroom friends, they resolved conflicts more quickly and easily with their best friends. We explored negative features, such as conflict, in our analyses, but had no specific hypothesis that they predict best friend status. We tested our hypotheses primarily with nominal logistic regression analyses.

Method

Participants

One hundred and twenty-four children (52 girls, 72 boys) aged 3–7 years participated in this study. Participants were enrolled in either a multiage preschool

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(n = 61, M = 4.21 years, SD = .44 years), full-day kindergarten (n = 34, M = 5.37 years, SD = .41 years), or first grade (n = 29, M = 6.55 years, SD = .38 years) at an ethnically diverse college laboratory school in California. Twenty-one percent of participants were Caucasian or White, 8.9% Asian or Asian American, 48.4% His-panic or Latino, 1% African American, 16.9% Multiracial, and 3.8% of participants indicated “Other” ethnicity or did not indicate any. In each of the three classrooms (preschool, kindergarten, and first grade), one lead teacher and two other teachers participated by completing questionnaires about the students’ friendships.

Measures and Procedure

Sociometric interviews. The picture sociometric interview procedure was similar to that originally described by McCandless and Marshall (1957). After at least one month of school, children were asked to nominate one best friend and up to four other friends from an array of pictures of children in their class. Children were also asked who they did not like in class (up to four classmates) and a series of “guess who” questions in which they were instructed to select one classmate who fit each description. Descriptions contributing to the composite prosocial behavior score included, “Who shares toys?” and “Who is nice to the other children?” Descriptions contributing to the composite aggression score included, “Who fights a lot?,” “Who hits without a reason?,” and “Who says mean things?” We totaled the number of nominations each child received for those items and standardized the scores within each class. We totaled the number of friendship nominations (whether reciprocated or not) each child received and standardized them by classroom to create the variable peer acceptance. We also totaled the number of dislike nominations each child received and standardized them by class to create the variable peer rejection.

Children were interviewed twice, once at the end of the fall semester (December–January) using the complete sociometric interview, and once during the spring semester (March–May). The second interview focused only on friend identification. In the second interview, researchers only asked children to identify their best friend and four other friends in the class and did not ask for the guess who nominations.

After sociometric interviews were completed at each time point, we identified friendships using a choice matrix that depicted whom the children selected as their best or other friends. We considered children to be friends if they each selected each other as a friend (either best or other status). We examined the choice matrix for each class to determine the pairs of friends mutually selected by the children and identified 129 pairs of reciprocal friendships (46 from the multiage preschool, 35 from kindergarten, and 48 from first grade). Forty-one pairs of friendships were identified only in the first interview, 54 pairs were identified only in the sec-ond interview and 34 pairs were stable friendships identified in both interviews. On average, children had 2.37 (SD = 1.70) mutual friends from both interviews

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combined. Of the 129 pairs of friends, 48 pairs were comprised of boys, 64 pairs were comprised of girls, and 17 pairs were mixed-gender. We used gender con-figuration (boy–boy, girl–girl, mixed) as a variable in the analysis predicting the pair’s best friend status. Twenty-eight children (23%) did not have friends at either interview and therefore were excluded from the friendship pair analyses.

Best friendship status. We created a dichotomous variable called best friend-ship status. If neither child selected their friend as a best friend, we labeled that friendship as other. If one or both of the friends selected the other as a best friend, we labeled it a best friendship. Of the total 129 friendships, 61 were other, and 68 were best friendships (48 that one friend identified as best, and 20 that both friends identified as best). Since most children had more than one friend, many had one best friend and one or two other friends. To determine an individual’s best friend status, we coded whether any of their friendships were best. This was a dichotomous variable created to compare children with and without at least one best friend. Of the 96 children who had at least one friend, 14 did not have a best friendship, and 82 had at least one best friendship.

Stability. Because children were interviewed twice regarding their friend-ships, we could investigate the stability of friendships. We identified 75 friend-ships in the first interview, and 34 (45%) of those friendships were also identified in the second interview. In addition, we identified 54 new friendships in the second interview.1 Of the 34 stable friendships, 26 retained their best friendship status (11 other, 15 best). The eight pairs that changed status were three who improved in status, going from other to best friends, and five who declined in status by being identified as other friendships after having been a best friendship. We created the dichotomous variable stability to indicate if the friendship was identified in both interviews (stable) or only in one (unstable). Because only a small number of friendships changed in best friend status, we were unable to investigate best friend status change.

Friendship features. In completing the Friendship Features Questionnaire (FFQ; Sebanc, 2003) teachers indicated on a 5-point Likert scale how true a par-ticular characteristic (e.g., fight a lot) was of the relationship between two friends. Teachers completed FFQs approximately 1 month after the interviews (one set in the fall and another in the spring) for all friends identified in their respective classes; they did not complete the FFQ twice for stable friendships, however. We did not inform the teachers of the results of the sociometric interviews in terms of best friend status or stability of the pairs in their class. We encouraged the teachers to complete the questionnaires at a team meeting. Teams were used because each room had one master teacher and two student teachers (always postbaccalaureate but precredential or premasters) so their experience working with children varied and may have affected their perceptions of friendships. Moreover, each teacher

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instructed one small group of children (5–7 children) more intensively for the entire year; therefore, teachers knew some children better than others.

The instructions at the top of the FFQ asked teachers to think about a pair of friends (names specified) and what the friends do when they are playing together. The scores ranged from 0 (not at all true) to 4 (really true). This 36-item question-naire was adapted from older children’s self-report measures for use on preschool children’s friendships and has been shown to be reliable and valid (see Sebanc, 2003, for scale description and origin). The FFQ measures Help and Guidance, Validation and Aid, Companionship, Intimate Exchange, Exclusivity, Conflict and Betrayal, Asymmetry/Relative Power, and Conflict Resolution. Each scale mean was submitted to a principal components analysis and similar results were found when compared to previous research with the FFQ.2

The principal components analysis revealed two super factors in which all positive features loaded on the first factor and all negative features loaded on the second. The positive factors were Help and Guidance (6 items, α = .94), with a factor loading of .85 on Factor 1 and –.14 on Factor 2; Validation and Aid (3 items, α = .94), with .89 on Factor 1 and –.19 on Factor 2; Companionship (5 items, α = .90), with .89 on Factor 1 and –.09 on Factor 2; Intimate Exchange (2 items, α = .91), with .84 on Factor 1 and .14 on Factor 2; and Exclusivity (6 items, α = .88), with .82 on Factor 1 and .25 on Factor 2. The negative features were Conflict and Betrayal (7 items, α = .78), with factor loadings of .21 on Factor 1 and .78 on Factor 2; Asymmetry/Relative Power (5 items, α = .94), with .37 on Factor 1 and .61 for Factor 2; and Conflict Resolution (2 items, α = .92), with .51 loading on Factor 1 and –.67 on Factor 2. Conflict resolution, though not a negative feature, was negatively weighted on Factor 2 and therefore represents the lack of conflict resolution as a negative friendship feature. Weighted means for the super factors were created and called Positive Features (Factor 1) and Negative Features (Factor 2). The alphas for all the scales showed adequate internal consistency.

Results

We conducted analyses to test the hypotheses in three steps. First, we found correlations between all the independent variables we used in the regression analyses to rule out multicollinearity problems. Having correlations greater than .70 between independent variables in regression analyses increases the chances of multicollinear-ity and concluding an inaccurate relationship between independent and dependent variables. The correlation results are reported at the beginning of each of the two sub-sections. Second, we conducted hierarchical binary logistic regression analyses using the individual children as the unit of analysis to determine if individual characteristics predicted having a best friend. We also repeated these analyses using the characteristic having a friend as the dependent variable. Third, we entered relationship characteris-tics into hierarchical binary logistic regression analyses on the pairs of friends to see whether relationship characteristics predicted best friendship status.

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Predicting an Individual Having a Best Friend or Not: Demographics and Peer Reports

We conducted correlations between all the independent variables to be entered in the regression analyses (see Table 1). We conducted Pearson zero order correlations between the continuous variables and Spearman correlations on the categorical variables with any of the other variables. Gender was cor-related with peer rejection and aggression. Boys were more likely to receive higher scores on both aggression and peer rejection. We found significant cor-relations between peer acceptance and prosocial behavior, as well as between peer rejection and aggression. Because aggression and peer rejection were correlated at greater than .70, multicollinearity was a problem. This strong correlation suggested that peers identified the same children as aggressive and as someone they disliked. Because both variables also had the same predicted relationship to best friend status (potentially keeping children from having best friends), we eliminated aggression from the logistic regression analyses to increase the reliability of the coefficients. The correlation between acceptance and prosocial behavior was moderate enough to use both in the logistic regres-sion model (r = .54).

We conducted a hierarchical binary logistic regression analysis to determine which individual characteristics (gender, age, peer acceptance, rejection, and prosocial behavior) predicted a child’s best friendship status (no best, at least one best). Two blocks were entered in the regression equation: we entered the demographic variables of gender and age in the first block, followed by peer acceptance, peer rejection, and prosocial behavior in the second block. The first block was significant, Nagelkerke R2 = .15, χ2

block (2, N = 124) = 14.43, p < .001, with age being a significant predictor of having a best friend (Wald statistic = 10.76, p = .001); gender was not significant (Wald = 2.60, p = .11). The final model with both blocks entered was significant, Nagelkerke R2 = .34, χ2

model

TABLE 1. Correlations Between Individual Characteristics

Measures 1 2 3 4 5 6

1. Age — .04 .12 –.00 .13 .022. Gender (all Spearman’s rho) — — .03 .38** –.05 .38**

3. Peer acceptance — — — –.08 .54** .014. Peer rejection — — — — –.06 .71***

5. Prosocial behavior — — — — — –.146. Aggression — — — — — —

**p < .01. ***p < .001.

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(5, N = 124) = 35.18, p < .001. The variables in the model that predicted best friendship status besides age (Wald = 8.18, p = .004), were being a girl (Wald = 4.38, p = .04), peer acceptance (Wald = 5.58, p = .02), and, marginally, proso-cial behavior (Wald = 3.18, p = .08). Having a best friend was not predicted by peer rejection (Wald = 2.65, p = .10). In general, the following characteristics predicted having a best friend: being older, being a girl, being more popular, and being more prosocial.

Because predicting which children will have a best friend may be the same as predicting which children will have a friend (a requirement of having a best friend), we used a second logistic regression with the same predictors as the last analysis to predict having a friend. The first block with age and gender was sig-nificant, Nagelkerke R2 = .08, χ2

block (2, N = 124) = 6.97, p = .03. Age significantly predicted having a friend (Wald = 5.72, p = .02). The model with both blocks entered was also significant, Nagelkerke R2 = .30, χ2

model (5, N = 124) = 27.38, p < .001. Besides age (Wald = 3.68, p = .06), which was marginally significant, peer acceptance (Wald = 9.15, p = .003) was the only other variable that significantly predicted having a friend (see Table 2).

TABLE 2. Logistic Regression Analyses: Predicting Having a Best Friend and Having a Friend From Individual Children’s Characteristics

Predictors Odds ratio Confidence interval

Having a best friend

Step 1 Gender (being a girl) 2.90* 1.07–7.89 Age 2.14*** 1.27–3.61Step 2 Peer acceptance 1.99* 1.12–3.51 Peer rejection 1.48 0.92–2.37 Prosocial behavior 1.73+ 0.95–3.18

Having a friend

Step 1 Gender (being a girl) .65 0.22–1.91 Age 1.72+ 0.99–3.00Step 2 Peer acceptance 3.15* 1.50–6.63 Peer rejection .95 0.59–1.54 Prosocial behavior 1.33 0.65–2.70

+p < .10. *p < .05. ***p < .001.

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Predicting Whether a Pair Are Best Friends: Gender Composition, Stability, and Friendship Features

We conducted correlations on all of the pairs’ relationship features. Gender composition, stability, and best friend status were correlated using Spearman’s rho. We also conducted correlation analyses between positive and negative friendship features and these categorical variables using Spearman’s rho. All correlations were less than .10 and not significant with the following exception: stability was positively and significantly correlated with Positive Friendship Fea-tures (r =.19, p = .033). Positive and Negative Friendship Features were also not correlated with each other according to a Pearson product moment correlation (r = .000, p = 1.00). Because all correlations were small or not significant, we included all friendship variables in the logistic regression analyses without risk of multicollinearity.

We conducted a hierarchical binary logistic regression analysis to determine which relationship features (gender configuration, stability over the school year, positive features, and negative features) predicted the two friends’ best friendship status (other or best). Two blocks were entered in the regression equation: we entered gender configuration and stability (both categorical) in the first block, fol-lowed by positive features and negative features (both continuous) in the second block. The first block was not significant, Nagerlerke R2 = .06, χ2

block (3, N = 129) = 5.95, p = .11, but the final model with both blocks entered was significant, with Nagelkerke R2 = .17 and χ2

model (5, N = 129) = 17.52, p = .003. Best friendship status was predicted by positive features (Wald = 9.22, p =.002), and marginally by stability (Wald = 2.92, p = .07; see Table 3). More positive and stable friend-ships were more likely to be best friends.

TABLE 3. Binary Logistic Regression Analyses: Predicting Best Friend Sta-tus From Dyadic Friendship Features

Predictors Odds ratio Confidence interval

Step 1 Gender configuration Boy–boy .80 0.25–2.60 Girl–girl .48 0.15–1.51 Boy–girl — — Stability 2.17+ 0.89–5.28Step 2 Positive quality 1.86* 1.25–2.78 Negative quality 1.27 0.87–1.84

+p < .10. *p < .05.

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Discussion

Consistent with our hypotheses, both individual characteristics and rela-tionship features predicted best friend status. Having a best friend was pre-dicted positively by age and peer acceptance and also marginally by prosocial behavior. Gender also predicted best friend status, and girls were more likely than boys to have a best friend. Peer rejection did not predict best friend status, and aggression was not investigated due to a risk of multicollinearity. In the analyses of friendship pairs, stability and positive friendship features predicted being best friends. Gender configuration of the pair and negative friendship features did not predict best friend status. Peer acceptance seems to be the key individual characteristic in both having a friend and having a best friend. When we used the regression analysis to predict having a friend rather than having a best friend, peer acceptance largely increased the odds of having a friend, and age marginally contributed to having a friend. Other researchers have found peer acceptance and friendships to overlap slightly but still be dif-ferent constructs (see Parker & Asher, 1993). Though we did not explore this particular question, peer acceptance was only related to prosocial behavior and not to the other individual characteristics. Peer acceptance is likely to be a necessity for friendship, but not the sole determining factor of who will have a best friend.

There are several reasons why older children are both more likely to have a friend and to have a best friend. In the present study, participants ranged in age from 3 to 7 years. Most of the age effects found were that children in kindergar-ten and first grade were more likely to have friends, and therefore best friends, than were preschoolers. Researchers have shown that children in preschool have fewer friends than do school-age children (Hartup, 1992). As children’s social networks expand, they probably increase the chance of making a best friend. In general, older children may be more likely to have a friend because they are more familiar with the questions the researcher asked, have thought about their friendships more than younger children, or their friendships are more important to them. Corrie and Leitao (1999) suggested that only socially able preschoolers have accurate judgments of their social network. However, the findings of the present study, that some preschool children identify best friendships and that teachers confirm these friendships to be more positive, should not be discounted. The children with best friendships in preschool may be more socially able and aware than those without.

Gender and prosocial behavior predicted having a best friend but did not pre-dict having a friend. Boys and girls were equally likely to have a friend, but girls were more likely to have a best friend than were boys. Girls tend to have a smaller number of friends than do boys (Benenson, 1994). School-aged girls also have more intimate friendships than boys have (Berndt & Perry, 1986). The features of girls’ friendships, therefore, may lead them to have one close friend and label

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them such. Girls also place more emphasis on suggestions and on the conven-tions of turn-taking in early childhood than do boys, who use more commands and overt aggression than girls use (Maccoby, 1986). The emphasis on prosocial behavior in girls’ groups may give girls an advantage over boys for making best friendships at this age because prosocial behavior was also mariginally related to best friend status.

As hypothesized, positive relationship features predicted whether a friend-ship was considered a best friendship. This implies that the term best friend already describes a different kind of relationship for young children. Best friend-ships have greater support, companionship, and exclusivity than do other friend-ships according to teacher ratings. Whether the friendship was stable over several months also predicted whether it would be considered a best friendship. It could be that children base the label best friend on one or all of these features of a rela-tionship. We did not investigate children’s perceptions of their best friendships or reasons for calling someone a best friend. Rather, in this study we show that children at this age use the label best friend to describe some of their relationships and that teachers view these relationships as more positive. Children at this age have always been considered limited in the way they select friends, their ability to differentiate between friends, or in their friendship expectations. However, an alternative explanation may be that children cannot express their knowledge of features of friendships or what they do with their best friends. Clearly, teachers recognize something different about best friendships for children at this age.

Contrary to our hypothesis, gender configuration did not predict best friend status. We hypothesized that same sex pairs would more likely be best friends than would cross-sex pairs. Whether the relationship was between two boys, two girls, or a boy and a girl, they were equally likely to be best friends. The small number of cross-sex friendships may have limited the predictability of best friend status. These analyses also compared boy–boy and girl–girl friendships rather than same-sex and cross-sex friendships, and this could also decrease the power to detect a difference. Nonetheless, several cross-sex friendships were considered best friends, and we conclude that there was no difference in the likelihood that cross-sex friendships would be best friends.

Comparing each regression result suggests that individual characteristics pre-dicted best friendship status better than relationship features did. The Nagelkerke R2 measures the percentage of cases that were correctly predicted by the model (Nagelkerke, 1991). Individual characteristics predicting best friend status had the largest R2, followed by individual characteristics predicting having a friend, and relationship features predicting the pair’s friendship status. This may mean that we did not look at the correct relationship variables to predict the pair’s best friendship status. It may also be that having a best friend or not is more of a trait variable at this age, whereas whether a relationship is currently a best friendship is more of a state variable. In other words, it is possible that a popular, prosocial girl over age 5 will always have a best friend at school but who that best friend is

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may change. Given the instability of young children’s friendships, perhaps best friend status is more of an individual characteristic than a relationship feature. This question should be investigated with school age children and adolescents to determine if it is only true at this age.

There are several limitations of the study that may affect the interpretation of the results. First, we only measured children’s school friendships and the features that teachers could rate. Variables such as how often children see each other out of school or how long they have known each other could play an important role in predicting best friend status. Second, teachers may be problematic reporters as they were asked to rate all friendships in their classroom. Invariably, teachers see some friends interact more with other friends and have opinions about individuals that may affect their reports of friends. Third, we did not investigate interactions between the independent variables in our regression analyses. It could be that friends who were highly positive and not negative were more likely to be best friends. Interaction terms were not investigated because of the small sample size, but in future research cluster analyses could be used to determine if there are types of best friendships. Finally, assuming that a child’s friendship with one friend is independent of their friendship with another may limit our results. We treated the friendships as independent by allowing all friendships of a particular child to be included in the dyadic analyses, as previous research has done (Vaughn et al., 2001). Friendship features, however, are likely to be affected by each individual in the pair, as well as their unique interaction when the two come together. Including multiple friendships from one child in the dyadic analyses may wash out differ-ences between best and other friendships.

Despite these limitations, we show that beginning in preschool, best friend-ships seem to be special relationships. The main contributions of our findings are that we found young children’s best friendships to be more positive than other friendships, similar to research with older children, and we found that having a best friend was predicted by positive individual traits. Young children’s best friendships may be more similar to older children’s than previously thought. Greater quality may suggest that best friendships are more influential and impor-tant than other friendships. Other researchers have shown that having a friendship that offers validation and aid helps young children enjoy school and feel support-ed by classmates (Ladd, et al., 1996). Teachers and parents, therefore, may want to promote children’s friendships at school by allowing children to choose their own partners for activities, offering activities for only two children, encouraging play dates outside of school, and working on prosocial behavior. Best friend status can be promoted by coaching and partnering children who already like each other (Franco & Stape, 1999). Because children with best friends were more popular and prosocial, practice in best friendships may increase social skills for younger children. Further investigation of the influence of best friendships and prosocial behavior during the early school years should be conducted to determine the direction of cause and effect.


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NOTES

1. Comparisons were made between friendships identified in interview 1 and inter-view 2 (leaving out those identified in both), and they did not differ on any of the variables of interest according to multivariate analyses of variance and logistic regression analyses. Analyses of friendships, therefore, do not use interview time as a variable.

2. In Sebanc (2003), four friendship features were requested from the principal components analysis and they were called Support, Conflict, Exclusivity/Intimacy, and Asymmetry. Conflict resolution loaded equally on support and conflict (negatively) but was excluded from the analyses.

AUTHOR NOTE

Anne M. Sebanc is an associate professor of child development at Whittier College who studies children’s friendships. In her current research, which is funded by the National Science Foundation, she is investigating friendships of Latino students across the transi-tion to middle school.

Kathryn T. Kearns received her BA in Child Development from Whittier College and is currently completing her credential.

Maria D. Hernandez received her BA in Child Development and MA in Education from Whittier College.

Katie B. Galvin completed her BA in Child Development at Whittier College.

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Received June 8, 2006Accepted June 8, 2007


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Documents

Predicting Having a Best Friend in Young Children: Individual Characteristics and Friendship Features