Social Motives Underlying Antisocial Behavior Across MiddleSchool Grades

摘要

The goal of the study was to examine whethersocial motives (social mimicry, mutual attraction, andunreciprocated attraction) predict changes in antisocialbehavior across middle school grades. The 2,003 initialparticipants (55% girls) were drawn from a larger longi-tudinal study of urban public school students: 44% Latino,26% African-American, 10% Asian, 9% Caucasian, and11% multiracial. Analyses of peer nominations and tea-cher-rated behavior included five waves of data betweenthe fall of sixth grade and the spring of eighth grade(n = 1,260-1,347 for longitudinal analyses). Supportingthe social mimicry hypothesis, students who associatedpeer-directed aggression with high social status in thebeginning of middle school engaged in elevated levels ofantisocial conduct during the second year in the newschool. Additionally, unreciprocated attraction towardpeers who bully others in the beginning of middle schoolwas related to increased antisocial behavior in the last yearof middle school. No support was obtained for the mutualattraction hypothesis. The findings provide insights aboutpossible social motives underlying susceptibility to nega-tive peer influence.