This study examined the relationship between adolescents 'adjustment and their supportive relations with significant others. It linked the Bowlby concept of social attachment with that of social support (derived from social network theory) in describing the exchange content of adolescents' interactions with parents, peer-friends, and adult nonkin. Within each of these three support systems, only moderate relationships were found between adolescents' number of supports and the strength of attachments to members of the respective support systems. Fewer relationships were found between supports and adjustment than between attachments and adjustment. For both sexes, the strength of attachments to parents and to teachers was associated with young people's positive feelings about themselves. Network ties providing informational support (encouragement, guidance, and advice) were related to girls'and boys'academic outcomes in different ways: among girls, support from parents and adult nonkin was related to academic self-concept, whereas among boys, support from friends was negatively related to self-concept and educational plans.
Students from 30 elementary school classrooms were classified according to the transition paths taken in moving from elementary school to 32 high school classrooms, and their adjustment was assessed at three time-points (prior to the transition, shortly after the transition event, and 4 months later). Results showed strong effects for transition path for both the expectations and reactions measures, with no effects for gender or personality factors. Where ecological change was greatest (i.e., moving from a small school to a large school) students were initially most optimistic, but also showed the greatest anxiety following the move. Later assessment of adolescents' perceptions of classroom environment found less favorable views following transition, with an increase recorded in the level of pressure and a decrease in supportiveness.
This study examined the social ecology of families in new mining towns by means of network analysis. It compared the personal social networks of 44 mothers living in mining towns with a similar group of mothers living in rural service towns, in terms of structural, interactional and support characteristics. Qualitatively different adaptation patterns were found between the two groups, which suggest that mining women are under more psychological stress than women in country towns. Mining women were less socially integrated into their community, had more fragile social networks, and were in greater need of social support than their country‐town counterparts.
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