Adolescents’ Characteristics and Peer Relationships in Class: A Population Study

Abstract

Background: This study aimed to investigate differences in adolescents’ social relationships with classmates of diverse gender, socioeconomic status, immigrant background, and academic achievement. Methods: A population of 10th-grade students (N = 406,783; males = 50.3%; Mage = 15.57 years, SDage = 0.75) completed the Classmates Social Isolation Questionnaire (CSIQ), an instrument specifically designed to measure two distinct but correlated types of peer relationships in class: peer acceptance and peer friendship. To obtain reliable comparisons across diverse adolescent characteristics, the measurement invariance of the CSIQ was established by means of CFAs and then latent mean differences tests were performed. Results: Immigrant background, academic achievement, and socioeconomic status all proved to be important factors influencing relationships with classmates, while being a male or a female was less relevant. Being a first-generation immigrant adolescent appears to be the foremost risk factor for being less accepted by classmates, while having a low academic achievement is the greatest hindrance for having friends in the group of classmates, a finding that diverges from previous studies. Conclusions: This population study suggests that adolescent characteristics (especially immigrant background, socioeconomic status, and academic achievement) seem to affect social relationships with classmates.

Addressing Adolescents’ Prejudice toward Immigrants: The Role of the Classroom Context

“…Prejudice against immigrants is still a critical issue for many Western countries, including Italy (Bergamaschi, 2013;Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development;OECD, 2017). Given that youth is considered a crucial period in life development, comprising becoming more aware of intergroup attitudes and relations (Cavicchiolo et al, 2022) with various social groups (Crocetti et al, 2022), schools represent a core context wherein adolescents can meet others and develop or change attitudes toward various aspects of life (e.g., democratic attitudes; civic participation; Hooghe & Dassonneville, 2013), with important implications for intergroup relations and prejudice (Verkuyten, 2018). Classesas cultural environments in which adolescents are socialized to the opinions of others and influenced by them (Mitchell, 2019) play a fundamental role in adolescents' views about immigrants (Eckstein et al, 2021;Miklikowska et al, 2021), but classlevel analyses of the factors affecting adolescents' prejudice toward immigrant are limited (e.g., Wilson-Daily et al, 2018).…”

Internet addiction in young adults: The role of impulsivity and codependency

“…In light of current developments, we believe there is a need to provide adequate distinctions between different types of addiction and to differentiate areas affected by possible problems. Considering that the administrations took place after the period of greatest impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy ( 84 ) which, as we know, imposed a prolonged isolation and reduction in direct contacts, it is probable that these percentages are affected by the impact of social isolation ( 85 , 86 ) and that this has contributed to a compensatory search on the Internet. The results are, however, similar to the findings of the study by Salarvand et al ( 87 ), also conducted with university students.…”

Prejudice towards Immigrants: A Conceptual and Theoretical Overview on Its Social Psychological Determinants

“…Even though immigrants continue to be victims of major discrimination (e.g., being denied housing or being denied a promotion) or hate speech (e.g., Bilewicz and Soral 2020), they often experience more "routine" forms of discrimination: For instance, they are avoided or disrespected in public places, monitored in stores, or treated with condescendence or paternalism (e.g., Taylor et al 2019). Even immigrant pupils are often harassed and bullied by their peers (e.g., Alivernini et al 2019;Bayram Özdemir et al 2016) and risk being socially isolated in the classroom (e.g., Cavicchiolo et al 2022Cavicchiolo et al , 2023. Moreover, teachers frequently evaluate students with immigrant backgrounds as less academically competent than native students (Kleen and Glock 2018;Menegatti et al 2017), undermining their academic performance, motivation, and well-being (Manganelli et al 2021;Paletta et al 2017).…”