Does the Residential Landscape Contextualize Friendships? Examining the Causes and Consequences of Affiliating with Older Friends

Abstract

Objectives: Examine the relationships among structural disadvantage, friendship network age composition, and violent offending by investigating the contextual and individual etiology of affiliating with older friends and exploring the mechanisms that link friendship network age composition to violent offending. Method: Hierarchical linear models analyze 8,481 respondents distributed across 1,485 census tracts from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health. Social network data are used to construct a measure of the proportion of a respondent’s friendship network that is at least one grade older than the respondent. Results: Consistent with hypotheses, structural disadvantage increases affiliations with older friends, older friendship networks report higher levels of violence, and affiliating with older friends increases violence among respondents. Contrary to expectations, the influence of affiliating with older friends on respondent violence decreases, rather than increases, as levels of violence in the friendship network increase. Conclusions: The results shed light on the inextricable linkages among social context, friendship network composition, and sociobehavioral outcomes among youth. The findings inform peer mentoring program evaluations observing iatrogenic effects via peer deviancy.

School Transitions, Peer Processes, and Delinquency: A Social Network Approach to Turning Points in Adolescence

“…In supplemental analyses, we consider whether responses to the out-of-grade friendship question vary by individuals’ delinquency participation and school district transition structures (see Supplemental Materials, Part B). Complementing prior work (Yohros & Zimmerman, 2020), we find that delinquent youth tend to report more out-of-grade friends than nondelinquent youth. However, this pattern does not vary across the district types in our sample, which reduces the likelihood that out-of-school friendship patterns are driving the findings presented here.…”

Learning disability in adolescence and civic engagement in young adulthood: Uncovering social‐psychological mechanisms

“…According to James Coleman's theories of structures and status systems in the students (Coleman 1961), school social structures create hierarchies and inequalities within schools, which can have a significant impact on students’ social as well as academic experiences (Field 1991). Student groups shaped by demographic and social characteristics reinforce inequalities within schools (Yohros and Zimmerman 2020), causing students with LD to experience more stigma and less social support, which can affect their sense of belonging and willingness to engage in civic action. In addition, a school culture that values academic achievement may be less supportive of students with LD, thereby reducing their sense of belonging and discouraging civic engagement both in adolescence and adulthood (Kim 2020).…”