The effects of age, gender, and gender role ideology on adolescents’ social perspective-taking ability and tendency in friendships

Abstract

Social perspective taking (SPT; i.e., the social-cognitive process of inferring another person's thoughts and feelings) is commonly thought to be essential for successful social relationships, yet the bulk of past work on the development of SPT does not consider youths' tendency to engage in SPT in the context of their close relationships. The current study of adolescents (ages 12-17, N ¼ 158) helps move the field forward by distinguishing between adolescents' SPT ability (i.e., whether they are developmentally capable of SPT) and their tendency to apply this ability in their actual social relationships, namely, friendships, and considering the roles of gender and age. Results indicate that SPT ability and SPT tendency are distinct, suggesting that youths do not always put to use the SPT skills that they possess. Girls scored higher than boys on both SPT ability and SPT tendency. Boys and girls had significant gains in SPT ability across adolescence. Surprisingly, however, boys' SPT tendency decreased from early to later adolescence, indicating that older boys tend to engage in less SPT in their friendships despite increasing ability to do so. This is worrisome given the importance of SPT in promoting high-quality relationships. Importantly, gender role ideology predicted this tendency in boys, such that boys with more stereotypical gender beliefs tended to engage in less SPT with their friends. Thus, the current findings point to the importance of going beyond mean-level gender differences to consider gendered beliefs and suggest that interventions aimed at promoting egalitarian views may help foster SPT and successful friendships among boys.

Age-varying associations between coping and depressive symptoms throughout adolescence and emerging adulthood

“…Developmental shifts in social factors, stress sensitivity, and the nature of stressors experienced by females and males suggest that gender differences in coping–depressive symptom associations may be greatest during middle to late adolescence and then dissipate into emerging adulthood. Social pressure to conform to culturally prescribed gender roles is heightened during early to middle adolescence as youth enter a phase of identity formation and increased peer salience (Flannery & Smith, 2016). As a result of these socialization processes, adolescent girls may be more likely to engage in emotion-focused strategies, such as rumination or venting emotions, and social support seeking in comparison to adolescent boys.…”

“…As a secondary objective, gender differences in the age-varying associations between specific coping strategies and depressive symptoms were investigated across adolescence and emerging adulthood. Based on gender differences in socialization processes, emotional reactivity, and stressor types that emerge during adolescence, we hypothesized that the associations between venting emotions, emotional support seeking, and instrumental support seeking and depressive symptoms would be stronger among females relative to males during the adolescent period (Flannery & Smith, 2016; Oldehinkel & Bouma, 2011; Rose & Rudolph, 2006). We also expected that these gender differences would not be observed during the emerging adulthood period due to developmental advances in social functioning, identity development, and acquisition and application of these coping strategies (Haan, 2013; Skinner & Zimmer-Gembeck, 2015).…”

An Examination of the Role of Mentees’ Social Skills and Relationship Quality in a School‐Based Mentoring Program

“…On the one hand, mentees could have overestimated their social skills due to a lack of self‐insight or social desirability. On the other hand, for boys, social skills might increasingly become less desired with increasing age, and therefore, self‐reports might give an underestimation (Flannery & Smith, ).…”

“…Interestingly, inconsistent with studies that showed neurological maturation during adolescence to be linked to increased social skills (Crone & Dahl, ), in the current study younger and not older mentees reported higher social skills. Research showed that for boys, although their interpersonal competence is increasing with age, they tend to engage in less social behavior due to their gender role ideology becoming more stereotypically (Flannery & Smith, ). This might explain the lower scores on social skills for older boys, which refers to either their actual behavior or the way they self‐reported their behavior.…”

“…On the one hand, mentees could have overestimated their social skills due to a lack of self-insight or social desirability. On the other hand, for boys, social skills might increasingly become less desired with increasing age, and therefore, self-reports might give an underestimation (Flannery & Smith, 2017). Despite these limitations, the current study is, to the best of our knowledge, the first to examine a school-based mentoring program in the Netherlands, taking into account age and gender differences.…”