Friends' influences on young people's aggression risk

Just as a young person's earlier aggression is likely to predispose later aggression, the person's friends may also play a role in the predisposition. For the latter, however, theory and research have not been consistently supportive. To clarify the personal and friends' influences, the present study analyzed data from 1746 Hong Kong Chinese pupils (i.e., 4th to 7th graders). The data included direct measures of friends nominated by the pupils. Results show that association with friends did not affect aggression risk. Friend aggression had a very weak but statistically significant effect on aggression risk, when the friend was the first nominated friend or reciprocally nominated friend. This effect was higher when the pupil had higher aggression before. The weak and conditional effects of friend aggression suggest that friendship had little direct influence on the child's aggression.

Highlight
► Association with friends did not affect a pupil's aggression risk.
► Friend aggression showed a very weak effect on pupil's aggression risk.
► The about effect is stronger when the pupil's aggression is higher.
► The effects were not statistically significant for all types of friends.