Developmental trajectories of students' beliefs about social success: Differences between students with and without a middle school transition.

Introduction: Attaining social success is a significant concern during early adolescence. The characteristics that youth believe will bring social success are known to change over time and vary across contexts, especially over the transition to middle school.

Methods: The analytic sample included 614 students (52% girls, 48% boys; 53% Black, 47% White) from the Midwestern United States.

The role of school friendship stability, instability, and network size in early adolescents' social adjustment.

This study examined longitudinal associations between early adolescents' school friendship stability, instability, and network size and their perceived social adjustment. The final sample consisted of 430 early adolescents residing in seven Midwestern schools (52% female, 47% Black, 42% White, 5% Hispanic or Latinx, and 6% Other). School friendship stability, instability, and network size were assessed via students' peer nominations of their same-grade friendships collected midway through their 7 and 8 grade years.

Changes in behavioral correlates of social status during early adolescence: Does school context matter?

This study investigated the role of school context in changes in the behaviors associated with having high social status during early adolescence. Three waves of surveys were collected from students (N = 542, 53% girls; 44% Black, 44% White, 5% Hispanic/Latinx, and 7% other; 60% free/reduced-fee lunch) in the middle of their sixth, seventh, and eighth grade school years. Peer nominations were used to assess two types of social status (peer acceptance and popularity) and three behavioral reputations (academic, prosocial, and physical aggression).

Social Status and Classroom Behavior in Math and Science during Early Adolescence.

Social status is a salient feature of the classroom peer ecology in early adolescence, yet research has not examined how it plays out within the domains of math and science. The current study investigated the behavioral profiles of cool and admired youth (n = 739, 51% female) in 5th and 6th grade math and science classes. "Cool" youth were perceived by peers as academically oriented, prosocial, and not disruptive.