Participants in the present study were 551 French Canadian children (301 boys, 250 girls) from a small community in northwestern Quebec, Canada (population 30,000).

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Participants in the present study were 551 French Canadian children (301 boys, 250 girls) from a small community in northwestern Quebec, Canada (population 30,000). They attended five elementary schools from kindergarten up to Grade 6, after which they transferred to one large high school. The elementary schools were homogeneous in size, characteristics of the children in the classes, and neighborhood characteristics. All French-speaking children in the community were targeted for study in each year of data collection, beginning in kindergarten (1986 – 1987). At least 90% of the children in the targeted classrooms participated in the study in each year. The current study uses data collected across 8 years from when the children were in kindergarten (M age 5 6.10 years, SD 5 .30) to when they were in seventh grade (M age 5 13.09 years, SD 5 .30). Children who did not participate did not receive parental permission or were absent from school on the day of data collection. Additional attrition occurred as children moved away from the area with their families. To be included in the present study, children needed to have information on a minimum of two study variables; 551 children met this criterion. However, only 163 of the 551 children in the final sample had complete data across all variables created for the study. Between 70% and 84% of data were available for each study variable. We conducted an attrition analysis in which all demographic covariates, early behavior indicators, and middle-childhood peer process variables were used to predict missingness on the early-adolescent outcome variables in a logistic regression framework. The results suggest that differential attrition did not occur. The omnibus test of the significance of the full model was nonsignificant, v2 (8) 5 12.60, ns, as was each of the individual parameter estimates. At kindergarten entry, 80% of children lived in twoparent families with both biological parents, 12% lived with the mother only, and 8% lived in other family configurations. Participants’ socioeconomic status (SES) according to the Blishen, Carroll, and Moore (1987) Occupational Prestige Scale (described later; M 5 40.75, SD 5 10.20) was similar to the average score for a representative sample of kindergarten children throughout Quebec (M 5 43.74, SD 5 12.88). Finally, 18% of the parents had completed high school, 47% had at least some post – high school education, and 35% had not graduated from high school. Each spring (in April or May), participants spent 2 hr of classroom time answering questionnaires. The children were informed about the purpose of the study and were told that all of their answers would be confidential and that they did not have to answer any of the questions if they did not want to. Trained research assistants administered and collected the questionnaires in the absence of classroom teachers. Teachers also completed questionnaires during this period. Parents (mostly mothers) completed questionnaires sent to them by mail around the same time as the data were collected at school. Measures All instruments were administered in French. Instruments that were written originally in English were translated into French and then translated back into English. English-speaking judges verified the semantic similarity between the back-translated items and the original items. 1040 Pedersen, Vitaro, Barker, and Borge Sociodemographicinformation. Mother-reportedmaternal occupation was scored on a continuous scale according to Blishen et al. (1987). This score is based on the average income and average education level associated with occupations in Canada. Maternal occupation scores for each child were averaged across the years of the study in which he or she participated. The mean maternal occupational status across children and waves of data was 40.75 (SD 5 10.20). Anxiety – social withdrawal. Mothers and teachers rated the children’s behavior at ages 6 and 7 using five anxiety – social withdrawal items from the Social Behavior Questionnaire (SBQ; Tremblay et al., 1991). Sample items include ”is solitary” and ”tends to fear new things and new situations.” Mothers and teachers indicated whether each item did not apply (0), applied sometimes (1), or applied often (2) to the child. Internal consistency was acceptable, with alphas ranging from .60 to .73 across time and raters. Scores were summed within rater and time; values ranged from 0 and 10 for mother and teacher ratings at each time point. Mother-rated anxiety – social withdrawal scores at ages 6 and 7 were correlated (r 5.56, p , .001), as were teacher-rated anxiety – social withdrawal scores (r 5 .23, p , .001). In addition, mean mother-rated and teacher-rated anxiety – social withdrawal scores were correlated (r 5 .25, p , .001). Because the correlation between the mean maternal and teacher reports of anxiety – social withdrawal and the stability of teacher-rated anxiety – social withdrawal were low to moderate in size, all analyses presented here were also conducted using only mother-reported values. The results were nearly identical to those obtained when the combined maternal and teacher reports were used. We present the results using the combined scores to maintain consistency with the measurement of disruptiveness, the other early behavioral indicator. The mean value across time and raters was 2.64 (SD 5 1.42). Disruptive behavior. Mothers and teachers rated children’s behavior at ages 6 and 7 using 13 disruptiveness items from the SBQ (Tremblay et al., 1991). The disruptiveness items covered physical aggression, opposition, hyperactivity, and antisociality (i.e., lying, cheating, stealing). Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses suggested that these items belonged to a single factor for children of this age (Rubin, Moller, & Emptage, 1986; Tremblay, Vitaro, Gagnon, Piche´, & Royer, 1992). Mothers and teachers indicated whether each item did not apply (0), applied sometimes (1), or applied often (2) to the child. Internal consistency was high, with alphas of .86 to .89 across time and raters. Values for the summed disruptiveness scores ranged from 0 to 24 for teacher and mother ratings at each time point. Mother-rated disruptiveness scores at ages 6 and 7 were correlated (r = .70, p , .001), as were teacherrated disruptiveness scores (r = .53, p , .001). In addition, mean mother-rated and teacher-rated disruptiveness scores were correlated (r = .47, p , .001). Values were averaged across time and raters to achieve more stable estimates of disruptiveness (M 5 5.35, SD 5 3.49). Peer rejection. Children’s sociometric status was assessed from ages 8 through 11 through peer nominations. Specifically, names of all children in a given class were handed out to the participants. Two research assistants ensured that all participants recognized the names of all classmates by reading them aloud in front of the class. The children were then asked to circle the names of the three children they liked most (positive nominations) and the three children they liked least (negative nominations). Criteria outlined by Coie, Dodge, and Coppotelli (1982) were used to compute the sociometric status for each participant in each year. The number of years children were in the rejected category was computed for two 2-year intervals (i.e., ages 8 – 9 and 10 – 11). Values ranged from 0 (never rejected) to 2 (rejected at both time points). The mean value across ages 8 and 9 was .25 (SD 5 .47) and across ages 10 and 11 was .24 (SD 5 .46). Both variables were transformed using an inverse transformation to improve their distributional characteristics (ages 8 – 9: M 5 .87, SD 5 .21; ages 10 – 11: M 5 .88, SD 5 .21). Please note that because inverse transformations of the peer rejection variables were used, the estimates presented in the results are opposite in sign to those produced by the analyses (i.e., we present the associations between peer rejection and other variables rather than the associations between the inverse of peer rejection and other variables). The signs are reversed for ease of presentation and interpretation of the results. Friendedness. Children were also asked to nominate up to four best friends in the classroom in each year from ages 8 to 11. For the purposes of this study, only reciprocal friends—when the nominated friend also nominated the target child as one of his or her four best friends (Bukowski & Hoza, 1989)—were used. The mean numbers of reciprocal friends across ages 8 and 9 and across ages 10 and 11 were calculated. Children had an average of 1.05 reciprocal friends across ages 8 and 9 (SD 5 .85) and an average of 1.28 reciprocal friends at ages 10 to 11 (SD 5 1.00; skewness 5 .47, kurtosis 5 – .57). The vast majority of these friends were of the same sex as the target child. Childhood Peer Rejection and Friendship 1041 At each wave, only 1% to 4% of children had one or more reciprocated other-sex friends. Depressive symptoms. Study participants completed the Children’s Depression Inventory (CDI; Kovacs, 1992) at ages 12 and 13. The CDI is a 27-item scale assessing self-reported symptoms of depression. The suicidal ideation item was not used in the current study because of concerns by the school administration. Individual item scores ranged from 0 to 2 with higher ratings indicating more severe symptoms. The CDI has relatively high internal consistency and stability and has been validated using normative and clinic-referred samples (Fundulis et al., 1991). The score on the CDI was calculated by summing the 26 individual item scores at each wave and then taking the mean of these two summed scores (M 5 9.85, SD 5 6.47, skewness 5 .91, kurtosis 5 .56). The scale exhibited high internal consistency at each wave (as 5 .85 and .87). Loneliness – social dissatisfaction. Participants’ feelings of loneliness and social dissatisfaction were assessed at ages 12 and 13 using a 16-item self-report measure developed by Asher, Hymel, and Renshaw (1984). This scale has been found to be reliable and valid in other studies (Asher & Wheeler, 1985) and exhibited high internal consistency at each wave of data collection in the current study (as 5 .75 and .82). Scores on the loneliness – social dissatisfaction scale were calculated by taking the mean of the items at each wave and the mean of the two average wave scores. The variable was then transformed using a log transformation to improve its distributional characteristics (M 5 .88, SD 5 .28). Delinquency. Involvement in delinquent behaviors was assessed at ages 12 and 13 using the 25-item Self-Reported Delinquency Questionnaire (SRDQ; LeBlanc & Fre´chette, 1989). The validity of selfreported measures of delinquency and drug use has been documented in several studies (Hindelang, Hirschi, & Weiss, 1981; Klein, 1989). At each time of assessment, the participants reported whether they had been involved in a variety of delinquent behaviors, such as interpersonal violence (e.g., ”Used a weapon during a fight with another person”), vandalism (e.g., ”Broken or destroyed something that did not belong to you”), theft (e.g., ”Taken and kept something in a store without paying”), and substance use (e.g., ”Used marijuana”) over the past 12 months. Response options ranged from never (1) to often (4). In the current study, the SRDQ exhibited high internal consistency across waves (as 5 .84 and .92). Scores were averaged within and across waves. The mean delinquency score was then transformed using a log transformation to improve its distributional characteristics (M 5 1.48, SD 5 .08). Results Bivariate Associations First, bivariate correlations among all study variables were examined (see Table 1). Relations of sex and maternal occupational prestige with the other study variables support the inclusion of these two variables as covariates in the path models tested in the current study. Girls were less disruptive, less likely to be rejected, and tended to have more reciprocal friends than boys. Girls also reported more depressive symptoms and less delinquency. Maternal occupational status was inversely related to disruptiveness and peer rejection and positively related to friendedness.

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