SIMILARITY AS THE BASIS FOR CHILDRENS FRIENDSHIPS - THE ROLES OF SOCIOMETRIC STATUS, AGGRESSIVE AND WITHDRAWN BEHAVIOR, ACADEMIC-ACHIEVEMENT AND DEMOGRAPHIC CHARACTERISTICS

The purpose of the present study was to examine similarity in demographic, behavioral, academic and social attributes as descriptors and predictors of children's friendships. The characteristics of all possible pairs of unique classroom dyads (N = 4725) were used to predict reciprocated school, home and best friendship choices among 554 third (M = 9.38 years old) and fourth (M = 10.47 years old) graders. Peer reports of aggressive and withdrawn behavior and sociometric status, teacher reports of poverty, and archival reports of sex, race and academic achievement were obtained. The main finding was that as similarity increased, the likelihood of being friends also increased. Specifically, patterns of gender, race, poverty, aggression, withdrawn behavior, achievement and sociometric status between dyad members were descriptive and predictive of children's friendships.