Abstract

The goal of this study was to identify whether friendship quality could serve as a protective factor for anxious preadolescents longitudinally. It was expected that by having high levels of intimacy and security within the friendships of anxious youth feelings of anxiety would decrease to a greater extent than those with low levels of said friendship factors. Preadolescents (N = 430) in grades 5 and 6 (ages 10-13) were tested within their classrooms. Two time points were used in this study, which were approximately six months apart. Measures of peer-rated anxiety, self-rated anxiety, and friendship quality (i.e., the Network of Relationships Inventory) were administered and analyzed via confirmatory factor analyses (CFA). Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to test the hypotheses of this study. Results demonstrated that both intimacy and security within close relationships could predict a significant decrease in anxiety in the self-rated anxiety measures, with security having a stronger effect than intimacy. Conversely, preadolescents who were considered anxious by their peers were perceived as anxious at the second time point even if they possessed intimate and secure friendships. Gender differences were not found. The findings of this study suggest that anxious preadolescents benefit from having intimate and secure close friendships given that they are found to be significantly less anxious over time compared with their anxious peers without such relationships. In contrast, being anxious seems to have a lasting impression since peer-rated anxious individuals were not perceived as being less anxious over time, despite their reduced feelings of anxiety. A similar effect was discovered for both boys and girls.