Reciprocal Links Between Friendship Quality and Peer Victimization Among Middle Adolescents

There is a robust association between friendship quality and victimization in adolescence; yet, it remains unclear whether friendship quality may be linked causally with different forms of victimization in middle adolescence. To fill this gap, this study examines the bidirectional associations of friendship quality and relational/verbal victimization with data collected at two time points, 6 months apart, in a sample of 671 middle Chinese adolescents (Mage = 15.63, SDage = 0.73, 49% males). Cross-lagged panel analyses revealed a two-way relationship between friendship quality and victimization, which existed in both verbal and relational victimization. Multi-group panel analyses observed that the cross-lagged associations between friendship quality and relational/verbal victimization were only found for males, but not for females. This result suggests that adolescent males' victimization is both affected by and a predictor of friendship quality, with implications for youth prevention programs.