Assessing children's representations of their peer group using a multidimensional scaling technique

The goal of this research was to examine whether multidimensional scaling (MDS) is a potentially reliable and valid method for assessing children's perceptions of their peer group. A total of 162 fourth- and fifth-grade students participated in two studies. MDS-derived depictions of the peer group were generated based on children's unconstrained (i.e., implicit) similarity judgments of same-sex dyads in their peer group. Overall, fit indices indicated that two-dimensional MDS solutions accounted for most of the variability in group members' similarity ratings, demonstrating considerable agreement between group members' implicit representations of their peer group. Furthermore, classroom teachers' perceptions of peer group organization were highly similar to their students' perceptions. Finally, the social network pattern in the peer group was related consistently to the organization of peer group members in the MDS similarity space; additional variance in the MDS space was accounted for by behavioral and nonbehavioral characteristics, most notably prosocial behavior. The results of this two-part study show the promise of using MDS methods to assess, and thus investigate, children's perceptions of their peer group's organizational structure. It was argued that implicit approaches to understanding children's perceptions of their peer group would be a useful addition to findings derived from the explicit methods typically employed in peer relations research.