The patterning of agonistic behaviors among friends and acquaintances in programs for emotionally disturbed children

Peer conflicts in two age groups (toddler and preschool) of emotionally disturbed children were examined for developmental trends and for changes over time in an intervention program. Children were observed in their peer groups six times over the course of a year. Prosocial and agonistic social behaviors were coded in a continuous coding observational procedure. Friendship pairs were identified from the observational records and validated by teacher reports. It was hypothesized that agonistic responses to both prosocial and agonistic bids would decrease over time and that friendships would facilitate conflict resolution and conflict avoidance in the emotionally disturbed children. Agonistic responses to agonistic bids decreased over time for all children. Older acquaintances responded to prosocial bids with agonistic responses. Friendship relationships facilitated conflict resolution and avoidance skills in preschool-age but not toddler-age friends. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for intervention.