Course description
Children and adolescents’ relations with their peers play a major role in their overall development. Peers contribute to social behaviors – prosocial or antisocial – and to psychological well-being well beyond the combined influences of parents, siblings, teachers and neighbourhood. This course explains how peer relations matter for all domains of child and adolescent development, through an examination of both normative and abnormal behaviors and thought processes.
The following topics will be addressed:
- Origins of social competence
- Risk factors and consequences of problematic peer behaviors, with a focus on bullying behaviour and victimization
- Peer status (popularity and likeability)
- Friendships
- Processes of peer influence
- Social media
Learning Outcomes
After completion of the course, students will be able to:
- Describe key theories and basic methodology in peer relations research.
- Understand how individual characteristics of children affect their relations with peers.
- Understand processes through which peer affiliations, peer status, and the general social context affect the behaviors and psychological adjustment of individual children and adolescents.
The course is intended for students of MDPINVEST and DPINVEST.
The course is also open to all graduate students and researchers in INVEST and Department of Psychology.
Teaching Period:
Oct-Dec 2024
Evaluation scale
1-5
- Opettaja
Claire Garandeau