René Veenstra

University of Groningen | RUG · Department of Sociology

Peers gain heightened significance during adolescence. Youth organize themselves into peer networks that reflect clusters of social relationships, and these social networks play a prominent role in youth's risk behaviors, internalizing symptoms, and adaptive behaviors. Remarkably, youth are often quite similar to their friends, which can be because...

Peer influence occurs across a wide variety of behavioral domains, which is an important reason for peer-led interventions: interventions in which peers are involved in the delivery of the program. These programs are promising in combatting undesirable behaviors (e.g., risk behavior) and promoting desirable behavior (e.g., healthy lifestyle), but i...

Compelling evidence demonstrates that peer influence is a pervasive force during adolescence, one that shapes adap-tive and maladaptive attitudes and behaviors. This literature review focuses on factors that make adolescence a period of special vulnerability to peer influence. Herein, we advance the Influence-Compatibility Model, which integrates c...

This article focuses on the link between social norms and behavioral development as presented in research on norms regarding bullying and aggression. The aim is to present a conceptual framework for how classroom norms may explain children’s decisions to defend others or refrain from defending. Norms emerge from group consensus about what is approp...

This volume presents an overview and summary of findings from the PROSPER (Promoting School-community-university Partnerships to Enhance Resilience) Peers project, which for over a decade has sought to illuminate how adolescent friendship networks channel and facilitate the spread of developmental outcomes such as substance use, other risky behavio...

Anti-bullying programs can create more positive classroom environments by fostering the development of positive leaders who establish constructive norms. The social identity theory of leadership addresses stability and change within different leader profiles and identifies leader group prototypicality: the extent to which leaders are perceived to e...

The aim of this study was to examine whether prolonged victimization relates to differential processing of emotions. Based on the social information processing theory, it was hypothesized that prolonged victimization would modulate emotion processing, such that victimization relates to a heightened attentional focus toward negative facial expressio...

While previous research suggests that peer and teacher preferences are linked to adolescents’ peer relationships, the specific impact of peer and teacher (dis)liking on adolescents’ friendship networks is not fully understood. This study used longitudinal social network analysis to examine how peer (dis)liking and perceptions of teacher (dis)liking...

The aim of this study was to examine whether repeated victimization relates to differential processing of social exclusion experiences. It was hypothesized that experiences of repeated victimization would modulate neural processing of social exclusion in the insula, anterior cingulate cortex, and lateral prefrontal cortex. Furthermore, we hypothesi...

Background: Adolescence is a developmental period during which an estimated 75% of mental health problems emerge (Solmi et al., 2022). This paper reports a feasibility study of a novel indicated, preventative, transdiagnostic, school-based intervention: Building Resilience Through Socioemotional Training (ReSET). The intervention addresses two doma...

This study tested to what extent the relation between bullying victimization and future symptoms of depression could be explained by victims being more hostile and less assertive than non-involved individuals. Data came from waves 2–4 of the Dutch TRacking Adolescents' Individual Lives Survey (TRAILS). Participants' bullying experiences were assess...

Dit boek biedt sociologische beschouwingen over het onderwijs. Een dertigtal gerenommeerde onderwijswetenschappers presenteert een breed scala aan inzichten en maakt duidelijk dat een sociologische kijk op onderwijs een vruchtbare en onmisbare aanvulling vormt op allerlei andere perspectieven. Daarmee is het boek een aanrader voor iedereen die bet...

This study applied a sociometric approach to examine the traditional sexual double standard within a sample of Dutch adolescents (N = 1,175; 53.8% females; M age = 14.75). Drawing on script theory and the key concept of social stigma, this study examined associations between self-reported sexual partnerships and three measures of peer preference: (...

Little is known about the conditions under which paternal incarceration is harmful to children and the mechanisms that explain this. This study addressed the family relationship context in the associations between paternal incarceration and adolescents’ internalizing and externalizing problem behaviors. Using data from the Future of Families and Ch...

Previous studies on peer relationships in school transitions neglected individual differences, or did not examine the relation with academic performance in secondary school. This study followed 649 students from their last year of primary school to their first year in secondary school (Mage at T1 = 11.6 (SD = 0.6); 53.6% girls). Results revealed th...

Adolescents’ peer interactions strongly influence their school behavior, raising the question of whether parents can still direct adolescents’ friendship choices or whether they are mostly on the sidelines. Chinese cultural values emphasize the importance of having “good” friends, raising questions about adolescents’ adherence to parental direction...

Background Peers constitute an important developmental context for adolescent academic behaviour providing support and resources to either promote or discourage attitudes and behaviours that contribute to school success. When looking for academic help, students may prefer specific partners based on their social goals regarding academic performance....

Background Adolescence is a period of heightened vulnerability to developing mental health problems, and rates of mental health disorder in this age group have increased in the last decade. Preventing mental health problems developing before they become entrenched, particularly in adolescents who are at high risk, is an important research and clini...

Despite the expanding body of research on school bullying and interventions, knowledge of what makes teachers intervene in bullying situations remains limited. Based on the Theory of Planned Behavior, a theoretical framework that combined the predictive elements contributing to teachers’ likelihood of intervening was tested empirically. The model u...

Various programmes have been implemented in prisons to strengthen parental involvement and parent-child relationships during imprisonment. In-depth insights into such programmes are limited. This qualitative study compared the experiences of two groups of imprisoned fathers in the Netherlands: fathers who participated in a family approach programme...

Positive and negative leadership styles may influence classroom norms and be related to the school and psychological adjustment of children in general, and victims in particular. This study tested the relation between leadership styles and children’s adjustment, and the moderating effects of leadership on the association between self-reported victi...

While a substantial body of research in clinical psychology and experimental psychopathology has employed performance-based measures, experimental designs, and intensive repeated measures to examine the development of psychopathology, these approaches have been underutilized in bullying research. This chapter illustrates how these methodologies can...

In dit proefschrift werden sociaal-cognitieve aspecten onderzocht die kunnen bijdragen aan het voortduren van chronisch pestslachtofferschap. Gepest worden heeft langdurige gevolgen, zoals meer mentale klachten, lagere schoolprestaties en zwakkere sociale vaardigheden, welke nog heviger zijn voor langdurige slachtoffers. Eerder onderzoek liet zien...

The finding that victims’ psychological problems tend to be exacerbated in lower-victimization classrooms has been referred to as the “healthy context paradox.” The current study has put the healthy context paradox to a strict test by examining whether classroom-level victimization moderates bidirectional within- and between-person associations bet...

Background: Adolescence is a period of heightened vulnerability to developing mental health problems, and rates of mental health disorder in this age group have increased in the last decade. Preventing mental health problems developing before they become entrenched, particularly in adolescents who are at high risk, is an important research and clin...

This study examined the relation between both implementation fidelity and quality and the outcomes of two different anti-bullying interventions targeting distinct processes involved in bullying: moral disengagement and social norms. In total, 34 French-speaking Belgian teachers from six elementary schools were trained to deliver either the moral di...

This volume presents an overview and summary of findings from the PROSPER (Promoting School-community-university Partnerships to Enhance Resilience) Peers project, which for over a decade has sought to illuminate how adolescent friendship networks channel and facilitate the spread of developmental outcomes such as substance use, other risky behavio...

Little is known about the link between fatherhood and reoffending among people released from prison. This study examined the association between fatherhood, residential status, and registered reconviction rates using data from a Dutch pre-trial prison cohort sample ( N = 845, 42.5% fathers). The results show that fathers who co-resided with a partn...

Social ties between members of in- and outgroups are theorized to reduce individual levels of prejudice. However, instances of intergroup contact are not isolated events; cross-group interactions are embedded in broader networks defined by various social processes that guide the formation and maintenance of interpersonal relationships. This project...

Purpose: Overweight in youth is influenced by genes and environment. Gene-environment interaction (G×E) has been demonstrated in twin studies and recent developments in genetics allow for studying G×E using individual genetic predispositions for overweight. We examine genetic influence on trajectories of overweight during adolescence and early adu...

Previous research has shown that leadership is associated not only with positive but also with negative characteristics and behaviors; knowledge of the similarities and differences between positive and negative leaders remains insufficient. This study aimed to examine (1) the existence of different subtypes of leaders and (2) to what extent these l...

The COVID-19 measures raised societal concerns about increases in adolescents’ loneliness. This study examined trajectories of adolescents’ loneliness during the pandemic, and whether trajectories varied across students with different types of peer status and contact with friends. We followed 512 Dutch students (Mage = 11.26, SD = 0.53; 53.1% girls...

This study examined whether having vulnerable friends helps or hurts victimized and depressed (i.e., vulnerable) adolescents and whether this depends on classroom supportive norms. Students (n = 1461, 46.7% girls, 93.4% Han nationality) were surveyed four times from seventh and eighth grade (Mage = 13 years) in 2015 and 2016 in Central China. Longi...

Bullying research has shown repeatedly that victims of bullying have an increased risk for later internalizing problems and bullies have an increased risk for later externalizing problems. Bullying involvement is often, either explicitly or implicitly, presented as part of a causal mechanism for maladjustment. However, genetic vulnerability may con...

Purpose: Overweight in youth is influenced by genes and environment. Gene-environment interaction (G×E) has been demonstrated in twin studies and recent developments in genetics allow for studying G×E using individual genetic predispositions for overweight. We examine genetic influence on trajectories of overweight during adolescence and early adul...

This study's aim was to examine whether there are negative increasing cycles of peer victimization and rejection sensitivity over time. Drawing from Social Information Processing Theory, we hypothesized that victimization leads to higher levels of rejection sensitivity, which would put adolescents at risk for higher future victimization. Data were...

Because no measure for sexual orientation-related rejection sensitivity (RS) for adolescents exists, we aimed to develop and validate the Sexual Minority Adolescent Rejection Sensitivity Scale (SMA-RSS). In Study 1, interviews with 22 sexual minority youth were conducted ( M age = 18.86, SD = 3.03). Based on these interviews, 29 scenarios were deve...

Peer influence is an instrument of change, with outcomes that are not preordained: The same processes that make influence a source of harm also make it a valuable interpersonal resource. Yet the benefits of peer influence are insufficiently appreciated. Knowing when and how much to conform to the wishes of others is an important skill that children...

Despite the expanding body of research on school bullying and interventions, knowledge is limited on what teachers should do to identify, prevent, and reduce bullying. This systematic literature review provides an overview of research on the role of primary school teachers with regard to bullying and victimization. A conceptual framework was develo...

Bullying research has shown repeatedly that victims of bullying have an increased risk for later internalizing problems and bullies have an increased risk for later externalizing problems. Bullying involvement is often, either explicitly or implicitly, presented as part of a causal mechanism for maladjustment. However, genetic vulnerability may con...

Peer relationships are prominent when children move into adolescence. Peer research has been motivated by an interest in understanding where peer interactions and relationships come from and how these experiences affect multiple aspects of positive and negative development. Peer research continues to provide insight in how adolescents strive for st...

The nature of the relation between victimization of bullying and social information processing is unclear. The prevention hypothesis predicts that victims focus more on negative social cues to prevent further escalation. In contrast, the reaffiliation hypothesis predicts that victims focus more on positive social cues to restore the social situatio...

Around a million school-aged minors from Syria have been living in Turkey with temporary protection status over an unanticipated extended period. This prolonged temporariness leads to uncertainties and unpredictabilities for Syrian families regarding how long they will be staying in Turkey. Drawing on 17 interviews with Syrian mothers and 3 couples...

The prevalence of bullying worldwide is high (UNESCO, 2018). Over the past decades, many anti-bullying interventions have been developed to remediate this problem. However, we lack insight into for whom these interventions work and what individual intervention components drive the total intervention effects. We conducted a large-scale individual pa...

Even though romantic partnerships are often understood as pairwise relationships, there is value in conceptualizing the dating patterns of adolescents as network phenomena, particularly as related to the spread of sexually transmitted infections. The current study adopts this perspective to evaluate how a local norm guiding the coexistence of datin...

This three‐armed randomized controlled trial examined how moral disengagement and social norms account for change in bullying behavior and their potential as targets of anti‐bullying components within separate interventions among 1200 French‐speaking Belgian elementary students (48% boys, 9–12 year‐olds, 57 classes, nine schools) during 2018–2019 (...

This introduction outlines the goals for the special section on social norms and behavioral development. The study of social norms has attracted much interest in peer relations research, and has turned attention to group-level processes, often defined based on the classroom, which create and sustain shared meanings that impact adolescent behavioral...

Acceptance and rejection by parents and peers play an important role in pre-adolescents’ educational outcomes. Prior research focused on either parents or peers, did not encompass effects into adulthood, or considered either acceptance or rejection. This study investigated the relation between parental and peer acceptance and rejection, and their i...

Introduction This study examined the effect of popularity levels on friendship selection and friends' influence on popularity levels in early and mid‐adolescence. Methods Participants were 4205 Spanish adolescents (Mage = 13.1 years at Wave 1; 48% girls) belonging to 160 classrooms in two waves. Adolescents were asked about their friendships and t...

This study investigates the network mechanisms underlying the co‐development of two types of negative relationships: dislike relationships, and victim‐bully relationships among children. Longitudinal data on school‐level networks of 15 Dutch primary schools (N = 2175; Mage(T1) = 10; 51% male) were analyzed with stochastic actor‐oriented models. Evi...

Aspects of parenting including overprotection explain individual differences in child adjustment. This review and meta‐analysis summarizes studies on parental overprotection and internalizing and externalizing problems. To ensure that findings could be compared as systematically as possible, the focus was on studies that used the overprotection sca...

Parental involvement in education is significant for children's schooling experience and their cognitive and academic development. It also plays a role in refugee children's success and integration in the host country. However, understanding refugee parents’ educational involvement can be a complex issue because of their different cultural beliefs...

Aspects of parenting including overprotection explain individual differences in child adjustment. This review and meta-analysis summarizes studies on parental overprotection and internalizing and externalizing problems. To ensure that findings could be compared as systematically as possible, the focus is on studies that used the overprotection scal...

Rationale Sexual and gender minority (SGM) youth consume more alcohol than their heterosexual, cisgender peers. The experience of minority stress is theorized to explain these disparities. Research often neglects the day-to-day variability in minority stress that SGM youth encounter and whether alcohol use is associated with daily experiences of mi...

This study examined the differential effects of two forms of adolescents' perceptions of peers' prosociality, aggression , and popularity, on friendship selection. Individuals' reports of their peers' behaviors (dyadic perceptions) and the aggregated classmates' reports (reputational perceptions) were disentangled. The findings indicated that adole...

Bullying is known to be associated with social status, but it remains unclear how bullying involvement over time relates to social position (status and affection), especially in the first years at a new school. The aim of this study was to investigate whether (the development of) bullying and victimization was related to the attainment of status (p...

In peer relations research, interest is increasing in studying the neural underpinnings of peer experiences in order to understand how peer interactions relate to adjustment and well-being. This review provides an overview of 27 studies examining how positive and negative peer experiences with personally familiar peers relate to neural processes. T...

Explanations about differences in drinking and smoking rates between educational tracks have so far mainly focused on factors outside the classroom. The extent to which these behaviors are rewarded with popularity within a classroom—so called popularity norms—and their interaction with individual characteristics could explain the observed differenc...

Recent work on bullying perpetration includes the hypothesis that bullying carries an evolutionary advantage for perpetrators in terms of health and reproductive success. We tested this hypothesis in the National Child Development Study (n = 4998 male, n = 4831 female), British Cohort Study 1970 (n = 4261 male, n = 4432 female), and TRacking Adoles...

Bullying does not occur in a vacuum. It is not a coincidence when bullying emerges in a group. Knowledge of both the causes of bullying and how it can be prevented has increased radically in recent decades. We know more about bullying today than we have ever done before. This knowledge is vital to children’s and young people’s development and learn...

Although father–child relationships (FCRs) are central to children’s experience of paternal imprisonment, few studies address this subject. A systematic review was conducted to synthesize the literature on paternal imprisonment and FCRs. Four academic databases were searched for peer-reviewed studies. Thirty studies were identified. It was found th...

This study investigates the extent to which defending victims of bullying depends on liking and disliking and its relation with the classroom bullying norm (descriptive and popularity) in a sample of 1,272 students (50.8% boys) in 48 fifth-grade classrooms. Social network analysis with bivariate exponential random graph modelings showed that childr...

Prosocial peer relationships, such as defending against victimization, are beneficial for integration. Using the concept of multiple categorization, this study considers the extent to which similarity in gender, being in the same classroom, and similarity in network position regarding bullying or victimization contributes to the formation of cross-...

The aim of this study was to test a longitudinal, transactional model that describes how social withdrawal and friendship development are interrelated in late adolescence, and to investigate if post‐secondary transitions are catalysts of change for highly withdrawn adolescents’ friendships. Unilateral friendship data of 1,019 adolescents (61.3% fem...

Research has shown that bullying is a group phenomenon and happens in a context, and that it is, therefore, unprofitable to focus on the individual level to troubleshoot. Research on social networks and social norms provides insight into how bullying works. Nowadays, school-wide anti-bullying interventions aim to change social norms such that bulli...

Social network research is the way to examine bullying as a group process. Cross-sectional network studies allow us to examine who bullies whom or who defends whom, as well as the agreement on these dyadic relationships. Longitudinal network studies allow us to particularly examine selection and influence processes. The longitudinal studies with th...

Though depressive symptoms tend to increase in early adolescence, the trajectories of these symptoms may vary strongly. This longitudinal study investigated the extent to which the distinct developmental trajectories of depressive symptoms were predicted by adolescents' academic achievement and perceived parental practices in a sample of Chinese yo...

This study investigated how teachers’ self-efficacy for intervening in social dynamics and teacher-student relationships directly impact students’ self-esteem, and indirectly buffer the negative association between both bullying and victimization and students’ self-esteem. Teachers play a key role in shaping the peer relations in the classroom, and...

Despite increased attention to tackling bullying and the use of effective anti-bullying programs that can reduce victimization for many, some children remain victimized. Preventing persistent victimization requires that teachers identify victims and intervene at an early stage, but this is often difficult because teachers cannot always recognize vi...

In interpersonal models of developmental psychopathology, friendships and affiliations with peers have been considered as both consequences and determinants of children’s and adolescents’ internalizing behaviors and peer victimization. Longitudinal stochastic actor-oriented models (SAOMs) allow developmental researchers to disentangle peer selectio...

In interpersonal models of developmental psychopathology, friendships and affiliations with peershave been considered as both consequences and determinants of children’s and adolescents’ internalizing behaviors and peer victimization. Longitudinal stochastic actor-oriented models (SAOMs) allow developmental researchers to disentangle peer selection...