Children’s Perceptions of Popular and Unpopular Peers:A Multimethod Assessment

Kathryn M. LaFontanaSacred Heart University

Antonius H. N. CillessenUniversity of Connecticut

Children’s perceptions of popular and unpopular peers were examined in 2 studies. Study 1 examined thedegree to which 4th–8th-grade boys and girls (N � 408) nominated the same peers for multiple criteria.Children viewed liked others as prosocial and disliked others as antisocial but associated perceivedpopularity with both prosocial and antisocial behavior. In Study 2, a subset of the children from Study 1(N � 92) described what makes boys and girls popular or unpopular. Children described popular peersas attractive with frequent peer interactions, and unpopular peers as unattractive, deviant, incompetent,and socially isolated. In both studies, children’s perceptions varied as a function of the gender, age, andethnicity of the participants.

Social psychologists have long studied people’s perceptionsabout various social groups. These perceptions consist of a per-son’s knowledge and beliefs about a particular group, and theytypically contain an affective component. Children use these per-ceptions or social categories to help interpret social situations andguide their behavior in social situations (Crick & Dodge, 1994).One very important social category for children in elementary andmiddle school is one based on popularity or peer status. Duringthese years of development, children become increasingly con-cerned with their own peer status and, as a result, increasinglysusceptible to peer influence (e.g., O’Brien & Bierman, 1988).Understanding the characteristics attributed to peers who are seenas popular and socially central may inform researchers about thebehavioral processes that children and adolescents use to increasetheir own status in the peer group.

Within developmental psychology, most research on peer statushas used sociometric nominations as the primary method of gath-ering data. Using this methodology, researchers have typicallyasked children in the peer group to name those peers that they likeand those they dislike and have then classified these target peers

into groups on the basis of the votes received (e.g., Coie, Dodge,& Coppotelli, 1982). A large number of these studies have focusedon target children who are sociometrically rejected (disliked bymany peers and liked by very few), because these children are atrisk for delinquent behavior, poor social functioning, and othernegative outcomes (e.g., Asher & Coie, 1990). Sociometricallypopular children (those who are liked by many and disliked byfew) have been found in numerous studies to be highly sociallycompetent and to behave very positively toward peers (e.g., Rubin,Bukowski, & Parker, 1998). The rejected and popular groups scoreat opposite extremes of a continuous dimension of peer acceptanceor sociometric popularity that underlies the distinction of socialstatus groups.

In addition to sociometric popularity, developmentalists re-cently have distinguished a dimension of perceived popularity.This dimension has existed for some time in a different researchtradition that was relatively disconnected from psychological re-search on children’s peer relations (see Parkhurst & Hopmeyer,1998), but it has not yet been considered frequently in the devel-opmental literature. Assessments of perceived popularity are ob-tained by asking children or adolescents to name directly who theythink is popular or unpopular, rather than whom they like ordislike. By asking children directly whom they perceive as popularor unpopular, one may measure popularity as a reputation ratherthan as a personal preference (see, e.g., Luthar & McMahon, 1996;Rodkin, Farmer, Pearl, & Van Acker, 2000).

Perceived popularity differs in a number of important ways fromsociometric popularity. When the number of nominations receivedfor liking and popularity were counted, the correlation between thecontinuous dimensions of sociometric and perceived popularitywas only a modest .40 (Parkhurst & Hopmeyer, 1998). Similarly,the correspondence between sociometric and perceived-popularityclassifications was moderate as well, with a kappa of .42 (LaFon-tana & Cillessen, 1999). Children who are perceived as popular aremore likely to be sociometrically controversial than sociometri-cally popular, and perceived popularity was associated morestrongly with social impact than with social preference (Parkhurst

Kathryn M. LaFontana, Department of Psychology, Sacred Heart Uni-versity; Antonius H. N. Cillessen, Department of Psychology, Universityof Connecticut.

Parts of this research were presented at the annual meeting of theAmerican Psychological Society, Denver, Colorado, June 1999, and at thetriennial meeting of the New England Social Development Consortium,Storrs, Connecticut, January 2000. This research was supported by aSacred Heart University Research and Creativity Grant awarded to KathrynM. LaFontana and a University of Connecticut Research Foundation fac-ulty grant awarded to Antonius H. N. Cillessen.

We acknowledge the undergraduates at the University of Connecticutand Sacred Heart University for their assistance both in running the studyand in coding children’s responses.

Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Kath-ryn M. LaFontana, Department of Psychology, Sacred Heart University,5151 Park Avenue, Fairfield, Connecticut 06825. E-mail: lafontanak@sacredheart.edu

Developmental Psychology Copyright 2002 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.2002, Vol. 38, No. 5, 635–647 0012-1649/02/$5.00 DOI: 10.1037//0012-1649.38.5.635

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& Hopmeyer, 1998). This study also demonstrated that those whowere high on perceived popularity but low on sociometric popu-larity were seen by peers as dominant, aggressive, and stuck-up,whereas peers who were high on sociometric popularity but low onperceived popularity were seen as kind and trustworthy, and thosewho were high on both measures possessed all of these traits.

Thus, although sociometric popularity is exclusively associatedwith prosocial characteristics, the popularity reputation (perceivedpopularity) is not. Luthar and McMahon (1996) found that areputation of peer popularity was linked with prosocial as well asaggressive or disruptive behaviors. Rodkin et al. (2000) distin-guished prosocial and antisocial subgroups of children who wereperceived as popular among peers (according to teacher ratings).These studies suggest that perceived popularity is not the same asbeing well liked by a majority of peers but a more complexphenomenon involving both positive and negative elements.

Although these studies have been very informative, a shortcom-ing is found if one examines them within the larger framework ofperson perception. Person perception is a function of perceiver,target, and relationship effects. That is, the variability in people’sjudgments of others is due to individual differences betweenperceivers, individual differences between those being perceived,and unique combinations of perceivers and targets (Kenny, 1994).

Most sociometric research has focused on target effects. Typi-cally, children’s social judgments are aggregated across perceiv-ers, with target as the unit of analysis, often by counting thenumber of nominations received by each child in the peer group.These scores then reflect the consensus among perceivers abouttarget children by determining, for example, who is seen as ag-gressive by a majority of peers. Similarly, the studies describedabove on the relationship between perceived and sociometric pop-ularity have all taken the target perspective. Researchers havedetermined who is seen as popular by the majority of peers andthen examined the characteristics of these target children by com-paring them with other target children.

In sociometric research, perceiver effects have hardly beenexamined, even though Moreno (1934) clearly argued for them(see also Cillessen & Bukowski, 2000). Recently, researchers havebegun to examine individual differences in perceiver judgments ofliking (Terry, 2000), but perceived popularity has not been exam-ined. Yet, perceiver effects of the popularity reputation are impor-tant in this context, because they reflect children’s perceptions andschemas about popular and unpopular peers. In particular, one canmeasure individual perceivers’ general beliefs (schemas or percep-tions) about others by examining the positive and negative behav-iors and traits that the perceiver thinks correspond with popularity.

It should be pointed out that perceiver and target effects in socialperception are independent by definition (Kenny, 1994). Thus, acorrelation between nominations at the level of the target does notnecessarily imply that the same correspondence exists in the mindsof the perceivers. In other words, a positive correlation betweenvotes received by targets for behaviors x and y does not mean thatindividual perceivers name the same targets as possessing bothbehaviors. Thus, the examination of perceiver effects, separatefrom target effects, is an important aspect of understanding thenature of peer popularity.

In the current article, two studies are presented, representing twodifferent methods of measuring children’s perceptions. First, wedetermined whether the traits and behaviors associated with socio-

metric and perceived popularity previously demonstrated at thelevel of the target also exist in the eyes of the perceiver. Towardthis end, traditional sociometric nominations were collected inStudy 1. However, a new methodology for scoring the data wasused: We computed kappa scores for perceivers that represent thedegree to which they name the same targets for various combina-tions of sociometric criteria (controlling for chance agreement). Bycombining votes for liking or popularity with various reputationalitems, we created indicators for children’s implicit perceptions orsocial schemas of popular and unpopular others. Children’s likingand popularity nominations were related to perceptions of physicaland relational aggression, prosocial behavior, withdrawal, andathletic and academic ability. We hypothesized that perceiverswould associate only positive characteristics with those targetsthey personally liked, but that their social schemas of those theyperceived as popular would include a mixture of positive andnegative traits.

In Study 2 we used a more traditional open-ended responsemethodology to validate the methodology from Study 1 and tounderstand more fully children’s schematic perceptions of popu-larity. Children provided descriptions of popular and unpopularsame-sex peers, not constrained by any a priori categories definedby the researchers. Study 2 thus used a prototype approach, byasking children to describe what a typical category member waslike. In contrast, Study 1 used an exemplar approach by examiningchildren’s characterizations of specific known individuals within aparticular social category. Both strategies are valid ways of mea-suring person perception (Stangor & Schaller, 2000), and togetherthey provide a comprehensive picture of children’s conceptions ofpopularity.

In both studies, age was included as a factor in the analyses.Several studies suggest that as children move toward adolescence,their conceptions about peer status and popularity change, and theybegin to view antisocial behavior in a more positive light. Forexample, Bukowski, Sippola, and Newcomb (2000) found thatattraction to aggressive peers increases as children move into earlyadolescence. Nukulkij, Cillessen, Bellmore, Whitcomb, and Burke(2000) found evidence that with age adolescents increasingly valuedominant or aggressive behaviors and use these as indicators ofpositive peer social status. Given these developmental changes inthe meaning of popularity, and the increasing importance of peerrelationships and popularity as children move into adolescence, weincluded age or grade level as a factor in both studies.

We also examined gender and ethnic differences in both studies.Research has shown that girls have demonstrated higher levels ofinterpersonal understanding, sensitivity to social cues, social per-ception accuracy, and awareness of their own and others’ status inthe peer group than have boys (Benenson, Apostoleris, & Parnass,1998; Cillessen & Bellmore, 2000; Hall, 1978; Kurdek & Krile,1982; LaFontana & Cillessen, 1999). Thus, girls may be better ablethan boys to distinguish their personal preference for a peer fromtheir judgment of that peer’s popularity. Because same-sex inter-actions are more frequent than opposite-sex interactions (Benen-son et al., 1998) and because of the unspoken but powerful socialrules that inhibit interaction between the genders in preadolescentgroups (Sroufe, Bennett, Englund, & Urban, 1993), both studiesexamine only same-sex perceptions.

Gender was expected to interact with ethnicity, on the basis ofseveral studies of ethnic differences in the correlates of popularity

636 LAFONTANA AND CILLESSEN

(e.g., Graham, Taylor, & Hudley, 1998; Kennedy, 1995). Thesestudies have demonstrated a tendency for African American boysto value academic status far less than other groups, whereas girls(and particularly African American girls, according to Kennedy,1995) value academic ability more than do other groups.

Study 1

Method

Participants

Participants were 405 students (49% girls, M � 11.8 years, SD � 1.6years) out of 467 students from 21 fourth- through eighth-grade classroomsat an inner-city public school serving an ethnically diverse, lower-middleclass community. (The school was 30% African American, 25% Latino,and 41% White, and 52% of the students received free or reduced-pricemeals.) All students in these grades were given permission slips to bedelivered to parents or guardians. The study was approved in advance bythe institutional review boards at Sacred Heart University, Fairfield, Con-necticut, and at University of Connecticut, Storrs, as well as by schooladministrators and teachers (although at the time of data collection, onefifth-grade teacher chose not to have his classroom participate). On thebasis of the wishes of the school administration, permission slips were tobe returned only if parents did not want their children to participate. Thefinal sample included 75 fourth graders, 33 fifth graders, 93 sixth graders,118 seventh graders, and 86 eighth graders, with roughly equal numbers ofboys and girls in each grade. The ethnic composition of the sample was26% African American, 31% Latino, 37% White, and 6% other ethnicities.

Procedure

A sociometric questionnaire was administered by trained research assis-tants in the participating classrooms in the spring of the school year.English-as-a-second-language students received a copy of the question-naire in Spanish and were assigned a bilingual tester. Along with thesociometric questionnaire, participants received a complete grade rosterwith student names alphabetized by first name and preceded by a codenumber. To facilitate the voting process, we broke the roster down byclassroom for the younger grades (4–6). The testers explained the socio-metric procedure, discussed confidentiality, and instructed participantshow to use code numbers. An unlimited choice procedure was used inwhich participants could name as many or as few peers in their grade asthey wanted for each question. There were 10 sociometric questions,divided into two sets. The first set included four nominations: popular(“Who are the popular kids in your grade?”), unpopular (“Who are the kidsin your grade who are not very popular?”), liked (“Who are the kids in yourgrade who you personally like the most?”), and disliked (“Who are the kidsin your grade who you personally like the least?”). The second set includedsix nominations: athletic ability (“Which kids in your grade are really goodat sports?”), academic ability (“Who are the smartest kids in your grade?”),prosocial behavior (“Who are the kids in your grade who cooperate andshare?”), physical aggression (“Who are the kids in your grade who startfights and call other kids names?”), relational aggression (“Who are thekids in your grade who spread rumors about other kids and make fun ofothers behind their backs?”), and social withdrawal (“Who are the kids inyour grade who keep to themselves and are hard to get to know?”).

Target sociometric measures. Traditional sociometric scores werecomputed for each child as a target by counting the number of votesreceived for each nomination and standardizing them within grade. Socialimpact and preference were determined by adding and subtracting, respec-tively, the standardized numbers of liked and disliked votes and againstandardizing the results (Coie et al., 1982). A measure of perceivedpopularity was determined for each child by subtracting the standardized

number of unpopular votes received from the standardized number ofpopular votes received and again standardizing the result within grade.

Perceiver sociometric measures. Kappa scores were computed forpairs of sociometric items to determine the traits and behaviors childrenassociated with popularity and liking. For a pair of sociometric items x andy we determined for each participant which same-sex peers he or shenamed (a) in response to both questions, (b) for x but not for y, (c) for y butnot for x, and (d) for neither x nor y. The counts of these choices (addingup to the total number of same-sex peers minus 1) were entered in a 2 � 2table for each participant. Cohen’s � was then computed across the fourcells of this table, yielding an implicit measure of how strongly theperceiver associated x and y, while controlling for association due tochance. For example, if a child named exactly the same peers as bothcooperative and popular, the kappa score would equal 1, indicating that heor she saw cooperativeness as an essential component of popularity. If thechild named completely different peers as cooperative and as popular,kappa would approach �1, indicating that he or she did not view cooper-ativeness as an important part of being popular.1 Similar kappa scores havebeen used previously to measure social perception accuracy in children(Bellmore, 2001; Cillessen & Bellmore, 2000), but this is the first time theyhave been used to examine the consistency among children’s multipleperceptions of others.

A kappa score was computed for each combination of the four liking orpopularity items (popular, unpopular, liked, and disliked) with the sixbehavior items (athletic ability, academic ability, prosocial behavior, phys-ical aggression, relational aggression, and withdrawal), yielding 24 kappascores for each perceiver. These scores indicated how strongly each be-havior was associated with liking or popularity in the mind of the perceiver.

Because of skew in the distribution of kappa, we normalized our datausing an inverse transformation (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2000). All analyseswere performed with and without this transformation. Because the resultswere virtually identical in both cases, we present the analyses on theoriginal scores because they are more readily interpretable.

Results and Discussion

Correlations Among Sociometric Nominations

We first compared the correlations of the behavior items withsocial preference and perceived popularity using the traditionalsociometric scores. These correlations are presented in Table 1,overall and by gender, grade (fourth and fifth combined vs. sixthvs. seventh vs. eighth), and ethnicity (African American vs. Latinovs. White). The overall correlation between perceived popularityand social preference was .70, which is higher than the .40 corre-lation found by Parkhurst and Hopmeyer (1998). We attribute thisdifference to the fact that our perceived popularity measure was acomposite of two scores and derived from unlimited rather thanlimited nominations.

Both social preference and perceived popularity correlated pos-itively with athletic ability, academic ability, and prosocial behav-ior, and negatively with social withdrawal. However, whereassocial preference correlated negatively with physical and relational

1 The kappa scores will almost never reach �1, even with perfectdisagreement, because of the large number of peers in the grade relative tothe number that the child named for either question. For example, if thereare 50 same-sex peers in the grade and the child nominates 5 peers for onequestion and 5 different peers for another question, there are still 40 peersthat were not named for either question and are therefore included in thekappa formula as agreements. Empirically, then, the kappa scores arealmost never lower than �0.3.

637PERCEPTIONS OF POPULAR AND UNPOPULAR PEERS

aggression, perceived popularity correlated positively with bothtypes of aggression. In addition, the correlations of perceivedpopularity and social preference with each behavior differed sig-nificantly from one another. Perceived popularity was morestrongly correlated with athletic ability and (negatively) with with-drawal than was social preference, whereas social preference wasmore strongly correlated with academic ability and prosocial be-havior than was perceived popularity.

The correlations by subgroups demonstrated that there was asignificantly stronger correlation between popularity and socialpreference for White than for African American and Latino chil-dren, for boys than for girls, and for fourth and fifth graders thanfor older children. For Latino children, physical and relationalaggression were not correlated with social preference but weremore strongly correlated with perceived popularity than for otherchildren. For boys, athletic ability was more strongly correlatedwith social preference and perceived popularity than for girls, andprosocial behavior was more strongly correlated with perceivedpopularity. Whereas relational aggression was positively corre-lated with perceived popularity for both boys and girls, it wasnegatively correlated with social preference for girls only. Also,the two measures of aggression were negatively correlated oruncorrelated with perceived popularity in fourth and fifth grade butsignificantly and positively correlated in the older grades.

Regarding the correlations of the six behaviors with socialpreference and perceived popularity, only White children differ-entiated the correlations of academic ability with both constructs,whereas only African American children failed to differentiate thetwo correlations with prosocial behavior. Only girls discounted the

importance of academic ability for perceived popularity, and onlyboys augmented the importance of athletic ability for perceivedpopularity. Finally, the difference in correlations of social prefer-ence and perceived popularity with social withdrawal was signif-icant in the older grades but not in the younger grades.

Perceptions of Perceived Popularity and Liking

To investigate how individual perceivers distinguished per-ceived popularity and liking, we conducted a 4 (criterion) � 2(gender) � 3 (ethnicity) � 4 (grade) repeated measures analysis ofvariance (ANOVA) for each behavior (athletic and academic abil-ity, prosocial behavior, physical and relational aggression, andsocial withdrawal). Because we ran six ANOVAs, the p value ofsignificance was adjusted to .008 for each effect (see Huberty &Morris, 1989). Criterion was a repeated measures factor formed bythe four kappa scores for each behavior, measuring the perceivedassociation of the behavior with being popular, unpopular, liked,and disliked, respectively. To create sufficient cell sizes for allcells of the design, we combined fourth and fifth graders, yieldingfour levels of the factor grade (fourth–fifth, sixth, seventh, andeighth grade).

Effects of criterion. A significant main effect of criterion wasfound for each behavior, as shown in Table 2. Post hoc compari-sons (Bonferroni corrected) demonstrated how each behavior wasdifferentially related to liking and perceived popularity. Athleticability and social withdrawal were more strongly associated withperceived popularity than with liking, whereas prosocial behaviorwas more strongly related to liking than to perceived popularity.

Table 1Correlations of Standardized Behavioral Nomination Scores With Social Preference and Perceived Popularity Overall and byEthnicity, Gender, and Grade for Study 1

Trait or behaviorOverall

(n � 442)

EthnicityGender Grade

AfricanAmerican(n � 121)

Latino(n � 161)

White(n � 160)

Boys(n � 225)

Girls(n � 215)

4–5(n � 115)

6(n � 100)

7(n � 123)

8(n � 104)

Social preferencePerceived popularity .70 .68a .60a .78b .79a .59b .82a .67b .69b .59b

Athletic abilitySocial preference .39 .49a .25b .33a, b .58a .28b .41a .56a .21b .42a

Perceived popularity .57 .65a .45b .55a, b .79a .39b .62a .56a .55a .56a

Academic abilitySocial preference .33 .36a .34a .35a .33a .32a .33a .37a .24a .42a

Perceived popularity .25 .27a .31a .24a .30a .19a .32a .20a .29a .17a

Prosocial behaviorSocial preference .55 .53a .53a .59a .59a .49a .59a .47a .54a .58a

Perceived popularity .39 .44a .37a .38a .50a .29b .47a .29a .40a .41a

Social withdrawalSocial preference �.21 �.25a �.05a �.26a �.27a �.17a �.12a �.37b �.17a, b �.19a,b

Perceived popularity �.37 �.41a �.34a �.37a �.39a �.36a �.11a �.50b �.37b �.51b

Physical aggressionSocial preference �.22 �.34a .07b �.30a �.14a �.30a �.36a .03b �.22a �.30a

Perceived popularity .26 .25a .45a �.05b .21a .33a �.12a .54b .31c .36b, c

Relational aggressionSocial preference �.15 �.34a .00b �.17a, b �.05a �.26b �.20a,b .02a �.13a, b �.25b

Perceived popularity .33 .22a .46b .15a .28a .37a .06a .60b .36c .35c

Note. Correlations within the same row among ethnicities, genders, or grades with different subscripts differ significantly. Pairs of correlations underlinedwithin the same column for the same behavior differ significantly.

638 LAFONTANA AND CILLESSEN

Also, for athletic ability and for social withdrawal, the differencein association with popular versus unpopular nominations waslarger than the difference in association with liked versus dis-liked nominations. The opposite occurred for prosocial behavior.Finally, children associated physical and relational aggressionmore strongly with disliking than liking but also associated bothforms of aggression more strongly with popularity than withunpopularity.

Our next task was to understand how these differential corre-lates of liking and popularity varied as a function of ethnicity,gender, and grade. To reduce the number of effects to be discussedand to stay close to our main theoretical interests, we restricted our

report to those effects of ethnicity, gender, and grade that furtherqualified the criterion differences described above. Thus, we donot report in detail the main effects of ethnicity, gender, and grade.These main effects are not of theoretical interest; for example, amain effect of gender might indicate that boys associate a certainbehavior more strongly with liking, disliking, popularity and un-popularity than do girls.

Effects of ethnicity. There was a significant Criterion � Eth-nicity interaction for withdrawal, F(6, 710) � 2.92, p � .008. Asshown in Figure 1, White children saw a negative associationbetween withdrawal and popularity, which differed significantly(according to post hoc tests) from Latino children’s positive asso-

Table 2Kappa Scores Measuring Overlap of Popularity and Liking Nominations With Behavioral Nominations in Study 1

Trait or behavior

Popular Unpopular Liked Disliked

F(3, 354) Partial �2M SE M SE M SE M SE

Athletic ability 0.33a 0.02 0.00b 0.01 0.23c 0.02 0.01b 0.01 132.31* .53Academic ability 0.19a 0.01 0.03b 0.01 0.20a 0.01 0.00b 0.01 62.54* .35Prosocial behavior 0.24a 0.02 0.06b 0.01 0.33c 0.02 �0.02d 0.01 143.28* .55Social withdrawal 0.00a 0.01 0.10b 0.01 0.03c 0.01 0.04c 0.01 14.84* .11Physical aggression 0.13a 0.01 0.07b 0.01 0.05b 0.01 0.17a 0.02 23.37* .17Relational aggression 0.10a 0.01 0.06b 0.01 0.05b 0.01 0.14a 0.02 11.86* .09

Note. Means in the same row with the same subscript do not differ at p � .01.* p � .001.

Figure 1. Graph of the interaction of criterion and ethnicity for social withdrawal nominations in Study 1.Within ethnic groups, means with the same subscript do not differ at p � .05. Error bars represent standarderrors.

639PERCEPTIONS OF POPULAR AND UNPOPULAR PEERS

ciation of the two constructs. White and Latino children alsodiffered in the degree to which they associated withdrawal withdisliking, with Whites making a stronger association than Latinos.Finally, unlike African American and White children, Latinos didnot associate withdrawal more strongly with unpopularity thanwith popularity. Children from different ethnic groups may havedifferent notions of what it means to keep to oneself, and thisbehavior may be valued differently in different cultures. Note thatthese results for withdrawal did not occur at the target level.Conversely, whereas there were ethnic differences in the role ofaggression at the target level, these differences were not foundwhen examining the associations made by individual children.

Effects of gender. There was a significant Criterion � Genderinteraction for athletic ability and prosocial behavior, Fs(3,354) � 12.97 and 9.02, respectively ( ps � .001; see Figure 2).Athletic ability was associated more strongly with popularity thanwith liking for boys, but girls did not make this distinction. Inaddition, boys discriminated popular and unpopular peers morestrongly in terms of athletic ability than girls did. Prosocial be-havior was associated more strongly with liking than with popu-larity for girls but not for boys. Girls also discriminated liked anddisliked peers more strongly in terms of prosocial behavior thanboys did.

Effects of grade. There was a significant interaction of crite-rion and grade for social withdrawal and for physical aggression,Fs(9, 1068) � 3.07 and 2.67, respectively ( ps � .005; see Figure3). With increasing age, the association of social withdrawalbecame stronger with unpopularity and weaker with popularity.Fourth, fifth, and sixth graders associated withdrawal equally withpopularity and unpopularity, whereas seventh and eighth gradersassociated withdrawal more strongly with unpopularity than withpopularity. Regarding physical aggression, in fourth and fifthgrade, children associated physical aggression less with popularitythan unpopularity, but this association was reversed in the threeolder age groups. The strongest association between popularity andaggression occurred in sixth grade. These age changes in chil-dren’s perceptions at the perceiver level mirror those found at thetarget level.

Effects of gender and grade. The three-way interaction ofcriterion with gender and grade was significant for social with-drawal, F(9, 1068) � 2.78, p � .003, and almost significant (usingthe .008 cut-off) for relational aggression, F(9, 1068) � 2.44, p �.01. For withdrawal, both boys and girls increasingly associatedsocial isolation with unpopularity as they got older (see above), butgirls (starting in sixth grade) made the association earlier than boysdid (starting in eighth grade). Boys associated relational aggressionmore strongly with unpopular than popular peers in Grades 4, 5,and 6, but this trend reversed in Grades 7 and 8. Girls did notdistinguish popular and unpopular peers in terms of relationalaggression in Grades 4 and 5 but associated relational aggressionwith popularity more strongly than unpopularity in Grades 6, 7,and 8.

The results of Study 1 demonstrate that individual childrenperceive different correlates for liking and popularity. These re-sults are similar to the correlations at the target level, however,these findings confirm that antisocial behavior is part of individualchildren’s schemas of popularity, a fact which could not be deter-mined from target correlations alone. Furthermore, unlike the

target correlations, children did not associate academic abilitymore with liking than with perceived popularity.

Children from different ethnic groups had fairly similar percep-tions of the traits and behaviors associated with popularity andliking, with the exception of social withdrawal. However, olderchildren increasingly distinguished their own liking of a personfrom their assessment of that person’s status among the majority ofpeers and began to view popularity instead as a function of a peer’sdominance, salience, and social network centrality. They alsobegan to view aggression more positively and social isolationincreasingly as a hallmark of being unpopular. Finally, girls madethis transition earlier than boys did, a finding that is consistent withmuch of the developmental literature.

Study 2

Study 1 used a new method for measuring children’s percep-tions using a predefined set of behaviors. In Study 2, we examinedmore thoroughly the content of children’s explicit perceptions ofpopularity using an open-ended response format. This methodallowed us to validate the results of Study 1 and discover otheraspects of children’s perceptions of popularity that are not cap-tured by a predefined set of peer nominations. Study 2 also used aprototype approach, rather than the exemplar approach used inStudy 1.

In a previous prototype study, LaFontana and Cillessen (1998)asked children to explain behaviors performed by hypotheticalpeers who were described as popular, unpopular, or neither. Chil-dren attributed more hostility to the behaviors of popular targetsthan neutral targets and did not like popular targets more thanneutral targets. Children also made less stable attributions for thepositive behaviors and more stable attributions for the negativebehaviors of popular targets than neutral targets.

Evidence from studies in sociology and education further dem-onstrates the complexities of popularity in middle childhood andearly adolescence. On the basis of participant observation, Adler,Kless, and Adler (1992) defined popularity as being liked by manypeers, being the most influential in setting group opinions, andhaving the greatest impact on determining the boundaries of mem-bership in the most exclusive social group. They also found thatpossessing savoir faire (sophistication in social and interpersonalskills, including using this knowledge to further one’s social ad-vantage by manipulating, dominating, and controlling others) wasan important aspect of being popular. Merten (1997) studied agroup of girls who were seen as both mean and popular. On thebasis of interviews with these girls and their peers and teachers,Merten concluded that the girls acted mean as a way of maintain-ing their status among their peers. Eder and Kinney (1995) ob-served middle school students’ involvement in extracurricular ac-tivities and the relationship of this involvement to popularity(“Which students in your grade are the most popular?” p. 303) andto peer status (“If you could choose any students in your grade tohang around with at school who would they be?” p. 303). For bothboys and girls, the most visible activities (cheerleading for girlsand basketball or wrestling for boys) were the most important fordetermining popularity. Furthermore, for girls, continued involve-ment in these activities served to increase their popularity butdecreased the degree to which they were liked by peers, because

640 LAFONTANA AND CILLESSEN

they were resented more and more by other girls for their positionof status.

The studies described above confirm that popularity in this agegroup is primarily a function of impact and visibility rather than

likability. Being seen as popular means having social power overothers, rather than simply getting along well with a majority ofone’s peers. Children seem to understand the Machiavellian natureof perceived popularity, realizing that aggressive or delinquent

Figure 2. Graphs of the interaction between criterion and gender for athletic and prosocial nominations inStudy 1. Within gender, means with the same subscript do not differ at p � .05. Error bars represent standarderrors.

641PERCEPTIONS OF POPULAR AND UNPOPULAR PEERS

behavior is sometimes necessary to maintain one’s power andinfluence in a social structure. This aggressive behavior is mani-fested by boys and girls, although it may take different forms (e.g.,physical vs. relational aggression) for each gender.

The goal of Study 2 was to determine the traits and behaviorsthat children spontaneously associate with popularity and unpop-

ularity. We hypothesized that children’s perceptions of unpopularpeers would be primarily negative, whereas their perceptions ofpopular peers would include both positive and negative aspects.We also expected children to describe popular peers primarily interms of dominance and power and unpopular peers in terms ofdeviance and social isolation. Moreover, descriptions of popular

Figure 3. Graphs of the interaction of criterion and age group for social withdrawal and physical aggressionnominations in Study 1. Within grade, means with the same subscript do not differ at p � .05. Error barsrepresent standard errors.

642 LAFONTANA AND CILLESSEN

and unpopular targets were expected to differ in the extent towhich they mentioned sophisticated interpersonal skills.

As in Study 1, these effects were predicted to strengthen withage. Also, girls were expected to have more complex perceptionsand to associate popularity more with power than boys would. Onthe basis of studies of gender effects (e.g., Adler et al., 1992),athletic ability was predicted to be very important when describingwhat makes boys popular, whereas physical appearance and aca-demic performance were expected to determine popularity amonggirls. Regarding ethnic differences, on the basis of several studies(e.g., Graham et al., 1998; Kennedy, 1995), African Americanchildren (boys in particular) were expected to associate academicability with popularity less than would Latino or White children.

Method

Participants

Participants were 92 children (50% girls) in Grades 4–8 who took partin an after-school program at a large kindergarten through eighth gradeinner-city elementary school. All children in the program had been invitedto participate in this study in addition to participating in the larger class-room study (Study 1) and had received parental permission. Childrenranged in age from 9 to 14 years (M � 11.5 years, SD � 1.4 years). Thesample was ethnically diverse: 40% African American, 16% Latino, 31%White, and 13% other ethnic groups.

Procedure

Children were interviewed individually by trained research assistants ina quiet room in school in the early spring of the school year. Interviewslasted about 20 min and included two open-ended questions to assesschildren’s perceptions of popular and unpopular same-sex peers. For ex-ample, to assess perceptions of popular boys, children were asked thefollowing question: “Think about the boys in your grade who everyonesays are the ‘popular’ boys. Now tell me, in general, what is it about boyslike this that makes them so popular with the other boys?” If the childhesitated or did not fully understand the question, the interviewer wouldprompt with “Why are these boys so popular?” or “What is it about themthat makes them popular?” Interviewers kept a verbatim transcript of eachchild’s responses by recording the information as completely as possiblewhile the child spoke and then filling in any gaps in note taking immedi-ately after the interview.

Coding of Answers to Open-Ended Questions

Because most children responded with more than one answer to eachopen-ended question, two coders independently split children’s responsesinto separate answers. They identified the exact same number of answersin 73% of the cases (Cohen’s � � .68) and differed by one answer or lessin 92% of the cases (Cohen’s � � .90). Discrepancies were solved throughdiscussion, yielding a final list of 1,159 separate answers. Three newcoders then rated how positively or negatively each answer described thetarget on a scale from –4 (most negative) to 0 (neutral) to �4 (mostpositive). Ratings were averaged across coders to a single valence rating foreach answer. Interrater reliability based on 100% of the answers was .90(Cronbach’s alpha).

The same three coders then coded the content of each answer into oneof 32 categories, identified by the authors after examining a subset ofanswers (see the Appendix). Coders used the most specific categorypossible for each answer. For example, if a child’s answer was “theirappearance,” this would have been coded as a 1 (physical appearance), butif the description referred to a more specific feature of the target’s appear-

ance, such as their clothing, the answer would have been coded 1a (cloth-ing). Cohen’s � was .72, .71, and .71, respectively, for each pair of codersacross the 32 content categories (73%, 72%, and 72% agreement, respec-tively). After initial coding, discrepancies were resolved through discus-sion and mutual agreement.

Ten main content categories were created by combining the initial 32categories as follows (with initial category numbers in parentheses): phys-ical appearance (1, 1a, 1b, and 1c), academic ability (2 and 3), competen-cies (9a, 9b, and 9c), athletic ability (4), deviance (6, 6a, and 6b), likability(5b), social connectedness (5a, 5c, 5d, 5e, and 5f), power and dominance(10 and 11), prosocial behavior (8), and antisocial behavior (7, 7a, 7b, and7c). The remaining content categories were dropped, because they were notused (5 and 9), too general or ambiguous (12, 13, and 14), or uncodable(category 15). Cohen’s � was .84, .82, and .81, respectively, for each pairof coders for the collapsed content categories (86%, 84%, and 84%agreement, respectively).

We then combined content and valence into one coding system. Thevalence ratings (on a scale from –4 to �4) of each participant’s descrip-tions were summed within each of the 10 categories for both targets(popular and unpopular). For example, if a child gave three descriptions ofa popular target that mentioned the target’s attractiveness, and these de-scriptions were rated by the coders as �2, �1, and �1, respectively, theseratings were summed to give the child a score of �4 for that category. Thismethod resulted in 20 scores for each child, 1 for each of the 10 categoriesdescribing each of the two targets.

Results and Discussion

Means and standard deviations for the scores described aboveare presented in Table 3. The means indicate how positive ornegative children’s descriptions were, and the standard deviationsindicate how much variability there was in children’s descriptions.Popular children were described most favorably in terms of attrac-tiveness and social connectedness, whereas unpopular peers weredescribed most unfavorably in terms of low attractiveness, antiso-cial behavior, deviance and lack of social connectedness. In con-trast, there was very little mention of deviance when describingpopular peers or of liking or disliking when describing unpopularpeers. Also, there was a great deal of variability in children’sdescriptions of the attractiveness of both popular and unpopularpeers and in the descriptions of the intelligence of unpopular peers.

To examine the effects of perceiver characteristics on judgmentsof popular and unpopular targets, we conducted a 2 (target popu-larity) � 2 (gender) � 3 (ethnicity) � 3 (grade) ANOVA on each

Table 3Means and Standard Deviations of Ratings of Descriptions forPopular and Unpopular Targets for Study 2

Popular Unpopular

M SD M SD

Attractiveness 0.92 1.78 �1.15 2.10Intelligence 0.41 1.33 0.11 1.74Competencies 0.25 1.64 �0.38 1.15Athleticism 0.47 1.15 �0.20 0.67Deviance 0.04 0.46 �0.54 1.15Likability 0.21 0.85 �0.06 0.42Connectedness 0.92 1.57 �0.58 1.50Dominance �0.36 1.29 �0.18 0.87Prosocial behavior 0.15 0.62 0.22 1.13Antisocial behavior �0.36 1.38 �0.70 1.53

643PERCEPTIONS OF POPULAR AND UNPOPULAR PEERS

of the 10 categories, with target popularity as a repeated measuresfactor. A Bonferroni correction was applied, adjusting the p valuefor significance to .005 for each effect (Huberty & Morris, 1989).To create sufficient cell sizes for all cells of the design, we dividedparticipants into three age groups (fourth–fifth, sixth, and seventh–eighth grade).

Effects of Target Popularity

A significant effect of target popularity indicates that children’sdescriptions of popular and unpopular peers differ in how favor-able they are for certain categories. These effects were significantfor attractiveness, F(1, 68) � 42.89, p � .001; intelligence, F(1,68) � 9.50, p � .003; athleticism, F(1, 68) � 13.53, p � .001; andsocial connectedness, F(1, 68) � 28.23, p � .001. There was alsoa marginally significant effect for deviance, F(1, 68) � 7.47, p �.008. As shown in Table 3, for all of these measures, populartargets were rated more positively than unpopular targets.

Figure 4 graphically presents the means of each category forpopular and unpopular targets. The direction of the mean for acategory (above or below zero) indicates the valence of the use ofthe category for each target. The distance from the zero lineindicates the degree of importance of the category to describe thetarget. For the most part, popular targets were described favorablyand unpopular targets unfavorably. However, when describing thedominance behavior (e.g., bullying) of the two targets, childrendescribed popular targets slightly less favorably than unpopulartargets. Furthermore, popular peers were described negativelyoverall in terms of their dominance and antisocial behavior.

Effects of Ethnicity, Gender, and Grade

There was a significant Popularity � Ethnicity interaction forintelligence, F(2, 68) � 6.21, p � .003. White and African

American children did not distinguish popular and unpopulartargets on the basis of intelligence, whereas Latino children de-scribed popular targets as much more academically skilled thanunpopular targets.

A significant Popularity � Gender interaction was also foundfor athletic ability, F(1, 68) � 8.69, p � .004. Boys distinguishedpopular and unpopular peers in terms of athletic ability more thangirls did. Although the Popularity � Gender interaction was notsignificant for intelligence, boys rated popular boys significantlyhigher than unpopular boys, but there was no difference for girls.This result was contrary to the expectation that academic abilitywould be more important for popularity in girls than boys.

Finally, a significant Popularity � Gender � Age interactionwas found for antisocial behavior, F(2, 68) � 6.01, p � .004. Thisinteraction was explained by a significant Popularity � Gradeinteraction for girls only, F(2, 34) � 4.72, p � .015. The youngest(fourth–fifth grade) girls perceived unpopular targets significantlyless favorably (M � �1.36) than popular targets (M � .10). Sixthgrade and seventh–eighth grade girls, however, did not see un-popular targets (Ms � –.48 and –1.02) significantly less favorablythan popular targets (Ms � �1.21 and 0.00). The interaction wasnot significant for boys, but in sixth grade, boys rated unpopulartargets less favorably than popular targets (–.39 vs. .00), whereasthere was no difference in the other age groups (Ms for popular vs.unpopular targets were –.44 vs. –.44 and .00 vs. –.36 for fourth–fifth and seventh–eighth grade boys, respectively). Thus, for bothgenders, there is a developmental period marked by a somewhatdecreased association of antisocial behavior with unpopular peersand an increased association of antisocial behavior with popularpeers. The peak of this trend was earlier for girls (in sixth grade)than for boys (who begin to show the trend somewhat in seventh–eighth grade).

Figure 4. Children’s descriptions of popular and unpopular targets in Study 2.

644 LAFONTANA AND CILLESSEN

In sum, perceived popularity was associated with attractiveness,athletic and other talents, and frequent interactions. Popular targetswere seen as competent, talented, and socially well connected. Butthey were also seen as willing to act aggressively or otherwiseantisocially to achieve their goals. Children saw unpopular targetsas unattractive, isolated, lacking talents or competencies, and notdressing or behaving in ways that allow them to fit in. Theseperceptions were mostly consistent across ethnicity, gender, andage groups. In accord with traditional gender stereotypes, athleticability was an important characteristic of popular boys, but unex-pectedly, academic ability did not distinguish popular and unpop-ular girls. Ethnic groups differed only in their views of the linkbetween academic ability and popularity, whereas age groupsdiffered in their perception of the relationship between aggressionand popularity.

General Discussion

Together, these studies demonstrate that children’s perceptionsabout popular and unpopular peers differ in important ways fromthe profiles of sociometrically popular and unpopular peers thathave emerged from past research (e.g., Rogosch & Newcomb,1989; Rubin et al., 1998). Across both studies, these results showthat from the perceiver’s perspective, liking and popularity are notidentical constructs. Children have mixed evaluative reactions toboth popular and unpopular peers. This evaluative complexity isreflected in the traits and behaviors that children associate withperceived popularity.

In both studies, children associated both prosocial and antisocialbehaviors with being popular. In Study 1, antisocial behavior wasactually associated more strongly with popularity than with un-popularity, whereas in Study 2 there was no difference in the levelof antisocial behavior attributed to popular and unpopular peers.There were not enough answers referring to subtypes of aggressionto permit formal analysis, but when children referred to antisocialbehavior in popular children they often described their tendency tobully others. They were more likely to see unpopular children asvictims of bullying. The aggression displayed by each group mighttherefore be described as instrumental or proactive for popularchildren (acting aggressively to obtain what they want) and hostileor reactive for unpopular children (acting aggressively because ofthe frustration that comes with being victimized). Future researchshould examine the link between popularity and proactive andreactive aggression separately.

There was a difference in both studies in the negative correlatesof popularity and unpopularity: Popular peers were seen primarilyas physically and relationally aggressive, whereas unpopular peerswere seen primarily as social isolates. Study 1 showed that chil-dren associate withdrawal most strongly with unpopular others,whereas Study 2 demonstrated that children use frequency ofinteraction as one of the strongest discriminators (other than phys-ical attractiveness) between popular and unpopular peers. It isinteresting that children focus on the quantity rather than thequality of interaction to determine popularity. From a social net-works perspective, it seems that children see those peers who havea large number of peer contacts and are more central to the socialnetwork as popular and those who have few social contacts asunpopular.

When considering social networks, one should also note thatcertain characteristics examined in this study (e.g., dominance,isolation, and deviance) are social roles as well as individual traits.It is possible that the correlates of perceived popularity may varyas a function of the school culture, and further research in differentsocial contexts is needed.

Both studies also provide evidence that talents and competen-cies are important determinants of perceived popularity. InStudy 1, athletic ability (and to a lesser extent academic ability)distinguished popular from unpopular peers. In Study 2, childrendescribed popular peers as more athletic and talented, whereasunpopular peers were described as less academically able andcompetent. Study 2 went on to demonstrate other traits, such asattractiveness, dominance, and deviance, that distinguished popu-lar and unpopular peers. Children overwhelmingly described pop-ular peers as attractive and unpopular peers as unattractive andused power (primarily in a negative way) to describe popular peersrather than unpopular peers. Unpopular peers were frequentlydescribed as deviant and unaware of how to fit in with peers.

Together, these two studies demonstrate that children’s percep-tions about popular and unpopular peers are complex and thatchildren may share a consensual view of popularity as a functionof dominance rather than liking. As children move from childhoodinto adolescence, their social goals are changing. Studies of earlyadolescents (e.g., Allen, Weissberg, & Hawkins, 1989) suggestthat negative or antisocial goals may become more valued aschildren grow older. The present studies suggest that children’ssocial goals gravitate toward being dominant rather than beingwell liked as they move into adolescence.

The distinction children make between popular and unpopularpeers relates back to the concept of savoir faire discussed earlier.Popular children are described as interpersonally skilled andknowing how to obtain their goals, even if it means using aggres-sion. Unpopular children, on the other hand, are described asmisfits who do not understand the proper way to behave in the peergroup. These results suggest that children in this age group viewpopularity as being equivalent to one’s position in the socialhierarchy, and a certain degree of Machiavellian behavior may beneeded to maintain one’s status at the top of that hierarchy. Popularchildren seem to be the ones who use the proper balance ofprosocial and antisocial behavior that allows them to dominate.Unpopular children, according to these results, are not disliked bypeers, but are seen as not possessing the social skills to rise fromthe bottom of the hierarchy.

These findings have implications for the definition of socialcompetence. Social competence may be viewed as being prosocial,altruistic, empathic, and cooperative. In this view, social compe-tence is seen as behavior that is socially approved and leads tobeing liked. Alternatively, social competence may be seen as theability to achieve one’s goals in social settings. The current studysuggests that these two viewpoints may represent two dimensionsof social competence. Because sociometric and perceived popu-larity overlap to some degree, and children can be both well likedand dominant, these two dimensions are potentially compatible.

Gender is an important moderator of the popularity perceptionsof children and adolescents. In both studies, girls were more likelythan boys to associate popularity with negative behaviors and todescribe popularity as a function of dominance rather than likabil-ity. Girls also seem to have more complex perceptions about other

645PERCEPTIONS OF POPULAR AND UNPOPULAR PEERS

girls than boys do about other boys. To some extent, boys asso-ciated positive traits with popular boys and negative traits withunpopular boys, but in both studies girls did not see popular girlsas more prosocial or more well liked than unpopular girls.

Ethnicity and age differences were influential as well. Whereasethnic groups were more similar than different, there were somedifferences in the association of popularity with withdrawal andwith academic ability. Age effects generally showed that childrenmade an increasingly strong association of negative traits andaggressive behavior with popular targets as they got older. Thestudy of age effects beyond early adolescence is an important goalfor future research. Although concerns about status and suscepti-bility to peer influence increase in adolescence (e.g., Jarvinen &Nicholls, 1996; O’Brien & Bierman, 1988), they may level off ordecrease in high school or college. In fact, at least for girls, someof the strongest associations of negative behaviors with popularityoccurred in sixth grade and began to level off in seventh and eighthgrades.

Furthermore, using the methodology of Study 1, it would bepossible to examine how the gender and the ethnicity of both theperceiver and the target independently contribute to children’s peerperceptions. The present research included only same-gender per-ceptions in both studies and examined only the effects due to therace of the perceiver. It is possible, however, that children mayhave different views of targets who are from different genders orraces.

The present studies underscore the importance of consideringperceived popularity in addition to sociometric status in peerrelations research. Furthermore, the methodology used in bothstudies provides researchers with a means of obtaining new andimportant information from existing data. Using the methodologyfrom Study 1, researchers could reexamine existing sociometricnomination data to learn more about children’s perceptions, andbased on the results of Study 2, new nomination measures may bedeveloped to identify important behaviors and traits that childrenand adolescents may possess. It is critical that researchers attemptto understand the structure and dynamics of the peer group as theyare seen from the child’s point of view. Only in understanding thisperspective will researchers be able to develop appropriate inter-ventions to assist unpopular children in becoming better adjustedand to help all children resist engaging in harmful behaviors toincrease their status among their peers.

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Appendix

Content Categories Used to Code Open-Ended Answers for Study 21. physical appearance

a. clothes (“dresses nice,” “wears the right brands”)b. physical attractiveness (“pretty,” “cute,” “ugly”)c. hygiene (“smells,” “dirty,” “stinks”)

2. academic performance (“good/bad in school,” “does homework”)3. intelligence (“smart,” “stupid”)4. athletic ability (“good in sports,” “plays basketball,” “can’t play ball”)5. peer interactions

a. has friends (“has lots of friends,” “doesn’t have many friends”)b. liking (“everyone likes them”)c. popularity (“hangs around with popular/unpopular people,” “popular kids hang out together”)d. high frequency of interaction (“talks to everyone,” “everyone talks to them”)e. low frequency of interaction/socially withdrawn (“new in school,” “stays by self,” “doesn’t interact with others”)f. opposite sex interactions (“has lots of boyfriends/girlfriends or has none,” “goes on dates”)

6. deviancea. act different from others (“different from others,” “doesn’t know rap music,” “doesn’t act in the right way,”

“doesn’t care what others think,” “uses big words that other kids don’tunderstand,” “does crazy things”)b. act the same as others (“do normal things,” “talk like Valley girl,” “dress alike”)

7. antisocial behaviora. direct/overt aggression (“hit people,” “put people in the hospital,” “fight”)b. indirect/covert aggression (“gossip,” “spread rumors,” “put people down”)c. disruptive/discipline problem (“talk back to parents/teacher,” “bother people”)

8. prosocial behavior (“cooperates,” “shares,” “helps”)9. competencies/incompetencies

a. talents (“can kiss”) or lack of talents (“can’t dance”)b. sense of humor (“good sense of humor”) or lack of sense of humor (“tells corny jokes”)c. appropriate or inappropriate behavior (“has manners,” “makes rude noises”)

10. bragging, showing off (“act like they’re all that,” “stuck up,” “thinks she’s ‘the bomb’,” “think they can beat upeveryone else”)

11. power, dominance (“no one messes with her,” “knows how to control people”)12. self-referent (“I’m unpopular,” “they act like me and my friends”)13. behavior—unspecified [only use this category as a last resort]14. personality traits—unspecified [only use this category as a last resort]15. uncodable (e.g., “I don’t know”) [use this category as an absolute last resort]

Received June 2, 2000Revision received March 11, 2002

Accepted March 11, 2002 �

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