From Managing Emotions to Improving Relationships: Higher Quality Best Friendships Predicted from Earlier Emotion Regulation. Elenda T. Hessel, Megan M. Schad, Joanna Chango, & Joseph P. Allen University of Virginia. We would like to thank the National Institute of Child Health & Human Development for funding awarded to Joseph P. Allen, Principal Investigator, (9 R01 HD A11) for funding to conduct this study as well as for the write-up of this study. Introduction Adolescence is a developmental period during which friendships becomes an important and influential force in children’s lives. During this period, social relationships build in importance as teens begin to increasingly turn towards friends for support and guidance. As such, teens who are more socially adept and who have higher quality friendships may be at an advantage. The ability to regulate emotions has been demonstrated as key to successful social interactions and friendship development for younger children, as well as for social interactions and relationships in adulthood. Despite this, much less is known about the role emotion regulation plays in friendships or social behavior in the teenage years. This study seeks to investigate the role of teens’ emotion regulation in predicting later interpersonal functioning and friendship quality. Hypotheses. Emotion Regulation at age 15 will predict an increase in teens’ best friend- rated social competence at age 17. Emotion Regulation at age 15 will predict an increase in friendship quality between the teen and their best friend, as evidenced by more each behaving more positively towards the other during an interaction at age 17. Emotion Regulation at age 15 will predict an increase in friendship quality between the teen and their best friend, as evidenced by each acting more agreeably towards the other during an interaction at age 17. Method Conclusions Results Participants Multi-method longitudinal data were obtained from 170 teenagers along with their best friends (N=164). 58% Caucasian, 29% African American, and 13% Mixed or Other ethnicity. Median household income was within the $40,000 to $59,000 range. Target teen mean age was years at Time 1, and at Time 2. Friends reported that they had known the target teen for an average of 5.1 years (SD =3.35) at Time 1, and 5.79 years (SD=3.18) Time 2. Procedures. Time 1 (Age 15) - Target teen and their best friend filled out questionnaires about the target teen. They then engaged in 2 interactions. In the first the teen asked their friend for advice or support, and during the second, the dyads were asked to discuss a hypothetical dilemma requiring them to come to a consensus on decisions they disagreed on. Time 2 (Age 17) - Target teen and their best friend came in and filled out questionnaires about the target teen. The dyad then engaged in two interactions tasks, similar to the ones from when the teen was 15 years old. Measures. Emotion Regulation Teens completed a self-report measure of emotional repair using the 6-item “Repair” subscale of the Trait Meta-Mood Scale (Salovey, et al, 1995). Responses were given on a 5-point likert scale, with possible responses ranging from “Strongly Agree” to “Strongly disagree”. Positively valenced items were reverse coded. The repair subscale has been well and it showed good internal consistency in this sample (Cronbach’s α =.82). Social Competence. The best friend was asked to rate the target teens’ overall social competence using questions from the Self-Perception Profile for Adolescents (Harter, 1988). Social competence was assessed as a composite of items from three scales assessing romantic competence, close friendship competence, and social acceptance. This measure requires the friends to choose between two contrasting descriptors and then rate the extent to which their choice is true about the target teen. Responses to each item are scored on a 4-point scale and then summed, with higher scores reflecting higher levels of perceived social competence. The internal consistency of this combined scale was good (α = ). Observed Friendship Quality with Best Friend Positivity – Teens were instructed to ask their friend for advice on an issue of their choice. The resulting 6 minute interactions were videotaped, and then coded for the degree of positivity expressed, operationalized as the valuing, engagement, satisfaction with the interaction, and reverse coded negative affect expressed by the adolescent. Interrater reliability was in the “good” to “excellent” range (intraclass r’s ranging from.67 to.82). Agreeableness – Each dyad participated in an 8-minute videotaped task in which they were presented with a hypothetical dilemma. Teens and friends were asked to first separately make decisions to solve the dilemmas, and were then asked to work together to try to resolve any differences and to come to a consensus. The Autonomy-Relatedness Coding System for Peer Interactions was used to code these interactions (Allen et al. 2001). Specific interactive behaviors, including use of confident tone, avoidance of disagreements, and pressuring another person to agree other than by making rational arguments, were coded then summed together into separate target teen and best friend “Agreeable” scales. Interrater reliability was in the “good” to “excellent” range (intraclass r’s ranging from.72 to.82). Teen’s ability to repair their emotions may predict their future success in navigating social relationships in general, as well as the quality of their future friendships in particular. Emotional repair—a specific form of emotion regulation—may allow adolescents to thrive in social relationships, because it may allow them to act in age appropriate manners, remain calm in the face of negative events, and gain social competence. These teens also act more positively towards their friends, and in turn have friends who are more agreeable to them, which may result in higher quality friendships over time. Going forward, it will be important to determine what specific mechanisms emotional repair acts through to enhance teen’s social competence and friendship quality. Teens’ emotional repair at 15 predicted an increase in best friend’s ratings of teens’ overall social competence (β=.17, p<.05) at 17. Higher levels of emotional repair at age 15 predicted relative increases in teens’ positivity towards their best friends at 17 (β=.17, p<.05), but did not predict best friends positivity. Conversely, higher levels of emotional repair at 15 for teens predicted relative increases in their best friend’s agreeableness towards them at age 17 (β= -.26, p<.05), but was not a significant predictor of changes in the teens’ own agreeableness. Finally, analyses demonstrated that higher levels of emotional repair at age 15 predicted relative increases in adolescents’ dominance with their best friends at age 17 (β= 23, p<.01).