ABSTRACT
Clinical, developmental and social psychologists have pondered the above questions in their academic, and no doubt private, capacity for some time. The study of children’s friendships has also been relatively ignored for another reason. Even if psychologists do not, parents and teachers have known for a long time that children of all ages can provide particular resources for their friends that adults simply cannot. The major beneficial function of friendship is to teach the skills of friendship like the tactics of friendship-making, and the skills of gaining entry to a group. For many years psychologists and educationalists have described various groups of rejected and neglected children and adolescents who seem to lack many of the appropriate skills that are to be important in both developing and maintaining peer friendships. Young adolescents may feel a sense of extreme anger at being unable to make friends, or at being neglected by significant and attractive others.
