ABSTRACT
Five years ago I began a chapter in which I assessed the state of our knowledge about adolescent romantic relationships by chiding social scientists for paying too little attention to this important aspect of young people’s relationships with peers (Brown, Feiring, & Furman, 1999). In the interim, scholars have made remarkable progress in unraveling the mysteries of teenage romance (at least in North America). Scientific journals and academic conferences now routinely offer new evidence derived from richer theoretical perspectives and a more diverse array of respondents. We have moved beyond the inclination to regard adolescents’ romantic forays as frivolous behavior, or to simply disregard them in favor of the more troublesome topic of teenage sexuality. The contributors to this book display the impressive progress that investigators have made in understanding adolescent romance. My comments will concentrate on Collins and van Dulmen (this volume), which is largely concerned with how aspects of adolescents’ relationships with friends and parents predict features of their romantic experiences.
