The Social Context of Adolescent Friendships: Parents, Peers, and Romantic Partners

We argue that adolescent friendships flourish, or wither, within the “linked lives” of other salient social network ties. Based on structural equation modeling with data from two time points, we find that young people tend to be in high-quality friendships when they are tightly embedded in their social network and receive social support from their peers, parents, and romantic partners. In addition, females have higher quality friendships than...