The Importance of Peer Relationships in Children

In early childhood, babies begin to show a marked interest in all other children. However, since the social skills necessary to play with other children are not yet fully developed, the first types of play are the ones they play alone. After a while, they start to play side-by-side games with their peers around the age of 2. In these parallel games, they play similarly, but they are still not interacting enough. At the age of 2 and a half, with the development of language, imaginary games and games in which communication increase is made. At the age of 3 and 3 and a half, “house-like” games are established, which are cooperative and where the imagination is highly developed.

The period in which peer relationships begin to affect lifelong development in children is the beginning of school. The pressure to be loved and accepted by the society, which is encountered for the first time, begins to show itself. Adoption by classmates is a major factor that can have a long-term impact on a child’s personality development and possible behavioral disorders. According to studies, it has been found that children who are not adopted, excluded and not accepted by their friends are more likely to change school, drop out of school, engage in delinquent behaviors and develop psychological disorders in their future lives. Children who do not have friends are not only “vicious” and “aggressive” children. Besides the children who are not accepted by their friends due to their irritable behaviors, there are also children who are rejected, neglected and not given the opportunity to develop their problem-solving skills. In order to support their children and show that they are there for them in every way, parents tend to intervene immediately in school problems. However, this situation often results in an obstacle to the ability of the child to seek solutions to the problems and to strive for solutions. The child may avoid one-to-one communication with his peers by seeking parental support in every problem he encounters in his life. In such cases, as social relations are negatively affected, the child may become more prone to social anxiety and depression.

In addition to the academic development it contains, the school is effective in many important acquisitions such as social experiences, a sense of competence and success, self-confidence and endurance in the lives of children. In this period, which contributes to children’s self-knowledge and awareness, there are important features such as determining their strengths and weaknesses, making social comparisons, and creating a lifelong positive self-perception. While children who are successful at school and gain a sense of satisfaction from school life develop a positive perspective in their general life; Children who encounter frustration at school and are not adopted may attribute this negative perception to their life-long personality structures. Some peer relationship problems, which do not seem so important to parents, can seriously damage both the meanings ascribed to the child’s bilateral relations and the sense of satisfaction received from social life.

Since friendship is viewed as a continuous social relationship that includes mutual support and trust, especially in peer relationships established during adolescence, it can be seen that adolescents sometimes give importance to friendship rather than family. When it is not realized that this situation is a periodic process, parents may seek help in a panic. Since most adolescents have not yet reached a stable identity structure and have difficulty thinking about the long-term consequences of their behavior, they need support, guidance and cooperation from their peers. For this reason, it is extremely important to develop healthy peer relationships in addition to parental guidance so that they can effectively cope with the problems they face.

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Psk. Deniz Tan KUMCUOĞLU