My peers, my friend, and I: Peer interactions and somatic complaints in boys and girls

In this article we present two studies about the relations between peer relationships and somatic complaints in children in Den Bosch, the Netherlands. In the first study (n = 711), when the children were average 10 years old, we focused on social status as rated by classmates (popular, neglected, controversial, rejected, and average), self-reported social anxiety and somatic complaints. The second study (n = 688) conducted 1.5 years later on the same sample, focused on possible positive influences of best friends on somatic complaints. We analyzed how reciprocity of the friendship, self-reported disclosure with the nominated best friend and self-reported emotion communication skill were related to children's somatic complaints. The results indicate an influence of peer interactions on somatic complaints. Social anxiety was associated with more somatic complaints, but peer status was unrelated to somatic complaints. Further, for girls with a reciprocated best friend, emotion communication skill was related to fewer somatic complaints. For boys emotion communication skill was negatively associated with somatic complaints when their friendship was unreciprocated, whereas disclosure with the nominated peer was related to the experience of more complaints in this case. The results indicate different associations of the sharing of emotions among boys and girls with regard to somatic complaints. It should be noted that self-reports on relationships and health may overlap more than classmates' reports of peer status because of shared method variance. © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.