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Home › Articles › Parenting Strategies › It's War!

It's War!

Helping Your Preteen Survive Friendship Fights

By Kelly Burgess

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(Broadway, 2001), there are a lot of emotional reasons for some of the unpleasant "clique-ish" behavior often seen at this stage.

"At this age, children are insecure and self-centered," Sagarese says. "Often these friendship fights center on the child thinking that a friend is not treating them the way they want to be treated. This isn't really very different than the reasons adults turn from their friends: giving more than you think you're getting back."

Sagarese adds that it's important to understand relationships are the terrain of the female. We base our worth and identity on our relationships with other people, so those are the areas in which girls feel the greatest anxiety and conflict. For boys, the competition is more tied into physical abilities. Boys are jockeying for a place in the male hierarchy, but their competition is more overt and centers on sports. Girls' power plays center upon relationships.

"Power and popularity are the calling cards of early adolescence," Sagarese says. "This is true for both boys and girls, but they compete in different ways. With boys, it's sports, because a boy's popularity is predicated upon their athletic ability. For girls, it's their social status and ability to manipulate relationships. That leaves room for a lot of schemes and jockeying for positions within cliques."


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