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Positive Relationships pp 127–143Cite as

Friendships: The Power of Positive Alliance

Abstract

Being accepted and having friends is essential to our mental health and well-being and amongst the most significant factors for life quality and enjoyment. From a young age, children need to learn the complex social skills and management of emotions that enable them to gain acceptance from peers and sustain mutually satisfying interactions leading to, in some cases, life-long friendships. The rewards of friendship are immense, but the consequences of not being accepted by peers and failing to develop friendships are also significant in terms of long-term mental health and well-being in later life. This chapter addresses why friendships throughout the life cycle are important and identifies the purposes served by such relationships. Features of friendships in childhood and adolescence are defined along with strategies for establishing and maintaining friendships and providing a context that promotes opportunities for friendships and enables them to flourish.

Keywords

  • Social Network
  • Middle Childhood
  • School Adjustment
  • Pretend Play
  • Friendship Group

These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.

Karen Majors is a tutor on the educational psychology training course at the Institute of Education, London University. She has written on friendship in the school context and completed her doctorate on Imaginary Friendships in children.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology and Human Development, Institute of Education, University of London, London, UK

    Karen Majors

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  1. Karen Majors
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Correspondence to Karen Majors .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Western Sydney, Milperra, Australia

    Sue Roffey

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Majors, K. (2012). Friendships: The Power of Positive Alliance. In: Roffey, S. (eds) Positive Relationships. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-2147-0_8

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