Emotional adjustment and peer relationships: The role of behavioural reputation and classroom social climate

PLOS One | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0332297 September 18, 2025 3 / 13 threat (e.g., anxiety), a response to frustration in achieving a goal (e.g., anger), or a consequence of having to relinquish a goal (e.g., sadness). Thus, we would expect that anger would frequently manifest as starting fights or disrupting group interactions, whereas both worries/fears and sadness would frequently manifest as social withdrawal. In both cases, cooperative and leadership behaviour would seem less likely manifestations of the negative emotion, but some degree of differentiation may be evi- dent here: leadership qualities would be difficult to exhibit in the context of socially withdrawn behaviour, and cooperative behaviour would not sit easily alongside disruptive behaviour [20]. In sum, we propose that a peer reputation for certain pro- files of behaviour can explain the link between the negative emotional experiences and lower levels of peer acceptance [21]. Moderation by classroom social climate Accumulating evidence shows the association between the climate of a school and children and young people’s mental health [22,23]. One of the highly relevant dimensions of this association concerns the social climate of a given peer group, as this may play a very significant role in determining what kind of peer reputation translates into higher or lower peer acceptance. Preliminary evidence for such a role of the peer context comes from studies on the effects of social with- drawal [24] as well as bullying and aggression in relation to popularity [25,26].

In the present study we focused on the social climate of a classroom in terms of the aggregated level of prosocial or victimising behaviour reported by the children in the class. This kind of social climate of a classroom has already been identified as an important moderator of socio-demographic effects on children’s emotional problems and social compe- tence [27]. Extending this ecological analysis of children’s social development, we propose that the translation of internal- ising and externalising profiles into relationship outcomes is similarly dependent on the social climate of the classroom. In particular, we suggest that the negative link between internalising characteristics and peer acceptance is likely to be buffered in a more positive classroom in terms of peer experience (where there is a greater concentration of prosocial and lower concentration of victimising behaviours); the greater prosociality and sensitivity of the social group should serve a protective function for those with internalising difficulties. Analysis at a dyadic level has demonstrated that positive friend- ships attenuated the link between internalising behaviours and victimising peer outcomes [28], but the effect of a positive classroom climate, reported directly by the children themselves, in attenuating the negative link between internalising behaviours and peer acceptance has not been adequately addressed. We expect the opposite pattern for the link between externalising behaviours and peer outcomes. Classroom social

climate can be conceptualised as setting normative expectations for social behaviour, so classrooms characterised by more prosocial and less victimising behaviour should be intolerant of aggressive and disruptive behaviour and therefore strengthen the negative link between externalising behaviours and peer acceptance [29]. Where the concentration of positive social interactions is at a relatively low starting point, however, we could expect the persistence and growth of externalising problems within social groups [30]. The investigation described here would provide data in the UK context on such patterns, previously studied in the USA [24], China [31], and the Netherlands [32]. Furthermore, it adds to the peer report data of children’s own self-reported emotional experiences and perceptions of social life. Crucially, it also uses a longitudinal design to test for the first time the hypothesis that this moderation effect involving children’s peer groups can account for the way in which specific patterns of emotional adjustment, reported by the children themselves, translate into meaningful relational outcomes. Hypotheses We hypothesised that differentiated pathways linking anger, anxiety, and depression with subsequent peer acceptance in the peer group would be explained by concurrent behavioural reputation. Specifically, anger should be associated with more negative peer relations via a reputation for less cooperative, more disruptive, and more aggressive behaviour,

whereas anxious and depressive emotional symptoms should predict less peer acceptance via a reputation for more shy