Journal of Adolescent Research

There is considerable interest in ways to support adolescents in their digital lives, particularly related to the relational challenges they face. While researchers have explored coping with cyberbullying, the scope of relevant digital issues is considerably broader. Through the lens of online peer responses to personal accounts posted by adolescents, this study explores recommended strategies for coping with different experiences of socio-digital stress, including both hostility-oriented issues and digital challenges related to navigating close relationships. A content analysis of 628 comments posted in response to 180 stories of digital stress reveals five common recommendations: Get Help from others, Communicate Directly, Cut Ties with the person involved, Ignore the situation, and Utilize Digital Solutions. The most common recommendation for hostility-oriented issues is to Get Help, while Cut Ties is most common for issues that arise in close relationships. Variations in the pattern of recommendations proposed for different digital issues and for each type of recommendation are described. The findings point to both practical implications for supporting digital youth and next steps for research.

Over the last decade, research on Internet addiction (IA) has increased. However, almost all studies in the area are cross-sectional and do not examine the context in which Internet use takes place. Therefore, a longitudinal study examined the role of conscientiousness (as a personality trait) and classroom hostility (as a contextual factor) in the development of IA. The participants comprised 648 adolescents and were assessed over a 2-year period (while aged 16-18 years). A three-level hierarchical linear model was carried out on the data collected. Findings revealed that (a) lower conscientiousness was associated with IA and this did not change over time and (b) although being in a more hostile classroom did not initially have a significant effect, it increased girls’ IA vulnerability over time and functioned protectively for boys. Results indicated that the contribution of individual and contextual IA factors may differ across genders and over time. More specifically, although the protective effect of conscientiousness appeared to hold, the over-time effect of classroom hostility increased the risk of IA for girls. These findings are discussed in relation to the psychological literature. The study’s limitations and implications are also discussed.

Social and cultural values are believed to play a role in the types of bodies that adolescent girls consider beautiful and desirable. In this article, the authors analyzed qualitative interviews from 27 Latina mid-adolescent girls (ages 14 to 16) regarding their perceptions of what body shapes and sizes are valued in Latino culture and European American culture, the nature of their conversations with friends about appearance, and whether boys and the larger community consider large body sizes to be acceptable. There was an overwhelming consensus that a slender but curvy figure is the ideal body type in Latino culture and that European Americans value unnaturally thin physiques. Themes drawn from the adolescents’ responses point to their friends’ opinions, perceptions of boys’ dating preferences, norms in their communities, and body shapes of female celebrities in Latino media outlets as sources of beauty and desirability. These findings have implications for body image intervention programs that expose Latina girls to multiple possibilities of beauty when their physical body shapes exclude them from attaining the ideal that they perceive is appreciated in Latino culture.