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. 2024 Oct 3;40(7-8):1800–1823. doi: 10.1177/08862605241265418

Quantifying Toxic Friendship: A Preliminary Investigation of a Measure of Victimization in the Friendships of Adolescents

Nicole S J Dryburgh 1, Alexa Martin-Storey 2, Wendy M Craig 3, Brett Holfeld 4, Melanie A Dirks 1,✉
PMCID: PMC11874602  PMID: 39360712

Abstract

Although friendship is a key source of support and intimacy for adolescents, adolescent friendships can also involve victimization, which can be harmful to youth well-being. To date, our understanding of victimization in friendship has been limited by a lack of measures that comprehensively capture the variety of negative behaviors occurring in this relationship. This study outlines the development and preliminary validation of the Friendship Victimization Scale for Adolescents (FVS-A), which assesses victimization and controlling behaviors in adolescent friendships. Adolescents (N = 706, Mage = 15.93, SD = 1.67; 62.3% cisgender girls, 33.7% cisgender boys) from high schools in Canada completed the FVS-A and other measures in the fall of 2019. The factor structure and psychometric properties of the measure were examined. The FVS-A demonstrated excellent internal consistency and a 3-factor structure (relational victimization, physical/verbal victimization, controlling behavior). There was evidence for demographic differences such that cisgender girls reported more overall friendship victimization, as well as relational victimization and control, than did cisgender boys. Greater friendship victimization was associated with greater dating victimization and gender-based bullying and was uniquely associated with greater depressive symptoms after accounting for these other types of victimization. Findings suggest that friendship victimization is common among adolescents. The results provide evidence for the utility of the FVS-A as a measure of an understudied source of interpersonal risk. Future work is needed to understand the long-term implications of friendship victimization and to elucidate the temporal associations between friendship victimization and other indicators of psychosocial adjustment.

Keywords: friendship, victimization, adolescence, youth, depression, assessment

Friendship is typically viewed as a positive context for adolescent development (Bagwell & Bukowski, 2018), but work with children and adolescents suggests that victimization occurs between friends (e.g., Brendgen et al., 2015; Crick & Nelson, 2002). Although some aggressive behaviors that occur in friendship may be similar to the types of victimization experienced in the wider peer group (e.g., physical aggression), the intimate nature of friendships may engender other forms of victimization. These other forms may include relationally aggressive behaviors that target the friendship specifically, as well as coercion and control. To our knowledge, no measure captures the variety of victimization behaviors likely to occur in the context of adolescent friendships. Such an assessment tool would facilitate the study of a relationship experience that is likely to be especially harmful. Thus, in the current study, we developed a comprehensive measure of adolescent friendship victimization, examined its psychometric properties, and explored the prevalence and demographic correlates of friendship victimization.

Negative Interactions in Adolescent Friendships

Friendships are close, voluntary, dyadic relationships with peers that involve many positive features, including security, intimacy, help, and companionship (Bagwell & Schmidt, 2013; see Dryburgh et al., 2022). Having a friendship high on these features promotes better adjustment (see Schwartz-Mette et al., 2020). However, negative interactions do occur in friendships (Asher & Weeks, 2018), and are largely independent of positive features (see Dryburgh et al., 2022), such that friendships characterized by closeness, intimacy, and support may also involve marked negativity. The coexistence of positive and negative features could be occurring, in part, because while a particular friendship might be worth pursuing because of its positive features, adolescents are learning to navigate emotional intimacy, and may struggle to effectively manage the conflicts and disappointments that occur in close relationships.

Although the most commonly studied negative feature of friendship is conflict, or the extent to which friends fight and disagree (Asher & Weeks, 2018), research with children and adolescents suggests that more serious victimization occurs between friends (e.g., Crick & Nelson, 2002; Etkin & Bowker, 2018). Victimization involves being targeted aggressively in a way that the victim perceives as harmful (see Casper & Card, 2017). To date, research examining victimization between friends has focused on physical forms such as hitting, kicking, and punching, verbal forms such as saying mean things, and relational forms such as being ignored or excluded by peers (e.g., Crick & Grotpeter, 1996; see Casper & Card, 2017). These behaviors occur between friends in childhood and adolescence (e.g., Crick & Grotpeter, 1996; Vucetic et al., 2021), and should be included in a measure of friendship victimization.

In general, researchers examining friendship victimization have studied behaviors that could occur in different types of peer relationships, such as with an acquaintance, a disliked peer, or a friend. However, there may be relationally aggressive behaviors that are particularly likely in the context of close relationships. For example, research suggests that dating partners may threaten to end the relationship or say or do things to make their partner jealous (e.g., Morelli et al., 2018). Some research suggests that similar types of relationship-specific relational aggression, for example, ignoring a friend because you are mad at them, occur in youths’ friendships (e.g., Grotpeter & Crick, 1996). Thus, a measure of victimization in adolescent friendships should incorporate forms of relational aggression that are more likely to occur in close relationships.

The close and intimate nature of adolescent friendships may engender other forms of victimization. Research on dating victimization has documented the occurrence of controlling behaviors, such as monitoring a partner’s whereabouts, isolating a partner from support, or making threats to influence a partner’s behavior or establish dominance (Breiding et al., 2015; Giordano et al., 2016). Some research has shown that, like dating relationships, friendships can involve expectations of exclusivity (e.g., Krems et al., 2021), jealousy (e.g., Parker et al., 2005), and may be characterized by an imbalance of power such that one friend is dominant over the other (Furman & Buhrmester, 1985). These features of friendship may contribute to controlling behaviors identified in past research such as preventing a friend from making their own decisions or making them feel bad about their ideas (Padilla-Walker et al., 2015), or other behaviors that are controlling, restrictive, or intrusive (Etkin & Bowker, 2018). Including these controlling behaviors in a measure of friendship victimization will allow for a more comprehensive understanding of interpersonal risk during adolescence.

Friendship Victimization and Psychosocial Adjustment

Victimization in friendship is likely to be linked to poorer social adjustment and victimization in other contexts. Socially, adolescents who experience victimization in one relationship may be more likely to experience it in others (e.g., Smith et al., 2023; Tippett & Wolke, 2015). Given evidence that adolescents’ negative behavior with friends is related to their negative behavior with dating partners (Furman et al., 2002), friendship victimization is likely correlated with victimization in a dating relationship. Friendship victimization may also be associated with other forms of victimization, such as gender-based bullying—that is, verbal victimization based on gender and sexual identity, which is a common and harmful experience for many adolescents and is often experienced alongside other types of victimization (Norris & Orchowski, 2020).

Friendship victimization is likely also linked to poorer emotional adjustment. A large body of work has documented associations between greater peer victimization, in general, and greater internalizing symptoms (see Casper & Card, 2017). Although limited work has examined victimization specifically in the context of friendship, research with adolescents has shown that being victimized by a greater number of friends is associated with greater symptoms of anxiety and depression (Faris et al., 2020; see also Crick & Nelson, 2002). Greater internalizing symptoms have also been linked to greater controlling behaviors in the friendships of early adolescents (Etkin & Bowker, 2018). Victimization in friendship may also be uniquely harmful; even when a friend is victimizing them, adolescents may be reluctant to end the relationship as they may still receive benefits from the friendship or perceive that leaving the friendship will hurt them socially (Bouchard et al., 2021). As a result, adolescents may be continually victimized over prolonged periods. Moreover, the positive features of friendship may heighten the interpersonal risk. A key provision of friendship is intimacy, which requires personal disclosure (Costello et al., 2024). Although greater personal disclosure can increase closeness, it also increases vulnerability (Faris et al., 2020), as friends may use private information to cause harm (e.g., by threatening to reveal this information to others as a way to control the friend). In sum, victimization in friendships is expected to be associated with poorer emotional adjustment, including greater depressive symptoms, even after accounting for victimization of other forms.

Current Study: Developing a Measure of Victimization in Adolescent Friendships

For adolescents, friendships are an important source of support and intimacy (Bagwell & Schmidt, 2013); however, friendships also have the potential to pose a significant risk to well-being. Victimization does occur in adolescent friendships (e.g., Bouchard et al., 2021; Faris et al., 2020), and the closeness of friendship may make victimization in this context particularly pernicious. To fully understand the ways in which friendships can harm, it is essential to have a measure that provides a comprehensive overview of victimization in these relationships. Thus, the overarching goals of the current study were to develop and obtain preliminary psychometric evidence for a measure of victimization in adolescent friendships, as well as to explore how common this experience is, and who may be more likely to experience victimization by a friend.

A recent study described the development of the Friendship Victimization Scale (FVS), a measure of victimization occurring in the friendships of emerging adults (Dryburgh et al., 2023). The FVS was created by adapting the Conflict in Adolescent Dating Relationship Inventory (CADRI; Wolfe et al., 2001)—a widely used measure of adolescent dating victimization that assesses physical, verbal, relational, and sexual victimization, as well as controlling behaviors—to assess victimization in friendship. Preliminary evidence was obtained for the reliability and validity of the FVS and results indicated that the majority of emerging adult participants reported experiencing at least one act of friendship victimization in the last 6 months.

In the current study, we adapted the CADRI to assess victimization in adolescents’ friendships, and then administered the measure to a large sample of adolescents, seeking to address two objectives. The first objective was to assess the psychometric properties of the measure with adolescents. We began by examining the factor structure. We then obtained preliminary evidence for the reliability and validity of the measure. Internal consistency was examined. Construct validity was evaluated by testing associations with other forms of victimization, as well as depressive symptoms. Second, we explored the prevalence and demographic correlates of friendship victimization in adolescence. Specifically, we tested whether friendship victimization varied as a function of gender, sexual identity, and relationship status. Based on previous research, specific hypotheses were as follows: (a) greater friendship victimization would be related to greater dating victimization and gender-based bullying about one’s sexual identity or gender; (b) greater friendship victimization would be uniquely associated with greater depressive symptoms after controlling for dating victimization and gender-based bullying. All other analyses were considered exploratory.

Methods

Participants

Participants were 724 adolescents between grades 9 and 12 from three Canadian provinces (Ontario, Manitoba, and Quebec). Eighteen participants were removed as they were younger than 14 or older than 19, leaving an analytic sample of 706 (Mage = 15.93, SDage = 1.67, range = 14–18.92). Twelve schools participated (six from Ontario: N = 262; four from Quebec: N = 233; two from Manitoba: N = 211). Demographic information is presented in Supplemental Table S1.

Procedure

All procedures were approved by the relevant Research Ethics Boards and school boards. This study was part of a larger project that worked with educators to prevent dating violence among high school students. Participants were identified by recruiting school boards, and then schools, to participate, and then approaching all students in the relevant grades to take part. Sample size was determined based on student interest in these relevant schools. All participants provided written assent and written parental consent was required for those under 18 years. Data were collected anonymously. Participants had the option to skip any question.

Measures

Friendship Victimization Scale for Adolescents

The Friendship Victimization Scale for Adolescents (FVS-A) was developed by adapting the CADRI (Wolfe et al., 2001). First, the items were modified to ask about a friendship rather than a dating relationship (e.g., “Threatened to end our friendship”). Due to ethical concerns, two sexual victimization items were combined (“Touched me sexually when I didn’t want them to” and “Forced me to have sex with them when I didn’t want to”) into one item that asked about sexual behaviors broadly (“Forced me to do something sexual that I didn’t want to do”). Next, 20 new items were added capturing a broader range of negative behaviors relevant to friendship, including controlling behaviors (e.g., “Made me let them read my e-mails or texts when I didn’t want them to”) and aggression targeting the relationship (e.g., “Told me I was not a good friend”). These items were based on a review of the literature and informal consultation with experts on adolescent relationships and interpersonal violence who were part of the larger project in which the measure was developed (see Dryburgh et al., 2023; Morrison et al., 2023). Participants rated how often each behavior occurred in the last 3 months, from 0 (never) to 4 (most days of the week).

Conflict in Adolescent Dating Relationship Inventory

The original CADRI was administered to assess victimization by a romantic, dating, or intimate partner, including physical, sexual, relational, emotional/verbal victimization, and threatening behavior (Wolfe et al., 2001). Again, two sexual items were combined into one (“Forced me to do something sexual that I didn’t want to do”). Participants were asked to indicate how often they experienced each item over the past 3 months on a 5-point Likert scale from 0 (never) to 4 (most days of the week). Internal consistency was excellent (α = .93).

Gender-Based Bullying

Participants completed two questions on gender-based bullying, or the frequency at which someone called them a bad or insulting name related to their (a) sexual identity or (b) gender identity. These questions were from the US National Crime Victimization Survey (https://nces.ed.gov/programs/crime/surveys.asp), an annual, nationally representative survey of households in the United States. Participants indicated the frequency of each act on a 5-point Likert scale from 0 (never) to 4 (almost every day) in the last 3 months.

Mood and Feelings Questionnaire: Short Version

The Mood and Feelings Questionnaire: Short Version (MFQ) is a commonly used 13-item measure of depressive symptoms for youth (Angold et al., 1995). The MFQ demonstrates strong psychometric properties and has been previously used to assess the links between social stressors and adolescent mental health (e.g., Hysing et al., 2021; Kelly et al., 2018). Participants rated the extent to which each item applied to them in the last 2 weeks on 3-point scale from 0 (not true) to 2 (true). Internal consistency was excellent (α = .93).

Demographic Information

Gender

Participants self-reported whether they were a boy, girl, or non-binary, and then indicated whether they were transgender, genderqueer, gender fluid, or unsure of their gender identity. Participants who were not cisgender boys or girls (4.0%) were retained in the sample for all analyses except those involving direct comparisons between gender, in which gender was coded cisgender boy (0) or cisgender girl (1).

Sexual Identity

Participants indicated their sexual identity by choosing from (a) heterosexual, (b) gay or lesbian, (c) bisexual, (d) queer, pansexual, or polysexual, (e) questioning, or (f) other. Few participants endorsed each category other than heterosexual (see Supplemental Table S1); thus, sexual identity was coded as heterosexual (0) or sexual minority (1).

Relationship Status

Participants reported their relationship status by indicating whether they had a dating partner right now (N = 185), had more than one dating partner right now (N = 2), did not have a partner right now but had one within the past three months (N = 61) or more than three months ago (N = 175), never had a dating partner (N = 258), or preferred not to answer (N = 25). Dating status was coded based on whether the participant endorsed having one or more current dating partners as 1 = currently in a relationship and 0 = not currently in a relationship.

Data Analysis

Our first objective was to examine the psychometric properties of the FVS-A. We began by examining the descriptive statistics for each item, including its mean, standard deviation, skewness, and kurtosis. Items were reviewed to identify whether any had a mean that was greater than 2 or skewness or kurtosis values exceeding |1.50| (Tabachnick & Fidell, 2013). Missing data was then assessed at the item level.

Next, we examined the factor structure of the FVS-A. As this measure has not been used with adolescents before, and the factor structure may differ from that observed in emerging adults, we took an exploratory approach. As six participants provided no relevant data (i.e., stopped after the demographic questions), the analytic sample for the factor analysis was 700 adolescents. First, items with low (<.20) inter-item correlations were deleted. Next, an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed testing from one to six factors with Mplus version 8.4 (Muthén & Muthén, 2019), with each item being treated as categorical indicators on an ordinal scale (see Flora & Curran, 2004), and with the weighted least squares means and variance adjusted estimator (Barendse et al., 2015). An oblique rotation was used as factors were expected to correlate. Model fit was evaluated based on agreement across several fit indices (Chen et al., 2008; Hu & Bentler, 1995): the comparative fit index (CFI) and Tucker–Lewis index (TLI) ≥ 0.95, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) ≤ 0.06, standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) ≤ 0.05, and the correlations between all factors in the model <.70. A change in CFI > 0.01 indicated that the model with an additional factor improved the fit (Chen, 2007; Cheung & Rensvold, 2002). This approach was chosen as the chi-square value (χ2) is sensitive to sample size and tends to result in over-factoring (Barendse et al., 2015). After identifying the best-fitting solution, all factor loadings were reviewed and items with a strong primary loading (>0.50) and no cross-loadings (>0.32) were retained (see Tabachnick & Fidell, 2013). We then re-ran the factor analysis including only the retained items. The construct captured by each factor was determined by reviewing the items.

After conducting the factor analysis, we examined the internal consistency of the total scale and any subscales with Cronbach’s alpha (α). To examine construct validity, we computed the zero-order correlations between friendship victimization and both gender-based bullying and dating victimization. Next, a regression analysis was conducted to test whether friendship victimization was associated with depressive symptoms after accounting for these other forms of victimization and demographics.

Our second objective was to explore the prevalence and demographic correlates of friendship victimization. To examine prevalence, the percentage of the sample who endorsed at least one item on the full scale was calculated, as well as each subscale. To test demographic correlates, we conducted regression analyses in which friendship victimization was the dependent variable and gender, sexual identity, and relationship status were predictors.

Results

Psychometric Properties of the FVS-A

All descriptive statistics for the 44 initial items are presented in Table S2 in Supplemental Material. No item had a mean score over two. Across items, no more than 3.0% of cases were missing. Missing data were handled using FIML.

The average inter-item correlations were examined for each item. Three items for which these averages were low were deleted (<.20): Forced me to do something sexual that I didn’t want to (r = .16), threatened to get me to do something sexual with him/her (r = .13), kissed me when I didn’t want him/her to (r = .15). The EFA was performed on the remaining items. Review of the fit indices for all models (see Supplemental Table S3) indicated that the 3-factor model was optimal. The chi-square was significant, χ2 (700) = 1,215.42, p < .001; however, all other fit indices demonstrated adequate fit, RMSEA = 0.032 [0.029, 0.035]; CFI = 0.97; TLI = 0.97; SRMR = 0.05, and the highest correlation between factors was also acceptable, r = .63. The difference in the CFI between the 2- and 3-factor models exceeded .01, indicating that the additional factor improved fit. Based on this criterion, adding a fourth factor did not improve fit.

Items were culled according to the pre-identified procedures and the factor analysis was run again on only the retained items. The factor loadings of the 3-factor model are presented in Table 1. Fit of this model continued to be excellent: RMSEA = 0.035 [0.030, 0.039]; CFI = 0.98; TLI = 0.98; SRMR = 0.04. The largest correlation between factors was r = .72. In examining the content of the final factors, Factor 1 comprised 13 items reflecting relational forms of victimization. Factor 2 had eight items assessing physical and verbal victimization. Factor 3 consisted of seven items assessing controlling behaviors.

Table 1.

Factor Loadings for Friendship Victimization Scale for Adolescents.

Item F1 F2 F3
Factor 1: Relational victimization
 1. Tried to turn my friends against me. 0.83* −0.11 0.01
 2. Said or did something just to make me feel jealous. 0.53* −0.12 0.31*
 4. Brought up something bad I had done in the past. 0.51* 0.16* 0.17*
 12. Said things to my friends about me to turn them against me. 0.89* 0.01 −0.04
 13. Ridiculed or made fun of me in front of other people. 0.55* 0.31* 0.01
 15. Blamed me for a problem or fight we were having. 0.56* 0.03 0.26*
 21. Threatened to end our friendship. 0.46* 0.07 0.34*
 24. Spread rumors about me. 0.90* 0.08 −0.08
 27. Left me out of an activity or a social group on purpose. 0.71* −0.10 0.19*
 29. Said mean things about me to other people. 0.87* 0.04 −0.04
 30. Talked about how other people were better or more fun than me. 0.60* −0.02 0.25*
 31. Told me that other people didn’t like me. 0.69* 0.15 0.03
 32. Told me that I was not a good friend. 0.48* 0.01 0.37*
Factor 2: Physical and verbal victimization
 5. Threw something at me. 0.03 0.86* −0.04
 16. Kicked, hit, or punched me. −0.05 0.90* −0.02
 18. Tried to frighten me on purpose. 0.02 0.49* 0.33*
 19. Slapped me or pulled my hair. 0.16 0.73* −0.01
 20. Threatened to hurt me. 0.06 0.72* 0.14
 22. Threatened to hit or throw something at me. −0.11 0.99* 0.04
 23. Pushed, shoved, grabbed, or shook me. −0.01 0.80* 0.04
 25. Screamed or yelled at me. 0.18* 0.45* 0.27*
Factor 3: Controlling behavior
 36. Got upset when I did really well on something. 0.13 −0.14 0.70*
 37. Told me that I needed to spend more time with him/her. 0.18* −0.04 0.50*
 38. Made me let them read my e-mails or texts when I didn’t want them to. 0.03 −0.09 0.78*
 40. Was mean to me or insulted me to get me to do something for him/her. 0.00 0.06 0.83*
 41. Got mad at me when I said “no” to him/her about something. −0.10 0.04 0.92*
 43. Insulted me or said mean things to me when I said “no” to him/her about doing something. −0.02 0.01 0.89*
 44. Kept pressuring me to do something even after I made it clear that I did not want to. −0.12 0.03 0.87*
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*

p < .05.

Cronbach’s alphas were excellent: .94 for the full scale, .92 for relational victimization, .88 for physical and verbal victimization, and .82 for control. To obtain preliminary evidence for the construct validity of the measure, the associations between friendship victimization and other forms of victimization were examined. The zero-order correlations of all variables are presented in Table 2. Overall, greater friendship victimization was associated with greater dating victimization, r = .36, p < .001; and bullying based on sexual orientation, r = .26, p < .001, and gender identity, r = .17, p < .001. The same pattern was found for each factor (see Table 2).

Table 2.

Bivariate Correlations and Descriptive Statistics for All Study Variables.

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 M (SD) Min Max
1. Friendship victimization: total .94** .76** .82** −.04 .10* .09* −.04 .36** .26** .17** .35** 0.38 (0.49) 0.00 3.89
2. Friendship victimization: F1 .54** .67** −.03 .13** .07 −.01 .34** .23** .17** .35** 0.49 (0.61) 0.00 4.00
3. Friendship victimization: F2 .54** −.10** −.05 .06 −.06 .26** .24** .08* .20** 0.29 (0.56) 0.00 3.88
4. Friendship victimization: F3 .03 .12** .12** −.05 .31** .20** .16** .29** 0.28 (0.48) 0.00 4.00
5. Age .07 .00 .12** .06 −.08* .03 .07 15.93 (1.17) 14.00 18.92
6. Gender .10** .03 .13** −.13** .10** .31** — — —
7. Sexual minority −.05 .06 .20** .15** .24** — — —
8. Dating status .22** .02 .00 .04 — — —
9. Dating victimization .14** .14** .30** 0.17 (0.36) 0.00 2.75
10. Bullying: sexual orientation .35** .10** 0.26 (0.78) 0.00 4.00
11. Bullying: gender identity .17** 0.19 (0.60) 0.00 4.00
12. Depressive symptoms 0.76 (0.56) 0.00 2.00
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Note. F1 = factor one; F2 = factor two; F3 = factor three; Gender coded 0 = boy and 1 = girl. Sexual minority coded 0 = heterosexual and 1 = sexual minority. Relationship status coded 0 = not currently in a relationship and 1 = currently in a relationship.

*

p < .05. **p < .01.

Regressions were then conducted to test whether friendship victimization was related to depressive symptoms over and above the other victimization and demographic variables. These results are presented in Table 3 for overall victimization and Supplemental Material Table S4 for subscales. Greater friendship victimization was associated with more depressive symptoms, β = .25, p < .001, explaining an additional 5.0% of the variance. Each factor of friendship victimization was also uniquely related to greater depressive symptoms: relational victimization, β = .24, p < .001; physical/verbal victimization, β = .15, p < .001; and control, β = .16, p < .001.

Table 3.

Regression Analyses Predicting Depressive Symptoms from Demographic Variables, Other Forms of Victimization, and Friendship Victimization.

Depressive symptoms
β P
Step 1 (R2 = .15)
 Age .05 .14
 Gender .29 <.001
 Sexual minority .21 <.001
 Relationship status .04 .31
Step 2 (R2 = .21)
 Age .05 .15
 Gender .25 <.001
 Sexual minority .18 <.001
 Relationship status −.02 .61
 Dating victimization .24 <.001
 Biased-based bullying: sexual identity .04 .30
 Biased-based bullying: gender .07 .05
Step 3 (R2 = .26)
 Age .06 .07
 Gender .23 <.001
 Sexual minority .18 <.001
 Relationship status .01 .85
 Dating victimization .16 <.001
 Biased-based bullying: sexual identity −.01 .80
 Biased-based bullying: gender .06 .09
 Friendship victimization .25 <.001
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Note. Gender coded 0 = boy and 1 = girl. Sexual minority coded 0 = heterosexual and 1 = sexual minority. Relationship status coded 0 = not currently in a relationship and 1 = currently in a relationship. β = standardized regression coefficient; R2 = adjusted R-squared.

Prevalence and Demographic Correlates of Friendship Victimization in Adolescence

The descriptive statistics for the FVS-A full scale and subscales are summarized in Table 2. Overall, 80.9% of the sample endorsed experiencing at least one act of victimization in their friendships in the last three months, with 76.1% reporting relational victimization, 46.8% reporting physical and verbal victimization, and 49.0% reporting controlling behavior.

To examine the demographic correlates of friendship victimization, a regression was conducted with gender, sexual identity, and relationship status predicting victimization by friends. The results of these analyses are reported in Table 4 for overall friendship victimization and in Supplemental Table S5 for each subscale. Girls reported more friendship victimization, β = .09, p = .01, relational victimization, β = .13, p = .001, and control β = .12, p = .003, than did boys. Gender was not associated with physical and verbal victimization, β = −.05, p = .25. There was no difference by relationship status in overall victimization, β = −.03, p = .44, or on any subscale: relational victimization, β = −.01, p = .81; physical and verbal victimization, β = −.04, p = .26; coercion and control, β = −.05, p = .20. Overall friendship victimization was also unrelated to age, β = −.04, p = .29. Age was negatively associated with physical and verbal victimization, β = −.10, p = .01, but was not associated with relational victimization, β = −.04, p = .36, or control, β = .03, p = .48. Sexual minority youth reported greater control in their friendships than did heterosexual youth, β = .11, p = .01, but sexual identity was unrelated to overall, β = .08, p = .05; relational, β = .05, p = .16; and physical and verbal victimization, β = .06, p = .12.

Table 4.

Regression Analysis Examining Associations Between Demographic Characteristics and Friendship Victimization.

β p
Age −.04 .29
Gender .09 .01
Sexual minority .08 .05
Relationship Status −.03 .44
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Note. The adjusted R2 for this model was .02. Gender was coded 0 = boy and 1 = girl. Sexual minority was coded 0 = heterosexual and 1 = sexual minority. Relationship status was coded 0 = not currently in a relationship and 1 = currently in a relationship. β = standardized regression coefficient; R2 = adjusted R-squared.

Discussion

Previous research suggests that adolescents can experience victimization in their friendships (e.g., Brendgen et al., 2015; Grotpeter & Crick, 1996; Vucetic et al., 2021), highlighting the need for a comprehensive measure of victimization occurring between friends during this developmental period. In the current study, the FVS-A was created by adapting and expanding a widely used measure of dating victimization (i.e., CADRI). Findings supported a three-factor solution, with factors reflecting relational victimization, physical and verbal victimization, and control. These results align with previous work documenting that children and adolescents experience physical, verbal, and relational aggression at the hands of friends (e.g., Brendgen et al., 2015; Crick & Nelson, 2002). Moreover, building on work examining relational aggression between dating partners (e.g., Morelli et al., 2018), and friends (e.g., Grotpeter & Crick, 1996), adolescents reported experiencing a variety of relationally aggressive behaviors that target the friendship directly (e.g., Told me that I was not a good friend). Many of the items assessing this type of relational aggression were included in the final scale, suggesting that broadening the measure to include these behaviors better captured the facets of friendship victimization in adolescence.

Consistent with work documenting jealousy and power imbalances in friendships (Furman & Buhrmester, 1985; Parker et al., 2005), adolescents reported experiencing a number of controlling behaviors by friends. Items on the control factor included a friend being mean or insulting to get an adolescent to do something, and making the adolescent let the friend read their e-mails or texts. Nearly half (49.0%) of the sample reported experiencing at least one controlling behavior by a friend, supporting studies that show early adolescents report restrictive, intrusive, and demeaning behaviors in their friendships (Etkin & Bowker, 2018; Padilla-Walker et al., 2015). Further, these behaviors formed a separate factor on the scale, suggesting that having one’s autonomy restricted by a friend is a unique experience that warrants further attention.

A measure of victimization in the friendships of emerging adults was previously developed with the same items used here (Dryburgh et al., 2023). Two key differences emerged. First, the scale with emerging adults comprised two factors—(a) relational and verbal victimization and (b) physical and sexual victimization and control. In the current adolescent sample, control emerged as a discrete factor. This difference may reflect developmental changes in friendships. Social networks increase in size from adolescence through emerging adulthood (Wrzus et al., 2013), possibly because adults are less constrained in their friendships by school or other institutional settings. As a result, adolescents may have less autonomy than do adults in their choice of friends, which may make it harder to find friends who share similar interests and values. Thus, for adolescents, controlling behaviors may be motivated, in part, by trying to get friends to participate in activities with them. For emerging adults, who may have a wider array of potential friends from whom to choose, and thus may be better able to develop friendships rooted in shared interests, controlling behaviors may be motivated by more harmful intent. For example, emerging adults may engage in controlling behaviors as a way of establishing dominance in the relationship, which may be why these behaviors are aligning with sexual and physical victimization. Second, items capturing sexual victimization were included on the scale for emerging adults, whereas in the current sample, items capturing sexual victimization were rarely endorsed and not retained. Although adolescent friendships can involve sexual experiences (Manning et al., 2006)—a pattern in need of more study (Furman & Rose, 2015)—this finding suggests that this dynamic may become more problematic with increasing age. Although it will be important to replicate these findings, results from the current study and Dryburgh et al. (2023) suggest that the ways in which friendships may cause harm to young people might change over the course of adolescence and into adulthood. Longitudinal research that maps changes in friendship victimization over time will elucidate key developmental differences from adolescence to adulthood.

Preliminary Evidence for Reliability and Validity of the FVS-A

Preliminary evidence for the reliability and construct validity of the FVS-A was obtained. Internal consistency of the full scale and all subscales was excellent. In support of the construct validity and consistent with Hypothesis 1, greater friendship victimization was associated with more dating victimization and gender-based bullying. In line with Hypothesis 2, greater friendship victimization was also uniquely associated with greater depressive symptoms, explaining an additional 5% of the variance after controlling for demographic correlates and other types of victimization. This result aligns with studies documenting associations between greater internalizing symptoms and having a friendship characterized by more negative features (Schwartz-Mette et al., 2020) and controlling behaviors (Etkin & Bowker, 2018). It also suggests that victimization in friendship may pose a unique risk to adolescent well-being. Longitudinal work is needed to map the prospective associations between friendship victimization and depressive symptoms, as well as other indicators of emotional and social maladjustment, such as loneliness.

Prevalence and Demographic Correlates of Friendship Victimization

Results showed that being victimized by a friend is a common experience in adolescence, with 80.9% of participants reporting at least one act of victimization in the previous three months. Relational victimization (76.1%) was more common than either physical/verbal victimization (46.8%) or control (49.0%). These results are consistent with previous studies documenting that victimization occurs in youths’ friendships (e.g., Crick & Nelson, 2002; Mishna et al., 2008; Waasdorp et al., 2009). For example, studies have reported that between 47% and 77% of participants in grades 4 and 5 report being bullied or relationally victimized by a friend (Mishna et al., 2008; Waasdorp et al., 2009). A recent study found that among early adolescents who reported having a friend, about half were in a friendship involving victimization (Andrews et al., 2021). These studies defined victimization more narrowly than did the current study (e.g., focusing on relational victimization; Waasdorp et al., 2009), which may account for the slightly lower rates of victimization reported in these previous studies compared to the current research. Although more work is needed to understand sources of variability in the prevalence of friendship victimization, the current findings contribute to a growing body of work highlighting friendship as a source of interpersonal risk.

The examination of demographic differences suggests that some adolescents may be more likely to experience friendship victimization than others. In particular, girls reported more friendship victimization, and particularly relational victimization and control, than did boys. A gender difference was not observed in endorsement of physical and verbal victimization. This pattern differs from that observed for general peer victimization, with meta-analytic work documenting that boys experience slightly more overt (i.e., physical and verbal) victimization than do girls, but not finding gender differences in relational aggression (Casper & Card, 2017). It may be that the friendships of adolescent girls are more likely to involve victimization. For example, some research suggests that girls have more difficulty coping with transgressions by friends (MacEvoy & Asher, 2012), which may contribute to greater aggression in their relationships. On the other hand, in a previous sample of emerging adults, men reported more friendship victimization than did women (Dryburgh et al., 2023). This difference may reflect age-related changes in the structure of friendships. Mixed-gender friendships become more common as adolescents get older and the behaviors that occur between and with friends may differ across same- and mixed-gender friendships (see Mehta et al., 2014). To understand gender differences in friendship victimization more fully, it will be important for future work to compare youth’s experience of victimization in same- and mixed-gender friendships. Sexual minority youth also reported greater control by friends than did heterosexual youth. It will be important to replicate this finding in future work that employs a greater representation of sexual minority youth. Future work should include more adolescents with diverse gender identities and other marginalized identities to examine whether these youth face greater risk.

Reports of physical and verbal victimization declined with greater age. This finding aligns with evidence that physical and verbal victimization become less frequent across adolescence (see Troop-Gordon, 2017). In the current sample, age was unrelated to relational victimization by a friend. This pattern differs from previous work suggesting that relational victimization decreases as adolescents get older (e.g., Orpinas et al., 2015). This difference may be due, at least in part, to the wider array of relationally aggressive behaviors that were assessed here. Past studies have typically focused on behaviors that occur with anyone, whereas the FVS-A includes behaviors that target a friendship specifically. These results suggest that the developmental trajectories of these two types of behaviors may vary. Age was also unrelated to report of coercion and control. This result contrasts previous longitudinal work showing that as adolescents get older, they engage in fewer controlling behaviors toward friends (Updegraff et al., 2002) and perceive their best friend as less dominant (De Goede et al., 2009). A lack of age-related differences in these cross-sectional data may belie meaningful within-person change; it will be critical for future work to examine longitudinal trajectories of all three forms of friendship victimization.

Limitations

Limitations of the current work should be noted. Although preliminary evidence for the psychometric properties of the FVS-A was obtained, future work should replicate its factor structure and establish test–retest reliability, discriminant validity, and whether friendship victimization is prospectively associated with subsequent maladjustment. Future studies should also assess victimization in the context of specific friendships. In the current study, we asked participants to report on victimization occurring in any friendship. This approach was used as the goal was to understand how frequently adolescents are having these experiences overall; however, asking about specific friendships will help elucidate the features and characteristics of friendship that contribute to greater victimization. Such work may provide additional insight into why youth may choose to stay in a friendship characterized by victimization (see Bouchard et al., 2021; Daniels et al., 2010).

Future Directions

When examining victimization in specific friendships, it will be important to assess reports of perpetration and victimization simultaneously, preferably from the perspective of both friends. Research to date has focused on one youth’s report of being victimized, implicitly or explicitly characterizing the dynamic as unilateral, such that one friend is targeting the other (e.g., Bouchard et al., 2021); however, victimization in adolescent dating relationships is often bi-directional, such that youth are both victimized by and perpetrating against their relationship partners (see Bates, 2016). For some, friendship victimization may similarly be a reciprocal process. Not only might the predictors and consequences of friendships involving bi-directional victimization differ from those in which only one friend is victimized by the other, but the interventions needed to address each situation will likely differ (see Bates, 2016). For example, youth who are engaged in a friendship characterized by a cycle of reciprocal victimization may need support to learn healthy conflict resolution techniques. In contrast, youth who are being unilaterally targeted by a friend may need support to develop other friendships. It is critical that future research disentangle bi-directional and unilateral victimization within friendship.

Conclusion

This study adds to a growing body of work showing that many adolescents are victimized by friends and that friendship victimization is associated with poorer social and emotional adjustment. Although friendship is typically viewed as a positive context, it is clear that victimization occurs in this relationship, and there is theoretical reason to expect that it may be particularly harmful. The FVS-A is a promising tool that can be used in future research to map the predictors, correlates, and consequences of victimization in adolescent friendships, work that may help us to understand and ultimately ameliorate an overlooked source of interpersonal risk in adolescents’ lives.

Supplemental Material

sj-docx-1-jiv-10.1177_08862605241265418 – Supplemental material for Quantifying Toxic Friendship: A Preliminary Investigation of a Measure of Victimization in the Friendships of Adolescents
sj-docx-1-jiv-10.1177_08862605241265418.docx (47.5KB, docx)

Supplemental material, sj-docx-1-jiv-10.1177_08862605241265418 for Quantifying Toxic Friendship: A Preliminary Investigation of a Measure of Victimization in the Friendships of Adolescents by Nicole S. J. Dryburgh, Alexa Martin-Storey, Wendy M. Craig, Brett Holfeld and Melanie A. Dirks in Journal of Interpersonal Violence

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to acknowledge the support of Camila Bahn, Emma Malcomber, and the rest of the research assistant team for their assistance with data collection, as well as the participants who provided their time to this project.

Author Biographies

Nicole S. J. Dryburgh is a PhD candidate in Clinical Psychology at McGill University. Her research focuses on close relationships in youth and emerging adulthood, such as friendship. In her current work, she is examining ties between positive and negative experiences within friendships, including victimization, and mental health.

Alexa Martin-Storey, PhD, is the Canada Research Chair in Stigma and Psychosocial Development at the Université de Sherbrooke. The main focus of her research is on how experiences of stigma overlap with other forms of violence in relation to adolescent and young adult outcomes.

Wendy M. Craig, PhD, is a psychology professor at Queen’s University. As co-founder and Scientific co-director of PREVNet (Promoting Relationships and Eliminating Violence Network), she has transformed the science of bullying and healthy relationships into evidence-based practice and policy. She was awarded the Order of Canada for her work on bullying and knowledge mobilization.

Brett Holfeld, PhD, is an associate professor and chair of the Psychology Program at Grenfell Campus, Memorial University of Newfoundland. His research has focused on understanding the role of digital technology (e.g., cyberbullying, sexting, and cyber dating violence) on the social and emotional development of children, adolescents, and young adults.

Melanie A. Dirks, PhD, is professor in the Department of Psychology at McGill University. Her research focuses on (a) mapping the social and emotional skills children, adolescents, and young adults need to develop and maintain high-quality relationships with siblings and peers; and (b) understanding how interpersonal functioning contributes to psychological symptoms.

Footnotes

Data Availability: The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interests with respect to the authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding: The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article: This work was supported by grants from the Public Health Agency of Canada awarded to Wendy Craig. Additional support came from fellowships from the Fonds de recherche du Québec—Société et culture and Mitacs awarded to Nicole Dryburgh and an Insight Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada to Melanie Dirks.

ORCID iD: Nicole S. J. Dryburgh Inline graphic https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1324-0164

Supplemental Material: Supplemental material for this article is available online.

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sj-docx-1-jiv-10.1177_08862605241265418 – Supplemental material for Quantifying Toxic Friendship: A Preliminary Investigation of a Measure of Victimization in the Friendships of Adolescents
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