Peer Sociometric Status and Personality Development from Middle Childhood to Preadolescence

Sociometric status, the regard that other group members confer to an individual, is one of the most ubiquitous and behaviourally relevant attributes assigned to the person by the social environment. Despite this, its contribution to personality development has received little attention. The present three–wave longitudinal study, spanning the age range 7–13 years ( n = 1222), sought to fill this gap by examining the transactional pathways between peer sociometric status (measured by peer nominations) and Five–Factor personality traits (measured by self–ratings and parent and teacher ratings). Sociometric status prospectively predicted the development of extraversion. By contrast, agreeableness and neuroticism prospectively predicted the development of sociometric status. Furthermore, individual–level stability in extraversion was associated with individual–level stability in sociometric status. The results were robust across different sources of personality ratings. We argue that peer sociometric status in the school classroom is the type of environmental effect that has potential to explain personality development. Because of its stability, broadness, and possible impact across a variety of personality processes, sociometric status can both repetitiously and simultaneously influence the network of multiple inter–correlated micro–level personality processes, potentially leading to a new network equilibrium that manifests in changes at the level of the broad personality trait. © 2019 European Association of Personality Psychology