Relationships between tattling, likeability, and social classification: a preliminary investigation of adolescents in residential care.
Tattling tanks likeability, but the same peer-report habit becomes a social boost when you flip it to noticing good behavior.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers asked staff and peers to rate how often teens in a group home told on others.
They also asked how much people liked each teen.
The goal was to see if frequent tattling hurts social standing.
What they found
Teens who tattled the most got the lowest likeability scores.
Both other kids and adults viewed them as less accepted.
More tattling meant more social rejection.
How this fits with other research
Perez et al. (2015) flips the script. They turned tattling into "tootling"—kids report good deeds, not bad ones.
In their study, this simple swap cut problem behavior and lifted helpful acts.
Together the papers show the same peer-report tool can harm or help, depending on what you ask kids to notice.
Kasari et al. (2011) and Bauminger et al. (2003) echo the downside: odd social moves, whether tattling or awkward bids, leave middle-schoolers on the fringe.
Why it matters
If you run social-skills groups, stop rewarding rule-violation reports. Instead, teach kids to catch classmates being kind. One week of tootling can do what months of lectures on "don't tattle" never will.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Little research has been published on tattling, even less on its social impact, and we found none directly investigating tattling by adolescents. This study assessed the extent to which tattling, as perceived by peers and caregivers of adolescents in a residential care program, was associated with various dimensions of social status and other behavioral correlates. Eighty-eight adolescent participants rated their housemates on likeability, perceived rates of tattling, and other behavioral descriptors. In addition, caretakers also rated each youth in terms of perceived tattling. On the basis of likeability ratings, participants were classified into one of five categories: popular, average, controversial, neglected, and rejected. Results showed a significant negative correlation between likeability and perceived tattling rates. In addition, youth classified as socially rejected were more likely to be perceived by both their peers and care providers as engaging in high rates of tattling.
Behavior modification, 2004 · doi:10.1177/0145445503258985