Factors associated with children's anticipated responses to ambiguous teases

The authors used two studies involving 5th- and 6th-grade children to examine factors potentially associated with individual differences in children's perceptions of and anticipated responses to ambiguous teases. Study 1 assessed the extent to which the children would expect recipients to feel hurt in response to a series of ambiguous teases and whether the children would perceive those teases as more like antisocial or prosocial teases. In Study 2 the children were asked to evaluate emotional and behavioral responses to ambiguous teases with various gender compositions of the teaser-target dyad. Despite some gender of participant differences, the studies demonstrated that children with relatively negative attitudes toward teases and relatively negative experiences as recipients of teases tended to interpret ambiguous teases as if they were meant to be hostile and antisocial.