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Inside the Blue Book
Popular Science

February 2002
by Jennifer L. Holley

Psychology 139a
Popularity, Friendship & Peer Relations
Faculty: Mitchell Prinstein, assistant professor of psychology

Want to learn how to win friends and influence people? One of every ten Yale College students should be able to give you a few hints. The largest course of the fall semester, Mitchell Prinstein's "Popularity, Friendship, and Peer Relations" dwells on what makes (or breaks) a person's chances of joining the "in" crowd. Prinstein explains, "I like to get students to be able to understand psychological science as applied to a social phenomenon that we all know and that we all live through."

A recent assignment asked students to design individual plans to help children become popular -- a worthy goal, says Prinstein, since adverse peer experiences, like victimization, can have devastating consequences, including substance abuse, dropping out of school, and suicide.

And the troubles don't simply vanish when one leaves high school. Unpopular people have shorter life spans than their counterparts. They are also more likely to have children at an earlier age and to experience unemployment and difficulty in occupational and marital relationships. "This is compelling evidence for the study of peer relations," Prinstein says, "with the ultimate goal of finding ways to intervene and help people."

With a teaching grant from Yale's Information Technology Services office, Prinstein created a unique component to the class: a mock study called "Project Popularity." Class members anonymously complete Internet questionnaires, and the results are used to demonstrate lecture topics, from friendship to dating.

Pop culture also weaves its way into the course. Included on the syllabus are the movie The Breakfast Club and the television show "Freaks and Geeks," which highlight the power of high school cliques. "I look around the class," Prinstein says, "and I see a lot of nodding."