Quality of youth sport friendships: Measurement development and validation

The role of peers has been neglected in research on youth psychosocial deve lopment in sport. The purpose of the present study was to develop and valid ate a measure of youth sport friendship quality for the purpose of facilita ting such research. Dimensions and higher order themes found in Weiss, Smit h, and Theeboom's (1996) qualitative study of sport friendships among child ren and adolescents, as well as a core set of items from previous research (Parker & Asher, 1993), were used to develop and refine items for a sport f riendship quality scale. Over the course of three studies, content, factori al, and construct validity, as well as internal consistency and test-retest reliability, were demonstrated for the Sport Friendship Quality Scale (SFQ S). Future research is recommended to examine the role of children's sport friendship quality on psychosocial development in the physical domain.