Co-Author of ‘Girl Wars’ Explains Relational Aggression:

An Interview with Charisse Nixon, Ph.D.

by Elizabeth Binet

Most of us are familiar with the movies Mean Girls, She’s All That, as well as the books “Queen Bees and Wannabes” and “Odd Girl Out.” What most of us don’t know is that they all deal with an issue that affects many young girls. It’s called relational aggression (RA).

Dr. Charisse Nixon, assistant professor of developmental psychology at Penn State Erie and Director of Research and Evaluation for The Ophelia Project, uses her research and expertise in the field of psychology to help educate the public on the developmental repercussions of RA, a form of social bullying that uses relationships to harm others.

I had the opportunity to interview Dr. Nixon over the phone. Dr. Nixon mentioned that like most children she was a victim of RA and now as the mother of two young daughters, she wants kids to learn to stand up to an aggressor. Her mission is to help children feel empowered and help them realize that they have the power to change a social situation from hurtful to helpful and caring.

That is why Dr. Nixon teamed up with The Ophelia Project, a national, non-profit organization founded in Erie, Pennsylvania in 1997 by Susan Wellman, an adolescent victim of RA herself. Wellman named the project after reading a book that had a huge impact on her life, Reviving Ophelia. This book by Mary Pipher addresses the destruction of the American adolescent girl’s self-esteem.

The Ophelia Project is committed to helping youth form healthy peer relationships, while creating a safe social culture for all. It promotes positive change to stop the destruction within schools and communities nationwide. The project was borne out of one community’s decision that parents and the community should be more involved in adolescents’ lives at a time when as a society we are taught to begin allowing children to become more independent.

The Ophelia Project has become a leader in educating the public on the damaging effects of RA and with the help of experts like Dr. Nixon, the group has brought to light this often ignored social problem. Relational aggression involves an aggressor (bully), a victim and the bystander(s). Dr. Nixon calls the victim, the girl in the middle (GIM). According to The Ophelia Project, RA encompasses purposely ignoring someone when angry (the silent treatment), giving burning looks, stealing someone’s online identity, spreading rumors about a classmate and telling others not to play with a certain person. Research proves that RA can cause depression, low grades, dropouts, drug and substance abuse, early pregnancy and criminal behavior.

Dr. Nixon has published several scholarly articles including one she co-authored with Dr. Nicole E. Werner, Normative Beliefs and Relational Aggression: An Investigation of the Cognitive Bases of Adolescent Aggressive Behavior. This recent fifteen-page study in the prestigious Journal of Youth and Adolescence, examined how kids feel about the rightness or wrongness of different aggressive actions and is closely related to how often they carry out such acts. The findings concluded that adolescents who believed aggression (whether relational and/or physical) was an appropriate response reported more aggressive behavior in comparison to those adolescents who believed that aggression was not an acceptable response.

Girl Wars, which Dr. Nixon co-authored with another established professional in the field, Cheryl Dellasega, Ph.D., breaks standing up against RA into strategies. Strategy One is to inform yourself and others. Strategies Two and Three say that to prevent RA you first have to teach girls that any behavior that hurts someone is never acceptable and that teaching girls the courage to be nice is important. Strategies Four through Seven teaches us to confront RA and provide support. Strategies Eight through Ten encourage support, while strategies Eleven and Twelve tell us the actions we can take to change the culture. Girl Wars is about building self-esteem, teaching conflict resolution skills and providing support.

Dr. Nixon feels our society is to blame for the difficulty in detecting RA. For example, an objective observer seeing an adolescent exclude another youngster knows it is an act of RA. But although “exclusion” is considered RA, Nixon’s research shows 82% of middle school kids do not think it is. The author claims this is because, “we are accepting of it as a culture.” Our culture teaches us that RA is just part of growing up. She feels this can be corrected by “helping young people find their existing beliefs and replacing them with more constructive beliefs.”

Dr. Nixon tours the country educating and training the public by arming teachers, counselors, volunteers and other adults interested in the subject with the tools needed to detect and fight RA. Dr. Nixon feels it’s not about targeting the victim or the aggressor. It’s about teaching healthy friendships. She says empowering others can help bring about change and she is optimistic with the findings that children with genuine self-esteem, who feel a connection with their schools and have good morals, are less likely to be involved with RA.

In her 2005 statistical analysis report, “Creating a Safer School,” Dr. Nixon studied both private and public school students in grades 3-8 from seven schools throughout the U.S. Students were 51% male and 49% female, mostly American of European descent and from middle to upper class backgrounds. The study found that one in three students, RA is a big problem at their school; 19% of students do not feel safe at school; 14.5% do not want to come to school because they are afraid that other kids will be mean to them and 17% reported adults do not care about them. Another interesting finding is that the more relationally aggressive students are the lower academic grades they report. Finally, the study finds girls experience RA more than do boys and older students are more likely than younger students to use relationally aggressive behaviors.

Near my home on Long Island, New York, The Girl Scouts of Nassau County (GSNC) had announced its initiative to combat RA before I had the opportunity to talk with the author. With 22,000 members and over 7,000 adult volunteers, GSNC has teamed up with The Ophelia Project to train volunteers, educators, PTA members, school principals, high school students and others interested in learning to deal with this issue facing young girls today. When this came up in my interview, Dr. Nixon said, “We are so excited to work with the Girl Scouts because their mission is in line with our mission. Our goal is building healthy friendships and self-esteem.”

I am glad to see the critical issue being confronted in my area. As long as young people continue to face this, Dr. Nixon’s expertise will continue to be in demand. With seminars scheduled all across the country, she sees no sign of slowing down. Dr. Nixon encourages us all to get informed so that we can help empower girls with the skills necessary to help them fight RA.