• PhD, University of Maryland - College Park

My research program focuses on the roles that close interpersonal relationships (e.g., friendships, parent-child relationships) play in social and emotional development and psychopathology during late childhood and early adolescence. I am especially interested in how peer relationships function as risk and protective factors in the lives of children and adolescents who are considered at risk for such internalizing and externalizing difficulties as anxiety, depression, and aggression. My work includes longitudinal analyses of peer nomination and self-report data, along with laboratory observations of adolescents and their best friends. Other current research projects examine the importance of time and place in understanding friendship and victimization experiences (the TRIP study, funded by a National Science Foundation grant), the developmental significance and internalizing consequences of temporal changes in peer relationships (e.g., losses of friendships), the emergence and impact of romantic experiences, such as other-sex crushes, and the peer and psychological correlates of social behaviors across cultures. Current projects also consider the developmental significance of being alone and spending time in solitude across the life-span, including in older age.

• Bowker, J.C., White, H.I., & Weingarten, J. (online first, May 2023). Exploratory study of best friendship dissolution characteristics and psychological difficulties during early adolescence. Infant and Child Development
• Bowker, J.C., Richard, C.L., Stotsky, M.V., Weingarten, J.P., & Shafik, M.I. (online first, 2023). Understanding shyness and psychosocial difficulties during early adolescence: The role of friend shyness and self-silencing. Personality and Individual Differences.
• Etkin, R.G. & Bowker, J.C. (April 2023). Bidirectional associations of friend overprotection and adolescent psychosocial adjustment. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Online First.
• Sun, Y., Bowker, J.C., Coplan, R.J., Liu, J., & Sang, B. (2023). Best friends' popularity: Associations with psychological well-being and school adjustment in China during early adolescence. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, Online First.
• White, H.W., Bowker, J.C., Adams, R.J., & Coplan, R.J. (2023). Solitude and affect during emerging adulthood: When, and for whom, spending time alone is related to positive and negative affect during social interactions. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 46, 490-499.
• Bowker, J.C., Sette, S., Ooi, L.L., Bayram-Ozdemir, S., Braathu, N., Castillo, K.N., Dogan, A., Greco, C., Kamble, S., Karevold, E., Kim, H.K., Kim, Y., Liu, J., Oh, W., Rapee, R., Wong, Q., Xiao, B., Zuffiano, A., & Coplan, R.J. (2023).  Cross-cultural measurement of social withdrawal motivations across ten countries using multiple-group factor analysis alignment. International Journal of Behavioral Development, 47, 190-198.
• Widmer, A., Havewalla, M., Bowker, J.C., & Rubin K.H. (2022). Insecure attachment relationships exacerbate the relation between attention-deficit hyperactivity symptoms and delinquency in adolescents. Journal of Attention Disorders, online first.
• Coplan, R.J., McVarnock, A., Hipson, W., & Bowker, J.C. (2022). Alone with my phone?: Examining beliefs about solitude and technology use in adolescence. International Journal of Behavioral Development, online first.
• Etkin, R.G., Bowker, J.C., & Simms, L.J. (2022). Friend overprotection in emerging adulthood: Measure development and associations with psychosocial outcomes. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 183, 107-121.
• Wood, K., Coplan, R.J., & Bowker, J.C. (2022). Normative beliefs about social withdrawal in adolescence. Journal of Research on Adolescence, 32, 372-381.
• Liu, J., Coplan, R.J., & Bowker, J.C. (2021). Measurement invariance of two different short forms of the Social Interaction Anxiety Scale (SIAS) and Social Phobia Scale (SPS) in Chinese and American samples. European Journal of Psychological Assessment. Online first.
• Bagwell, C.L., Bowker. J.C., & Asher, S.A. (2021). Back to the dyad: Future directions for friendship research. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 67, 457-484.
• Coplan, R.J. & Bowker, J.C. (2021). Looking beyond social motivations: Considering novel perspectives on social withdrawal in childhood and adolescence. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly, 67, 390-415.
• Oh, W., Bowker, J.C., Santos, J., Guedes, M., Kim, H.K., & Rubin, K.H. (2021). Distinct profiles of relationships with mothers, fathers, and best friends and socio-emotional functioning in early adolescence: A cross-cultural study. Child Development, 92, e1154-e1170.
• Laursen, B., Dickson, D.J., Boivin, M., Bowker, J.C., Brendgen, M., Bukowski, W.M., & Rubin, K.H. (2021). Revisiting the hypothesis that friends buffer against diminished self-esteem arising from poor parent-adolescent relationships: A replication study. Developmental Psychology, 57, 2067-2081.