• 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.

• Weingarten, J., Bowker, J.C., & Simms, L.S. (2024). A peer trade-off model of personality disorder traits during adolescence. International Journal of Developmental Science, Online First.
• Bowker, J.C.  Weingarten, J.P, Etkin, R.E., & Dirks, M.A. (2024). When best friendships end: Young adolescents’ responses to best friendship dissolution. Frontiers of Developmental Psychology, Special issue on peer relationships, 2, 1-17.
• Weingarten, J., Bowker, J.C., Coplan, R.J, & Rubin, K.H. (2024). Maternal beliefs about the benefits and costs of spending time with friends. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, Online First
• McVarnock, A.M., Coplan, R.J., White, H.I., & Bowker, J.C. (registered report, 2023). Looking beyond time alone: A person-centered examination of solitary activities, motivation for solitude, and aloneliness in emerging adulthood. Journal of Personality, Online First.
• Coplan, R.J., Weingarten, J.P., Bowker, J.C., Ooi, L.L., & Archbell, K. (2023). Maternal beliefs about the costs and benefits of solitude in childhood and adolescence. Journal of Child and Family Studies. 1-14.
• Bowker, J.C., Gurbacki, J.N., Richard, C.L., & Rubin, K.H. (2023). Anxious-withdrawal and sleep problems during adolescence: The moderating role of peer difficulties. Special issue on the Developmental Trajectory of Children’s Social Behaviors and Their Cognitive Neural Mechanisms in Behavioral Sciences, 13, 740.
• Bowker, J.C., White, H.I., & Weingarten, J. (2023). Exploratory study of best friendship dissolution characteristics and psychological difficulties during early adolescence. Infant and Child Development, 32, e2428.
• Bowker, J.C., Richard, C.L., Stotsky, M.V., Weingarten, J.P.*, & Shafik, M.I. (2023). Understanding shyness and psychosocial difficulties during early adolescence: The role of friend shyness and self-silencing. Personality and Individual Differences, 209, 112209.
• Etkin, R.G. & Bowker, J.C. (2023). Bidirectional associations of friend overprotection and adolescent psychosocial adjustment. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 52, 780-793.
• 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, 52, 670-683.
• 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.