This work, as with other recent work, makes clear that the most severely aggressive youth tend to engage in high R2 levels of both proactive and reactive aggression and are otherwise also generally more distressed and dysregulated, as compared with youth who are more moderately aggressive and tend to engage in reactive aggression only, and youth who have low levels of aggression.
This is a well-written paper with a large sample of girls that replicates and extends important research on relational aggression. The focus on the functions (reactive and proactive) of relational aggression has significant implications for intervention with adolescent girls. I commend the authors for this timely and crucial study on factors that influence the development of aggression and antisocial behavior in girls, which is typically an understudied topic.