Girls and boys are more likely to
attack their same-sex peers than any
other type of victim (Franke et al.,
2002), as noted above. A study by
Lockwood (1997) found that, regardless
of gender, the most common reasons
youth were violent toward peers
was to punish them for something
done or said, to get them to back
down from offensive actions, and in
self-defense. Physical touching, often
aggressive, was the most frequent
immediate precipitator of a violent
incident. The second most common
trigger of peer violence was negative
verbal exchanges.