 Parental rejection and anxiety during adolescence: Moderating effects of popularity and peer acceptance 
It is widely recognized that anxiety symptoms impair adolescents’ functioning at the interpersonal, academic, and recreational levels, in the short, medium, and long term. Parental rejection appears to be a risk factor for the development of these symptoms in adolescence, a period when relationships with peers gain in importance. This study aims to verify the possible moderating effects of social acceptance and peer popularity on the link between parental rejection and adolescent anxiety symptoms. Regression analyses with moderation effects were carried out on a sample of 212 girls and 116 boys (average age = 15.79 years) followed over two consecutive school years. Our analyses corroborate recent studies by showing a link between adolescents’ perception of parental rejection and their anxiety symptoms. As hypothesized, a moderating effect of popularity was found, revealing that an association between the perception of parental rejection and an increase in anxiety symptoms was present for highly popular adolescents, but not for those who had moderate or low levels of popularity. Contrary to our hypothesis, the interaction term turned out to be non-significant in the model including social acceptance as a moderator. We discuss self-esteem as a variable that may explain why popularity plays out as a risk factor which adds to the deleterious effects of parental rejection. The clinical implications of these results for schools are also discussed.