Meeting in the Middle: The Role of Mutual Biracial Friends in Cross‐Race Friendships

Social network analysis was used to examine the role of having a mutual biracial friend on cross‐race friendship nominations among monoracial sixth‐grade students (Mage = 10.56 years) in two racially diverse middle schools (n = 385; n = 351). Monoracial youth were most likely to choose same‐race peers as friends but more likely to choose biracial than different‐race peers as friends, suggesting that racial homophily may operate in an incremental way to influence friendships. Monoracial different‐race youth were also more likely to be friends if they had a mutual biracial friend. The findings shed light on the unique role that biracial youth play in diverse friendship networks. Implications for including biracial youth in studies of cross‐race friendship are discussed.