The study hypothesized that girls would report using more emotion-focused strategies and boys would report using more avoidant strategies. Given that gender-role orientation is influenced by socialization factors, it was also predicted that masculine-typed boys and girls would use more avoidant strategies; whereas, feminine-typed and androgynous-typed boys and girls would use more emotion-focused strategies in response to a peer stressor. The study participants were 285 (124 boys and 161 girls) eighth-grade and ninth-grade students from 2 junior high schools in a suburban public school district in the Midwestern United States. Using the COPE instrument, youth reported the strategies they recently used to deal with a stressful peer-related situation. Instruments were also used to measure gender-role orientation (Bem Sex-Role Inventory) and obtain demographic information. A factor analysis of the COPE results found distinct coping strategies: active, avoidant, acceptance, and emotion-focused. The most often reported stressful event involved arguments/fights with same-sex friends. Girls, however, reported more arguments/fights with opposite-sex friends. Boys reported more physical fights and threats. Students' rating of the seriousness of the situation (how much it mattered to them) as a covariate in a MANCOVA was used to compare coping by gender and gender-role orientation. Girls were more likely than boys to report that peer-related stressors mattered significantly to them. As hypothesized, boys and girls classified with feminine-typed and androgynous-typed gender-role orientations were more likely to report that situations mattered. The masculine-typed gender-role orientation was linked with independent, rational, ambitious, and instrumental characteristics; whereas, the feminine-typed gender-role orientation included emotional, dependent, and supportive behaviors. Gender-role orientation, but not gender, predicted differences in coping factors. The hypothesis that avoidant coping strategies would be used more often by masculine-typed boys and girls was not supported by the current findings. Feminine-typed boys and girls used more emotion-focused coping than did undifferentiated-typed students. Androgynous-typed students reported more emotion-focused coping than did either undifferentiated-typed or masculine-typed students. 5 tables and 35 references