The socialisation of adolescent boys and girls takes place primarily online in virtual environments, where cyberbullying is one of the greatest current social dangers faced by that age group. Socio-emotional e-competencies (i.e., competencies that apply specifically to online environments) are a protective factor against cyberaggression and…

There is limited research examining peer victimization (PV) experiences in early childhood, particularly during the transition from preschool to kindergarten. Given the gaps in the PV literature among this young population and the need for earlier PV prevention and intervention efforts, the current study advances the literature by examining: (1)…

Bullying victimization is a very common, complex, and potentially damaging form of violence among children and adolescents. Bullying is defined as unwanted, aggressive behavior, which involves a real or perceived social power imbalance. One in 10 public schools reports at least one case of serious violent crime, such as aggressive bullying,…

We examined associations between proactive and reactive aggression and peer likability across two academic years. Analyses were based on a sample of 442 elementary school children. Proactive and reactive aggression were assessed through self-report and peer likability was assessed via a peer nomination inventory. Data were collected in the fall…

Aggressive behaviors are common among youth with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and correlate with pervasive social-emotional difficulties. Communication skill is an important correlate of disruptive behavior in typical development, and clarification of links between communication and aggression in ASD may inform intervention methods. We…

African American youth are more likely to experience racial discrimination, which contributes to greater sensitivity to disrespect and aggressive behavior. However, little is known about possible reciprocal relationships among discrimination, disrespect sensitivity, and aggression. This study investigated these reciprocal relationships and whether…

Prosocial teasing is the positive playful form of relational aggression, and studies have found children engage in playful teasing more often than aggressive teasing. Therefore, understanding the basic characteristics or skills that contribute to the more complex social skill of prosocial teasing is important. The current study focused on the role…

Adolescent behavior now occurs offline and online. Frequently studied and treated independently, the relationship between offline problem behaviors and online risk taking is not well understood. This study asked whether there are any problematic behaviors predictive of online risk taking by high school students. Using a 2009 dataset of 2,077 high…

Although dating violence poses a serious threat to adolescents' health and well-being around the globe, little evidence is available for Europe in general and Switzerland in particular. Also, evidence on the role of cognitive predictors related to a more general justification of aggressive behavior and gender-based violence is lacking. Therefore,…

Little is known about how children's value priorities develop over time. This study identifies children's value priority profiles and follows their development during middle childhood. Australian children (N = 609; ages 5-12 at Time 1) reported their values over 2 years. Latent Transition Analysis indicated four profiles: Social-Focus, Self-Focus,…

This study examines whether bullies' gender conformity, pressure to conform to gender norms (felt pressure), and experiences of homophobic name-calling are associated with a tendency to bully gender conforming victims (GCV) and gender non-conforming victims (GNCV). Longitudinal changes were analyzed on all peer interactions in an entire 6th-grade…

This study aims to analyse the relationship between moral disengagement mechanisms, aggression and bullying behaviour in 221 high school students between 11 and 17 years who took the Mechanisms of Moral Disengagement Questionnaire, The Aggression Questionnaire and the School Bullying Questionnaire. Findings suggest significant positive…

An expanded Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB; Ajzen, "Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes" 50:179-211, 1991, Ajzen, "Journal of Applied Social Psychology" 32:665-683, 2002) which incorporates affective, moral, and personal belief variables with Ajzen's original social, behavioural, and cognitive factors has not…

Surprisingly little research has considered whether parent-child activities facilitate social-emotional development and whether these associations differ for boys and girls. To address this gap, this study leveraged the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth (2006-2008) to examine the extent to which story reading, storytelling and…

The goal of this study was to examine the unique associations of aggression with peer status in a non-Western context. The moderating effects of peer community and teacher closeness at the classroom level and gender and grade at the individual level were considered. Participants were 1954 third to sixth grade students (M[subscript age] = 9.60…