Do Emotional Components of Alexithymia Mediate the Interplay between Cyberbullying Victimization and Perpetration?

Sebastian Wachs, Ludwig Bilz, Saskia M. Fischer and Michelle F. Wright
Additional contact information
Sebastian Wachs: Department of Educational Studies, University of Potsdam, 14476 Potsdam, Germany
Ludwig Bilz: Department of Health Sciences, Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg, 03046 Cottbus, Germany
Saskia M. Fischer: Department of Health Sciences, Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg, 03046 Cottbus, Germany
Michelle F. Wright: Department of Psychology, Pennsylvania State University, PA 16802, USA

IJERPH, 2017, vol. 14, issue 12, 1-11

Abstract: A substantial amount of research has revealed that cyberbully-victims have more emotional and behavioral problems than either cyberbullying victims or perpetrators. However, until now, little research has been conducted into the factors that contribute to the interplay between cyberbullying victimization and perpetration. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between cyberbullying victimization, perpetration, and two emotional components of alexithymia, namely difficulties in identifying and describing one’s own feelings. Self-report questions were administered to 1549 adolescents between 12 and 18 years old ( M = 14.51; SD = 1.68; 42.1% ( n = 652) male) from Germany and Thailand. Results showed that cyberbullying victimization and alexithymia are associated with cyberbullying perpetration. Moreover, alexithymia mediated the associations between cyberbullying victimization and adolescents’ cyberbullying perpetration. Consequently, we suggest that the ability to describe and identify one’s own feelings might be important for understanding the link between cyberbullying, victimization, and perpetration. The results may help develop prevention and intervention programs focused on reducing cyberbullying.

Keywords: alexithymia; cyberbully-victims; cyberbullying; cybervictimization; mediation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/14/12/1530/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/14/12/1530/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:14:y:2017:i:12:p:1530-:d:122109

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().