Running Head: PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING

Why victimized by peers promotes cyberbullying in college students? Testing a

moderated mediation model in a three-wave longitudinal study

Ming-Chen Zhang
Research Center of Adolescent Psychology and Behavior, School of Education,
Guangzhou University, Guangzhou China

Lin-Xin Wang
Research Center of Adolescent Psychology and Behavior, School of Education,
Guangzhou University, Guangzhou China

Kai Dou*
Research Center of Adolescent Psychology and Behavior, School of Education,
Guangzhou University, Guangzhou China

Yue Liang*
School of Social Development and Public Policy, Beijing Normal University, Beijing,
China
Research Center of Adolescent Psychology and Behavior, School of Education,
Guangzhou University, Guangzhou China

* Corresponding author: Kai Dou & Yue Liang

E-mail address: psydk@gzhu.edu.cn (Kai Dou); liangyue1989@gmail.com (Yue
Liang)
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 2

Abstract
Cyberbullying is a major youth social problem over the world and it has been

associated with a variety of negative outcomes. However, few studies investigated

how offline peer victimization affect cyberbullying and the potential relations

between family factors and cyberbullying remains unknown. The current study

addresses this gap in knowledge by examining the victimized by peers is associated

with higher moral disengagement which further promotes college student’s bullying

online. A three-wave longitudinal study, each wave spanning six months apart, was

conducted in a sample of 521 Chinese college students (Mage = 22.45, SD = 4.44,

59.3% girls). Results of moderated mediation model shown that peer victimization at

T1 predicted more cyberbullying at T3 through moral disengagement at T2, after

controlling for demographic variables and cyberbullying at T1. T2 moral

disengagement significantly mediating the association between T1 peer victimization

and T3 cyberbullying. In addition, high level of negative parenting strengthened the

effect of moral disengagement at T2 on cyberbullying at T3. The prevention and

intervention for both offline and online bullying victimization are discussed.

Keywords: cyberbullying, peer victimization, moral disengagement, negative

parenting, late adolescent

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 3

Why victimized by peer promotes cyberbullying in college students? Testing a

moderated mediation model in a three-wave longitudinal study

1. Introduction

Cyberbullying refers to one’s aggressive, harassment or bullying behaviors to

others through electronic context (Olweus & Limber, 2018; Young et al., 2017) which

also known as online aggressive behavior (Vandebosch & Van Cleemput, 2008;

Ybarra & Mitchell, 2004). Internet use among college students is on the rise in China

(China Internet Network Information Center, 2020) and western countries

(Mascheroni & Olafsson, 2016). Cyberbullying is becoming a major problem among

worldwide youth (Selkie et al., 2016; Wang et al., 2016). Research found that

engagement in cyberbullying among adolescents may due to their past negative

experiences, such as offline peer victimization experiences (Kowalski et al., 2014).

Some cyberbullies may be victims of offline bullying (Ybarra & Mitchell, 2004).

During college, individuals’ peer relationship has great implications on their

development (Collins & Laursen, 2004). Given the high anonymity in cyber space,

individuals under offline peer victimization may hide in the online world and

ultimately result in their “vicarious aggressive behavior” online (i.e., cyberbullying)

(Jang et al., 2014).

Despite the great concern related to the relation between cyberbullying and

offline peer victimization, there are some gaps needed to be address. First, although

previous studies found that experiences of victimization may increase individuals’

aggressive behavior, there is a paucity of research on the relation between offline

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 4

victim (i.e., peer victimization) and online aggressive behaviors (e.g., cyberbullying).

Moreover, research on cyberbullying is plagued by inconsistent findings (Olweus &

Limber, 2018). It is necessary to further examine the risk factors of cyberbullying.

Second, the mechanism through which peer victimization was associated with

cyberbullying remain unclear. Prior studies found that negative environmental factors

may influence individuals’ cyberbullying via cognition (Wang et al., 2019). Moral

disengagement (MD) may be an important cognitive factor in individuals’ transition

from a victim (i.e., experience of peer victimization) to a bully (i.e., engage in

cyberbullying). However, limited research attention has been paid to how college

students’ moral disengagement may mediate the association between peer

victimization and cyberbullying. Third, interactions with both peer and family factors

are critical for predicting individuals’ behaviors (Bronfenbrenner, 1979). While many

existing cyberbullying prevention programs are implemented in schools, few include

parent perspectives to prevent cyberbullying and ways to help children face with

cyberbullying situations at home. Parenting may play protective (i.e., positive

parenting) or deteriorated (i.e., negative parenting) role for individuals’ cyberbullying

(Yang et al., 2018). However, few studies investigated how peer and family factors

influence college students’ cyberbullying in a structural model.

To address these gaps, the present study aimed to investigate whether peer

victimization predict adolescent cyberbullying. In addition, we also explore the

moderating effects of moral disengagement (MD) and the moderating role of

parenting behaviors.
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 5

1.1 Peer victimization and Cyberbullying

Peer victimization is defined as the aggressive or bullying behaviors from

peers (Kawabata, 2020), including the repeated nature of harassment, an imbalance in

power between the bully and the victim, and the intention to cause harm on the part of

the perpetrator (Van Geel et al., 2014). Previous studies found that victimized youth

are more likely to engage in internalizing problems (Adrian et al., 2019; Martinez-

Monteagudo et al., 2020; Olweus & Limber, 2018), and become more vulnerable to

maladaptive behaviors and outcomes (Kim et al., 2020; Pouwels et al., 2016).

However, victimization experiences and perpetration of bullying are by no means

mutually exclusive (Song et al., 2019). Those individuals experienced peer

victimization may bully other individuals online (Jang et al., 2014). According to the

frustration-aggression hypothesis (Berkowitz, 1989), individuals who experienced

frustrated situation are more likely to evoke aggressive emotions. Anonymity of

online world has become a potential aggressive clue, which exacerbate cyberbullying

among college students.

In addition, given the status and physical strength gaps between victims and

bullies, individuals experienced offline peer victimization afraid to retaliate against

the bullies. Thus, they are more prone to search for relatively slimmer objects to carry

out substitutive aggression online (i.e., cyberbullying). Moreover, previous studies

found that youth who are victimized are excluded from normal peer interactions

(Resnik & Bellmore, 2019), which lead them increase the propensity to use online
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 6

media as a platform to compensate their negative peer relationships (Radovic et al.,

2017) and, as a result, the increase in time spent online also increased their chances of

using cyberbullying (Zhai et al., 2019). According to cycle of violence Hypothesis

(Dodge et al., 1990), individuals bully others online to buffer stresses and negative

emotion from their peer victimized experience may create a “circle of violence”

(Schoeler et al., 2018). Therefore, if people experienced the victimized by peer, they

may be more dependent on the online space and more prone to cyberbullying others.

1.2 The mediation effect of moral disengagement

One potential pathway through which peer victimization may impact college

students’ cyberbullying is via moral disengagement (MD). As a self-regulation

process, MD is defined as the cognitive mechanisms that de-activate personal

sanctions following harmful behavior (Bandura, 1999a). This process is compound by

a total eight mechanisms include advantageous comparison, displacement of

responsibility, moral justification, euphemistic language, diffusion of responsibility,

disregarding or distorting the consequences, dehumanization and attribution of blame

(Bandura, 1999a; Bandura et al., 1996). According to the social cognitive theory

(Bandura, 1999b), there is a interaction in one’s environment factors, cognition and

behavior outcomes. In this framework, negative environmental factor (e.g., peer

victimization) may leads to the deviation of individuals’ moral cognition and weakens

the function of moral regulation (Runions et al., 2019). Given that peer victimization

leads serious negative outcomes (Adrian et al., 2019; Reijntjes et al., 2010),
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 7

individuals prefer MD for self-preservation and cognitive compensation(Georgiou et

al., 2019; Jiang et al., 2020).

Additionally, the social cognitive theory emphasized the importance of MD as

a key risk factor for adolescents’ cyberbullying perpetration (Chen et al., 2017). Moral

cognition and action are the products of the interplay of personal and social

influences. Individuals under MD’s mechanisms view their behaviors as springing

from the social pressures of others rather than as something for which they are

personally responsible and minimize the harm that the act incurs (Detert et al., 2008).

Despite most of individuals rated cyberbullying as “wrong” (Bussey et al., 2015).

Experience of being a victim might reduce the ability to provide rationalizations for

their bullying behavior (Hymel et al., 2005), ultimately exacerbating the propensity of

their cyberbullying (Marin-Lopez et al., 2020). However, whether moral

disengagement may serve as core explanatory mechanism for the effects of peer

victimization experiences on later cyberbullying among college students remain

unknown.

1.3 The moderation effect of negative parenting

Parenting, as the most proximal and influential context for individual

development (Bronfenbrenner & Morris, 2006), may operate together with moral

disengagement to explain why peer victimization is associated with cyberbullying.

Specifically, negative parenting, which refers to the negative interaction between

parents and their children may play an important role in how college students’ MD
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 8

affects their cyberbullying perpetration (Ang, 2015; Baldry et al., 2019). Previous

research found that negative parenting such as inconsistent discipline (Barry et al.,

2009), are more likely to cause youths to drift toward aggressive behavior (Reitz et

al., 2006; Sam et al., 2019). Moreover, considering to the lack of effective supervision

of the children, negative parenting may expose children to the Internet untimely

(Charalampous et al., 2018), as a result, they are more likely to bully others online

(Arseneault et al., 2010). For example, Lozano-Blasco et al. (2020) found that college

students who tend to seek more autonomy in their online behavior yet may take

unhealthy risks without parents’ supervision. Similarly, Flanagan et al. (2019)

indicated that the lack of parental supervision may increase their child’s online

misbehavior such as cyberbullying. More importantly, according to the Ecological

Systems Theory (Bronfenbrenner, 1979), family and peers are the two microsystems

most directly connected with youth development. Thus, cyberbullying should be a

product of the interplay of personal (e.g., moral disengagement) and social (e.g., peer

victimization and negative parenting) influences. That is, negative parenting may

operate as a risk factor and strengthen deleterious effects of MD on college students’

cyberbullying (Yang et al., 2018).

Notability, cyberbullying reach beyond the school settings into the home

among adolescents (Kowalski et al., 2014) and their cyberbullying usually takes place

at home (Helfrich et al., 2020). By contrast, given that most of college students are

boarding at their school, their cyberbullying behaviors are free from the control of

their parents. Thus, peer factors (e.g., peer victimization) should be a proximal risk
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 9

factors while family factors such as negative parenting should be a distal risk factor,

which represents an underlying vulnerability for a particular condition (e.g., high

moral disengagement) among college students. The risk-enhancing model (Masten,

2001) highlights that negative factors in one context (e.g., negative parenting) could

enhance the impacts of risk factors of another context (e.g., moral disengagement) on

individuals’ developmental outcomes. Campaert et al. (2018) demonstrated that, for

those individuals who engaging in moral disengagement, high level of negative

parenting such as inconsistent discipline may ultimately increase their propensity to

cyberbullying. Yang et al (2018) also found that negative family environment may

enhance the adverse effect of moral disengagement on cyberbullying. Based on the

previous research, we propose that high level of negative parenting may facilitate the

intensified effect of MD on cyberbullying, while low level of negative parenting may

attenuate this relation.

1.4 The present study

To our knowledge, little research has investigated the mediating and

moderating mechanisms underlying this relation from the perspective of “peer ×

family” interplay. Based on previous research, the present study aimed to investigate

the relation between peer victimization and cyberbullying and proposed a moderated

mediation model (Fig. 1). We hypothesized that: (1) Peer victimization associated

positively with cyberbullying among college students; (2) Moral disengagement

mediated the association between peer victimization and cyberbullying; (3a) Negative
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 10

parenting would moderate the relation between moral disengagement and

cyberbullying and (3b) Negative parenting would moderate the mediation effect of

moral disengagement.

[Insert Figure 1 about here]

2. Methods

Participants and Procedures

Data were collected from several universities in a large city in southern China.

All procedures involving human participants were reviewed and approved by the

research ethics committee at XXX University (Protocol Number: XXX) (Blind).

Fliers with basic information about the current study were first online distributed to

college students. A total of 521 adolescents (M = 22.45, SD = 4.44, 59.3% females)

participated in the first wave of data collection. The sample was diverse in terms of

parents’ levels of education. In the current sample, 68.9% of the participants came

from urban areas, and 31.1% came from rural areas. With regard to parents’ levels of

education, 55.3% of the fathers graduated from middle school, 29.4% of the fathers

had a college degree or equivalent, and 2.3% had a graduate degree, 52.2% of the

mothers graduated from middle school, 20.3% had a college degree or equivalent, and

0.6% had a graduate degree. Of the 521 adolescents, 496 (attrition rate = 5%) and 380

(attrition rate = 30%) participated in the assessments at Time 2 and Time 3

respectively. The time interval of data collection was six months between two waves.
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 11

Data collection procedures were identical across waves. We distributed the

survey invitation codes to students from several universities. College students who

agreed to participated in the study were invited to fill out the surveys online. After

completing the questionnaires, all participants were compensated with small amount

of money for their participation.

Measures

Peer victimization at Time 1. Peer victimization was measured by the 9-item

revised Chinese version of Multidimensional Peer-victimization Scale (Zhou et al.,

2014), which adapted from Multidimensional Peer-victimization Scale (MPVS)

(Mynard & Joseph, 2000). Participants each of the 9 items (“My peers make fun of

me for some reason”) was rated on a 5-point Likert scale (from “1 = Never” to “5 =

Greater than or equal to 4 times”). Items were summed with a higher score indicating

that the participant was more likely to experienced peer victimization in half a year.

The Cronbach’s alpha was .88 in the current study.

Moral disengagement at Time 2. The Chinese version of Moral

Disengagement Scale (CMDS), which was developed by Bandura et al.’s (1996)

Moral Disengagement Scale (Bandura et al., 1996). This scale consists of 32 items

(e.g., “It is alright to fight to protect your friends”). College students rate each item on

a 5-point scale ranging from “1 = Strongly disagree” to “5 = Strong agree”.

Responses to all items were averaged with higher scores indicating higher levels of

moral disengagement. Prior studies have demonstrated that the CMDS was valid and

reliable in Chinese population (Wang et al., 2020). For this study, the Cronbach’s
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 12

alpha was .92.

Negative parenting at Time 2. Negative parenting was a using a composite of

two subscales from the Alabama Parenting Questionnaire (APQ) (Zlomke et al.,

2015): Poor Monitoring (3 items; example: “Your dad/mom do not know the friends

you go out with”) and Inconsistent Discipline (3 items; example: “Your parents

threaten to punish you and then do not do it”). Items were rated on a 5-point scale

ranging from “1 = Never” to “5 = Always”. Higher score indicates a higher level of

perceived negative parenting. A reliable tool in previous study conducted in the

Chinese context (e.g., Dou et al., 2020). For the current study, Cronbach’s alphas

ranged from .83 to .87 for subscales and was .84 for the overall scale.

Cyberbullying at Time 1 and Time 3. The 31-item Adolescent Online

Aggressive Behavior Scale (AOABS; Zhao & Gao, 2012) was used to assess

participants cyberbullying (e.g., I make fun of other people with my friends online).

Participants indicated how often they use a certain behavior of cyberbullying on a 4-

point Likert scale ranging from “0 = Never” to “3 = Always”. The Cronbach’s alpha

for this scale was .88 to .91 at Time 1 and Time 3. Mean scores of each dimension

were computed and used in analyses. The composite average score of cyberbullying

assessed at Time 1 were used as baseline entered in the model.

Covariates at Time 1. College students Gender (0 = female, 1 = male),

students age and parents’ education (1 = primary school, 2 = middle school, 3 =

undergraduate, 4 = graduate student) were included as covariates in all the analyses.

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 13

Data Analytic strategies

Initially, we conducted the attrition analysis, descriptive statistics and bivariate

correlations for the study variables with SPSS 26.0. Second, we tested the mediation

model with structural equation modeling (SEM) and moderated mediation model with

latent moderated structural equations (LMS) in Mplus 8.0 (Muthén & Muthén, 2012).

To test hypotheses 1 and 2, we constructed a mediation model to test the mediating

effects of T2 moral disengagement between T1 peer victimization and T3

cyberbullying. To test hypotheses 3a and 3b, we performed a moderated mediation

model by adding the latent moderator (i.e., negative parenting) in the aforementioned

mediation model. Across the SEM and the LMS models, we handled the missing data

with the full information maximum likelihood estimation (FIML; Acock, 2005).

Model adequacy was evaluated with the following indices: a nonsignificant chi-square

statistics ( χ2 ), the values of comparative fit index (CFI; acceptable > .90, good > .95),

root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA; acceptable < .08, good < .05;

Steiger, 1990), and the standardized root mean square residual (SRMR; acceptable

< .08, good < .05). Considering that bootstrapping has several advantages over

traditional approaches in examining mediation models (Preacher & Hayes, 2008), we

used bootstrapping technique (N = 5,000) and its 95% confidence intervals (CI) to

assess the indirect and direct effects of mediation model.

3. Result

3.1 Attrition Analysis

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 14

We conducted attrition analyses to examine potential bias between participants

who had completed measure across all time points (Group1) and participants who

dropped out at time 2 and/or time 3 (Group2). These results indicated that the two

groups did not differ in T1 peer victimization (η2 = .002), T2 moral disengagement (η2

= .005), T1 cyberbullying (η2 = .002), T2 negative parenting (η2 = .000), age (η2

= .004), gender (c2(1) = 0.278, p = 0.617), father’s education (c2(3) = 0.949, p =

0.814) or mother’s education (c2(3) = 1.909, p = 0.591). Taken together, these data

suggested that our data set was not likely to be biased due to attrition.

3.2 Descriptive and Correlations

The descriptive statistics and bivariate correlations of the study variables and

covariates are shown in Table 1. Specifically, T1 peer victimization was positively

associated with T2 moral disengagement, T1/T3 cyberbullying and T2 negative

parenting, respectively. T2 moral disengagement was positively associated with T1/T3

cyberbullying and T2 negative parenting, respectively. Besides, T2 negative parenting

were positively associated with T1/T3 cyberbullying as well.

[Insert Table 1 about here]

3.3 The Mediation Effect of T2 Moral Disengagement in the Relation between T1

Peer Victimization and T3 Cyberbullying

The mediation model depicted in Figure 2 fit the data well, χ2 = 333.25, df =

124, p < .001, RMSEA = .06 (90% CI = [.050, .064]), CFI = 0.914, and SRMR =
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 15

0.052. This model explained 31.4% variance in T3 cyberbullying. After controlling

for a range of demographic variables and T1 cyberbullying, the relation between T1

peer victimization and T3 cyberbullying was not significant (β = 0.08, SE = 0.06, p

= .165, B = 0.15). Additionally, T1 peer victimization was positively associated with

T2 moral disengagement (β = 0.14, SE = 0.06, p = .012, B = 1.47), which was

positively associated with T3 cyberbullying (β = 0.22, SE = 0.07, p < .001, B = 0.04).

Results of mediation analyses indicated that the mediation effect of T2 moral

disengagement was significant (β = 0.03, SE = 0.02, 95% CI = [0.009, 0.076], B =

0.06).

[Insert Figure 2 and Table 2 about here]

3.4 The Mediation Effect of T2 Moral Disengagement in the Relation between T1

Peer Victimization and T3 Cyberbullying by Levels of T2 Negative Parenting

On the basis of the SEM measurement model examined above, we used LMS

modeling to examine whether T2 negative parenting would moderate the relation

between T2 moral disengagement and T3 cyberbullying. As shown in Table 3, the

results indicated that T2 negative parenting moderate the relation between T2 moral

disengagement and T3 cyberbullying (β = 0.17, SE = 0.06, p = .005, B = 1.66). The

follow-up simple slope test (Figure 3) indicated that the association T2 moral

disengagement and T3 cyberbullying was stronger among participants who reported

high level (one SD above the mean, SD = 0.66) of negative parenting (B = 0.08, SE =
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 16

0.02, 95% CI = [0.043, 0.116]) than those reporting low level (one SD below the

mean, SD = 0.66) of negative parenting (B = 0.08, SE = 0.02, 95% CI = [-0.025,

0.046]).

[Insert Table 3 and Figure 3 about here]

In addition, Table 4 summarized the mediation effect of T2 moral

disengagement by the levels of T2 negative parenting. Specifically, the mediation

effect of T2 moral disengagement was not significant when the levels of negative

parenting were low (one SD below the mean, SD = 0.66) (B = 0.02, SE = 0.03, 95%

CI = [-0.043, 0.078]) but such effect became significant when the levels of negative

parenting were high (one SD above the mean, SD = 0.66) (B = 0.13, SE = 0.06, 95%

CI = [0.017, 0.248]).

[Insert Table 4 about here]

4. Discussion

The current study adopted a longitudinal design and examined the relation

between peer victimization and cyberbullying among Chinese college students. The

core findings of this study were that moral disengagement mediated the association

between peer victimization and cyberbullying, especially among college students with

high level of negative parenting. These results contribute to a deeper understanding of

cyberbullying in college students in several ways, as commented below.

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 17

4.1 Peer victimization and cyberbullying

Previous cross-sectional studies have revealed that peer victimization is

associated with more cyberbullying among youths (Jang et al., 2014). In the present

study, we employed a longitudinal design and controlled for the baseline levels of

cyberbullying, we failed to disclose a direct relation between peer victimization and

cyberbullying. Nevertheless, this does not mean that peer victimization does not play

a role in later cyberbullying. Our findings indicate that moral disengagement mediates

the relation between peer victimization and college students’ cyberbullying and the

residual direct effect of peer victimization on college students’ cyberbullying becomes

nonsignificant. Given that college students face in forming new social and

interpersonal relationships (Swenson et al., 2008), their social learning about peer

problem behaviors (e.g., peer victimization) (Ding et al., 2020) is still important for

prevention and intervention.

4.2 The mediated role of moral disengagement

Consistent with our hypothesis, results showed that moral disengagement

(MD) mediated the relation between peer victimization and cyberbullying. These

findings also provided empirical support to the Social cognitive theory (Bandura,

1999b), which suggested that environmental events (i.e., peer victimization),

cognition (i.e., MD) and behaviors (i.e., cyberbullying) could be include in a causal

model of triadic reciprocal causation. Consist with the previous studies, experience of

peer victimization may weakens individuals ability of moral regulation (Runions et

al., 2019) and promote their adoption of MD as a self-defense mechanism (Georgiou

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 18

et al., 2019; Jiang et al., 2020). University serves as one of the most important places

for socialization because college students spend less time with their families and more

time with peers (Brown & Larson, 2009). However, peer victimization restrains their

peer support system, which undermines the moral example role of peers in their minds

(McNicholas et al., 2017). Peer victimization victims may violate their moral code to

express moral disengagement mechanisms (Thornberg, 2018).

Additionally, MD is a set of processes to dampen the negative self-judgments

(Bandura, 1999a) that can facilitate engaging in behavior (i.e., legitimizes their

cyberbullying) one knows is morally wrong (Yang et al., 2018). Cyberbullying

perpetrators reframe their behaviors as having benign intentions and less harmful

consequences, displace or diffuse their responsibility towards others (e.g., those who

victimized them), and advantageous compare their cyberbullying with those worse

behaviors (e.g., victimization from peers). Given online world may be a social context

that promotes moral disengagement (Bauman, 2010) because of the features such as

anonymity and invisibility, which leads perpetrators of cyberbully minimizing and

disregarding the severity of their behavioral consequences (Pornari & Wood, 2010). It

is noteworthy that college students are the main force of Internet use, moral training

could be an essential way to prevent from the “circle of violence”.

4.3 The moderated role of negative parenting

Confirming our hypotheses, high level of negative parenting enhanced the

adverse effect of moral disengagement on cyberbullying. A significant relation

between moral disengagement and cyberbullying was not present for college students
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 19

with low levels of negative parenting. In line with the risk-enhancing model (Masten,

2001), although negative parenting is a distal risk factor comparing to peer factors

among college students, high level of negative parenting still strongly amplified the

negative effect of moral disengagement on college students’ cyberbullying (Bartolo et

al., 2019). One possible explanation is that, for those college students who own poor

moral standards, they could not obtain guidance and encouragement from their parent

because they live in a family environment with lack of clear, appropriate rules, and

supervision. Moreover, negative parenting also sent a message to their children that

parents may not view their children important (Wang et al., 2020). The strong feelings

of frustration make college students hide in online space and ultimately reinforces

cyberbullying (Lozano-Blasco et al., 2020).

Taken together, the findings contribute to the existing research and highlights

the importance of high level of negative parenting in enhancing the negative effect

between the moral disengagement and cyberbullying. Given that online environment

is characterized by anonymity, and invisibility (Suler, 2004), cyberbullying could

compensate the harm they suffer from their peers (i.e., peer victimization) and family

(i.e., negative parenting) in real life. Moreover, comparing to middle school students,

college students among China are more likely to out of their parents' supervision

because most of their time are boarding at their school. It is noteworthy that China is a

collectivist society that emphasizes family relationships (Wang et al., 2020) and the

parenting is considered as essential part of individuals’ development (Wen & Lin,

2012). Thus, the adverse effect of high level of negative parenting on college students’
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 20

moralization and behavior socialization may be strong in China.

5. Limitations

It is important to note several limitations when considering its implications.

First, the findings of the current study are based solely on college students’ self-

reports, which may lead to the findings being influenced by shared method variance.

Therefore, multiple measures should be employed in order to gain further insight into

the relation between peer victimization and cyberbullying. For instance, future studies

should include peer-reports or parent reports. Second, we focused on the role of

college students’ perceptions of negative parenting only and did not measure parental

reports of their negative parenting. It is possible that college students’ perceptions of

negative parenting and parental reports of their parenting may have different effects

on college students’ moralization and behavior socialization. Therefore, future studies

may test the congruent and incongruent effects of college students’ perceptions and

parental reports of negative parenting.

6. Implications

Our findings provided three important implications for developing

intervention aiming to reduce college students’ cyberbullying. First, although our

result showed that the direct effect between peer victimization and cyberbullying

among college students was not significant after control the T1 cyberbullying. It

doesn’t mean that peer victimization is not a significant risk factor. The mental health
PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 21

of victims of bullying remains a matter of concern. More importantly, given that peer

victimization may increase the propensity of cyberbullying via moral disengagement

among college students, encourage them to moral training (DeSmet et al., 2015) and

focus on building a positive moral standard for them (Kowalski et al., 2014) should be

noteworthy. Second, findings of the current study underscore potential values of

targeting college students with high negative parenting, who were at highest risk for

developing cyberbullying. Thus, it’s important to pay more attention on those college

students who perceived negative parenting from family-of-origin, and provide support

and guidance, which may ultimately help college students less engaging in

misbehaviors (e.g., cyberbullying) (Ang, 2015). Finally, our moderated mediation

model suggests that an interaction among parents and peer and individual factors

should be considered to effectively reduce college students’ cyberbullying, rather than

focusing on factors from only one aspect.

7. Conclusion

The present study investigated the underlying mechanism linking which

college students’ peer victimization and cyberbullying. College students who

experienced more peer victimization were more likely to adopt moral disengagement,

which in turn was associated with their cyberbullying. These results provide empirical

evidence to hypotheses of the social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1999b), high peer

victimization may weaken individual's moral standard, which increase their moral

disengagement and ultimately lead to cyberbullying. Additionally, consistent with

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 22

hypotheses of the risk-enhancing model (Masten, 2001), high levels of negative

parenting may heighten risk for college students with high levels of moral

disengagement and propensity of cyberbullying. Taken together, these findings

underscore the potential importance of reduce college students’ peer victimization for

preventing them from exhibiting cyberbullying.

PEER VICTIMIAZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 23

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PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 35
Table 1
The means, standard deviations, correlations and reliabilities among the variables
M SD 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Covariates
1. Student age at T1 21.91 1.18
2. Student gender 0.41 0.49 .07
3. Father’s level of education 2.21 0.69 -.10* .07
**
4. Mother’s level of education 1.95 0.70 -.13 .07 .61***
Key variables
5. T1 Peer victimization 1.49 0.51 -.06 .10* -.09* -.11*
6. T2 Moral disengagement 1.89 0.55 -.08 .13** .10* .01 .13**
7. T1 Cyberbullying 1.14 0.17 -.05 .18*** .09* .00 .36*** .40***
8. T3 Cyberbullying 1.15 0.20 -.10* .17*** .03 -.05 .22*** .39*** .50***
9. T2 Negative parenting 2.63 0.66 -.11* .11* .06 .05 .11* .38*** .22*** .15**
Note: Sample size ranged from 380 to 521 due to missing data. * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001. student gender: 0 = females, 1 = males;
education: 1 = primary school, 2 = middle school, 3 = undergraduate, 4 = graduate student; T1 = Time 1, T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3.
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 36

Table 2
Summary of the direct and indirect effects
Bias-Corrected Bootstrapped Estimates for the Effects
Direct and indirect effects
Standardized SE 95% CI Unstandardized
Direct Pathway
T1 Peer victimization → T3 Cyberbullying 0.08 0.06 [-0.033, 0.201] 0.15
Indirect Pathways
T1 Peer victimization → T2 Moral disengagement → T3 Cyberbullying 0.03 0.02 [0.009, 0.076] 0.06
Note: T1 = Time 1, T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3; The significant results are in bold.
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 37

Table 3
Summary of the moderated mediation model
T2 Moral disengagement (R2 = 0.03) T3 Cyberbullying (R2 = 0.32)
β SE p B β SE p B
Covariates
Student age at T1 -0.07 0.05 0.129 -0.01
Student gender 0.04 0.05 0.396 0.01
Father’s level of education 0.06 0.06 0.332 0.01
Mother’s level of education -0.03 0.06 0.601 -0.01
Study variables
T1 Peer victimization 0.17 0.06 0.005 1.66 0.08 0.06 0.158 0.15
T2 Moral disengagement 0.25 0.06 <0.001 0.05
T2 Negative parenting 0.07 0.08 0.413 0.01
T2 Moral disengagement × T2
0.19 0.07 0.009 0.04
Negative parenting
T1 Cyberbullying 0.42 0.05 <0.001 0.28
Note. student gender: 0 = females, 1 = males; education: 1 = primary school, 2 = middle school, 3 = undergraduate, 4 = graduate student; T1 =
Time 1, T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3; The significant results are in bold.
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 38

Table 4
Conditional indirect effects of T1 peer victimization on T3 cyberbullying via T2 moral disengagement by levels of T2 negative parenting
Levels of T2 negative parenting Indirect effect SE 95% CI
Low 0.02 0.03 [-0.043, 0.078]
Med 0.08 0.03 [0.008, 0.141]
High 0.13 0.06 [0.017, 0.248]
Note. T1 = Time 1, T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3. The significant results are in bold.
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 39

Figure 1. Conceptual Moderated Mediation Model

Note: PV1 - PV3 = three dimensions of peer victimization; MD1 - MD8 = eight dimensions of moral disengagement; NP1 - NP2 = two
dimensions of negative parenting; CB1 - CB2 = two dimensions of cyberbullying; T1 = Time 1, T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3.
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 40
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 41

Figure 2. The mediating effect of moral disengagement in the relationship between peer victimization and negative parenting
Note: Standardized coefficients are reported; PV1 - PV3 = three dimensions of peer victimization; MD1 - MD8 = eight dimensions of moral
disengagement; NP1 - NP2 = two dimensions of negative parenting; CB1 - CB2 = two dimensions of cyberbullying; **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001. T1 =
Time 1, T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3. Dashed line indicates a non-significant coefficient. Without the mediating effect of moral disengagement, the
direct effect of peer victimization on cyberbullying is given in bracket.
PEER VICTIMIZATION AND CYBERBULLYING 42

Figure 3. The relationship between MD and cyberbullying (T3) by negative parenting (T2).
Note: MD = moral disengagement; T2 = Time 2, T3 = Time 3.