Gratitude for Bystander Action Varies by Peer Intervention and Social Norms

Abstract

Gratitude is associated with increased social integration, which may counter the loneliness stemming from repeated peer victimization. The gratitude youth feel after different types of bystander action may depend on which behaviors are most congruent with personal beliefs. Face and honor cultures provide social norms for expectations and interpretations of behavior, including how to act during and after interpersonal conflict. In the current study, 264 ethnically diverse adolescents (African, European, Mexican-American, and Indigenous) from the Pacific Northwest described past instances when they experienced an act of peer-instigated aggression and subsequent bystander action. We examined how face and honor endorsements predicted victims’ gratitude following three different types of bystander action (calm, avenge, and reconcile). Face endorsement predicted higher gratitude for being calmed, whereas honor endorsement predicted higher gratitude for being avenged. Bystander efforts to reconcile conflict elicited the most gratitude but were not related to social norm endorsement. Our findings shed light on the association between social norm endorsement and victimized youths’ gratitude for their intervening peers’ bystander actions.