Abstract
The identification of factors associated with ethnic bullying within multiethnic schools is a timely social issue. Up to now, ethnic prejudice has been found to facilitate aggression triggered by schoolmates’ cultural background. Yet, there is still a dearth of research about the mechanisms underlying this relation among children. In order to fill this gap, by adopting a social-cognitive developmental perspective on prejudice and morality, this paper investigated the mediating role of moral disengagement in the association between ethnic prejudice and ethnic bullying, as well as the moderating role of closeness with the teacher. A mediation model and a moderated mediation model were applied to data collected from 552 primary school children aged 8–10years. Ethnic prejudice, ethnic bullying, and moral disengagement were assessed through self-reported questionnaires, whereas a questionnaire was administered to teachers to assess the level of closeness with their pupils. Results indicated that ethnic prejudice was directly and positively related to ethnic bullying and that moral disengagement partially mediated this association. This indirect link was particularly strong for children with low levels of closeness with their teachers, whereas it resulted not significant for pupils with high levels of closeness, suggesting that closeness with the teacher might restrain morally disengaged children from enacting ethnic bullying. Implications for research and practice aimed at reducing prejudice and moral disengagement, as well as at promoting positive relationships among children and between pupils and teachers, are discussed.
Highlights
The term ethnic bullying identifies an aggressive action perpetrated toward individuals on ground of their ethnic origins (Elamé, 2013)
Positive and significant correlations emerged between ethnic prejudice, moral disengagement, and ethnic bullying perpetration
A moderated mediation model was proposed examining whether moral disengagement mediated the linkage between negative feelings and attitudes toward pupils from other countries and ethnic bullying perpetration, and whether closeness with the teacher impacted the direct and indirect associations between ethnic prejudice, moral disengagement, and ethnic bullying
Summary
The term ethnic bullying identifies an aggressive action perpetrated toward individuals on ground of their ethnic origins (Elamé, 2013). A way in which children might turn their negative feelings and attitudes into reprehensible behaviors is by condoning their actions through moral disengagement mechanisms, which may make their conduct appear legitimate and, facilitate ethnic bullying This line of reasoning may be justified by the integrative social-cognitive developmental perspective on prejudice (Rutland et al, 2010), which posited that children consider together group-based criteria (e.g., group identity, in-group favoritism, and stereotyping) and morality (e.g., believing that it is fair/unfair to exclude someone) when they are about to reject groups and individuals. In order to fill this gap, the present work sought to provide a better understanding of how affective ethnic prejudice, moral disengagement, and closeness with the teacher might jointly impact ethnicity-based bullying among primary Italian and immigrant school children The links between these variables were tested within a moderated mediation model (Figure 1). Students from minority groups, in comparison with the majority ones, have been found to show more problematic relationships with their teachers (Jerome et al, 2009) and higher levels of moral disengagement (Caravita et al, 2019), whereas findings about differences in ethnic bullying involvement between minority and majority groups are still scarce (Tolsma et al, 2013)
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