Students’ moral emotions and judgments of cyberbullying: The influence of previous cyberbullying experiences

Abstract

The current study examined the effects of previous cyberbullying experiences and age on moral judgments and emotions about cyberbullying incidents within a sample of Chinese elementary and high school students. One hundred and sixty-six students between the ages of 8 and 16 years from elementary and junior high schools in China read vignettes about cyberbullying incidents. They were then asked to take the perspective of either the perpetrator or bystander within the vignettes, and to evaluate the perpetrator’s or bystander’s behaviour and consider their emotions. Students’ experiences with cyberbullying were then measured using a series of scales to see whether they had been bullies, victims, bully-victims, or bystanders in the past. Results showed that students’ previous cyberbullying experiences influenced both moral emotions and judgments, but that this depended on whether they were taking the perspective of a perpetrator or bystander. Specifically, previous cyberbullying experiences influenced students’ moral emotion attributions when they took the perspective of a bystander but not when they took the perspective of a perpetrator. On the other hand, previous cyberbullying experiences and age influenced students’ moral judgments when they took the perspective of a perpetrator but not when they took the perspective of a bystander. Moral emotion attributions predicted moral judgments only when students took the perspective of a perpetrator. Findings from this study could help teachers and school psychologists understand the psychological mechanisms behind students’ cyberbullying behaviours and develop interventions accordingly.