The Effects of Child Maltreatment on Reactive Aggression Amongst Middle-School Students and the Moderating Role of Self-Control

Abstract

The present study examined the effects of child maltreatment and self-control on reactive aggression amongst middle-school students and investigated whether students’ self-control had any form of moderating effect on the relationship between child maltreatment and reactive aggression. The participants of this study consisted of 482 students (204 boys and 278 girls) from four middle schools located in Seoul and Gyoung-gi province. The Peer Conflict Scale (Marsee, Kimonis, & Frick, 2004) was used to measure the level of reactive aggression. The level of child maltreatment was assessed by means of the Child Trauma Questionnaire (Bernstein & Fink, 1998). Self-control was measured by the Self-Control Scale (Nam, 1999). Statistical analyses of data used for this study comprised the following methods; frequency, mean, standard deviation, and hierarchical regression. The moderating effect of self-control was analyzed by using the procedures proposed by Baron and Kenny (1986). The results indicated that the level of child maltreatment increased the level of reactive aggression whereas the level of self-control decreased the level of reactive aggression. In addition, self-control moderated the influence of child maltreatment on student’s reactive aggression. As a result, the influence of child maltreatment upon reactive aggression was greater when the level of self-control was low, compared to when it was high. 색인어: 중학생, ë°˜ì‘ì  공격성, 부모로부터의 학대 경험, ìžê¸°í†µì œë ¥ Keywords: middle-school students, reactive aggression, child maltreatment, self-control