Persistent bullying behavior is that which starts high and remains either moderately high or persistently high, seemingly in spite of intervention/prevention approaches employed: yet little is known about how/why persistent bullying emerges or is sustained. Those who do not respond to interventions and persist with their bullying behavior, require…

Machiavellianism is an antisocial interpersonal style involving the use of manipulative, deceptive, and coercive behaviors in the pursuit of self-interest. Although widely studied as a "dark" personality trait in adults, relatively little is known about the developmental correlates of Machiavellian tendencies earlier in life. The present…

Emotional abuse can have an enormous impact on children. Its effects can be equivalent to, or exceed, those of other forms of abuse. In today's classrooms, educators can expect to encounter numerous children who are exposed to this form of violence in their lives. It is essential that those who work with child are aware of the signs and symptoms…

Children who show elevated levels of indirect aggression (IA) from childhood to adolescence are at increased risks of experiencing detrimental outcomes. Some studies suggest that psychopathic traits could act as a predisposing vulnerability in the development of IA, but the contributions of all three dimensions of psychopathic traits in explaining…

Background: Anxiety disorders are common comorbidities in children and adolescents with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) who are also at a high risk of bullying behavior. However, little is known about the roles of anxiety symptomatology in the relationship between ADHD and bullying behavior. Objective: This cross-sectional,…

Moral disengagement (MD) refers to social-cognitive distortions that allow individuals to sidestep the self-regulatory processes that normally prevent immoral conduct. MD has been linked to bullying in childhood and adolescence, but most studies have used a cross-sectional design. Less is known about the longitudinal link. Therefore, the aim of…

Middle childhood seems to be crucial for the emergence of a moral identity, that is, an evaluative stance of how important it is for someone's sense of self to be moral. This study investigates the effects of moral identity on the neural processing of moral content in 10-year-old children. Participants were presented with scenes portraying…

Uncivil behavior in the classroom is a growing issue among children and youth both academically and developmentally. This unique low-level antisocial behavior may be a precursor to higher-level antisocial behavior, and it is therefore important to have a relevant tool to be able to measure engagement in such behavior in the classroom. Using data…

The present review aimed to examine cross-cultural differences (eastern vs western cultures) in the evaluation of antisocial and prosocial lies through two meta-analyses. A total of 10 studies consisting of 2,347 participants between 5 and 12 years of age were included. Both meta-analyses did not find significant cross-cultural differences on…

During four decades, numerous school-based bullying prevention programmes have been developed and evaluated. Meta-analyses indicate that such programmes have positive average effects, as compared with treatment as usual. However, the effects are small to moderate, and they are especially weak among some specific groups, such as adolescents. After…

This study explores the relationship between childhood trauma and malevolent creativity in college students and examines the chain mediation roles of positive parenting and resilience. Data is collected through survey questionnaires in a quantitative research approach. The SPSS macroprocess 4.2 and SPSS 27.0 are used for data analysis. The sample…

Angelman Syndrome (AS) is a neurodevelopmental disorder most commonly caused by the impaired expression of the maternal "UBE3A" gene on chromosome 15. Though anxiety has been identified as a frequently present characteristic in AS, there are limited studies examining anxiety in this population. Studies of anxiety in other…

Prior studies have indicated that prosocial behavior might be a protective factor for developing internalizing and externalizing behavioral problems. However, little research has been conducted on within-person changes of prosocial behavior and behavioral problems over time. With random-intercept cross-lagged panel models (RI-CLPMs), the current…

Condemnation is ubiquitous in the social world and adults treat condemnation as a costly signal. We explore when children begin to treat condemnation as a signal by presenting 4- to 9-year-old children (N = 435) with stories involving a condemner of stealing and a noncondemner. Children were asked to predict who would be more likely to steal as…

Are moral judgement maturity and self-serving cognitive distortions or moral disengagement merely opposites, as recently claimed? Self-serving cognitive distortions and moral disengagement constitute (more or less interchangeable) neutralization techniques; they stem from the same theoretical background and refer to the same cognitive processes.…