The Moderating Roles of Empathy and Peer Support on the Relationship between Latent Class Typologies of Bullying Involvement and Mental Health Problems

Background and Purpose:

Bullying involvement tends to bring about greater mental health problems among school-aged youths, and research suggests that empathy and peer support may play crucial roles in mitigating these adverse consequences. Of interest in this study are empathy and peer support, which may operate as stress-buffering and coping mechanisms in bullying involvement and mental health. However, little is known about how different types of bullying involvement continue to contribute to mental health in higher education. This study fills the knowledge gap by examining how empathy and peer support moderate the association between the patterns of bullying involvement and depressive and anxiety symptoms among college students.

Methods:

A total of 835 students aged 21-24 (mean age=22.0 years, SD=0.97) from a public university in Singapore completed an online survey. Of the sample, 20.8% were males and more than 90% of the sample consisted of the local ethnic majority (Chinese). To better understand the patterns of bullying in the sample, a latent class analysis (LCA) using Mplus and the poLCA package in R was conducted. Further, a series of hierarchical regressions with depression and anxiety separately were run to test for moderation by the proposed moderators (empathy and peer support).

Results:

Using latent class analysis, a four-class typology was uncovered, consisting of high/multiple bully–victims (Class 1; 7%), cyberbully–victims (Class 2; 7%), relational and verbal victims (Class 3; 27%), and persons uninvolved (Class 4; 59%) in bullying involvement. Multiple regression analyses showed that relational and verbal victims (Class 3) reported more depressive symptoms, and those who were involved in bullying (Classes 1-3; high/multiple bully–victims, cyberbully–victims, and relational and verbal victims) tended to experience elevated anxiety symptoms compared to those who were uninvolved. Two 2-way interactions involving empathy and peer support were found: Compared to the uninvolved, having strong peer relationship protected cyberbully-victims from anxiety, and being more empathic protected high/multiple bully-victims from anxiety.

Conclusions and Implications:

This study contributes to scholarship on the relationship between the patterns of bullying and mental health outcomes for young adults and the moderating effects of empathy and peer support to reinforce the resilience against bullying and mental health outcomes. In particular, the results indicated that a person who is involved as both a bully and a victim tends to have the worst mental health. The findings can be used by social work practitioners in school and community-based settings in developing and implementing effective bullying and mental health prevention programs to inform students, parents, and school administrators regarding the significance of bullying and severe psychological consequences. Insights gained from the current findings could also shed light on specific school-based intervention strategies for college students that address mechanisms of the association between bullying, empathy and peer support, and mental health outcomes. Building strong peer support networks and empathy training might be effective forms of interventions.