The chain mediating role of hostile cognition and anger between dark triad and college students' cyberbullying / 中华行为医学与脑科学杂志

Objective:To explore the chain mediating effects of hostile cognition and anger between dark triad and college students' cyberbullying.Methods:From May to July 2022, a total of 1 316 college students from four universities completed a cross-section questionnaire survey including the dirty dozen (DD), the cyberbullying subscale of the revised cyber bullying inventory (RCBI), the hostility cognition and anger subquestionnaires of the aggression questionnaire (AQ). SPSS 26.0 and SPSS PROCESS macro program were used for descriptive analysis, Pearson correlation analysis and mediating effect test.Results:The prevalence of cyberbullying among college students in the past six months was 20.29%(267/1 316). Dark triad (34.80±12.11), hostile cognition (21.65±7.25), anger (17.58±5.44) and cyberbullying (15.19±3.98) were all significantly positively correlated with each other ( r=0.16-0.59, all P<0.01). The results of mediating effect test showed the indirect effect of dark triad on college students' cyberbullying through two pathways, one was the separate mediating effect of anger, and the effect value was 0.029 (95% CI=0.017-0.044), the other was the chain mediating effect of hostile cognition and anger, and the effect value was 0.037(95% CI=0.023-0.055). Conclusion:Dark triad can not only directly affect college students' cyberbullying, but also indirectly affect cyberbullying through the mediating role of anger and the chain mediating role of hostile cognition and anger.

The Differing Roles of Cognitive Empathy and Affective Empathy in the Relationship Between Trait Anger and Aggressive Behavior: A Chinese College Students Survey.

Empathy is essential for effective social interaction. People often express the belief that empathy is closely related to aggressive behavior, but empirical data has challenged this assumption. However, there is a lack of research that focuses on the role of empathy in the relationship between trait anger and aggressive behavior. The current research focuses on the roles that different components of empathy have performed in the combinations of trait anger-hostile cognition-aggressive behavior link and attempt to identify, with reference to Integrated Model of Emotion Processes and Cognition in Social Information Processing, at which step this may occur. Participants included 663 undergraduate students who completed self-report measures of Trait Anger Scale, Aggressive Behavior Questionnaire, the Interpersonal Reactivity Index, and the Reactive-Proactive Aggression Questionnaire. Results from correlation analysis show that there is no significant correlation between cognitive empathy and aggressive behavior (r = -.06) but do however suggest a significant correlation between affective empathy and aggressive behavior (r = -.19). Results from structural equation modeling reveal that different components of empathy perform different roles in relation to aggressive behavior. The moderated mediating model analysis results show that cognitive empathy played a moderating role in both the direct effect and the first stage of the mediating model of trait anger-hostile cognition-aggression behavior. The results of multiple mediation model analysis demonstrate that affective empathy only played a partial mediating role between hostile cognition and aggressive behavior. This study contributes to understanding of Social Information Processing Models (SIPMs) and provides insight into the relationship between empathy and aggressive behavior.

State narcissism and aggression: The mediating roles of anger and hostile attributional bias.

Prior research has documented a relationship between narcissism and aggression but has focused only on dispositional narcissism without considering situational factors that may increase narcissism temporarily. This study explored the possibility that an increase in state narcissism would foster aggressive responding by increasing anger and hostile attributional bias following unexpected provocation among 162 college students from China. We created a guided-imagination manipulation to heighten narcissism and investigated its effects on anger, aroused hostile attribution bias, and aggressive responses following a provocation with a 2 (narcissism/neutral manipulation) × 2 (unexpected provocation/positive evaluation condition) between-subjects design. We found that the manipulation did increase self-reported state narcissism. The increase in state narcissism in turn heightened aggression, and this relation was mediated by increased anger. Regardless of the level of state narcissism, individuals were more aggressive after being provoked and this effect of provocation was mediated by hostile attributional bias. The findings indicate that narcissism can be temporarily heightened in a nonclinical sample of individuals, and that the effect of state narcissism on aggression is mediated by anger. Differences between state and trait narcissism and possible influences of culture are discussed. Aggr. Behav. 42:333-345, 2016. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.