| Peer victimization refers to children's experience of being a target of aggressivebehavior from peers, which is a phenomenon of high prevalence during childhood andadolescence, and can lead to multiple negative effects and maladjustment on the partof victims. Although a lot of researches have been carried out on peer victimization inthe past decades, these researches have several limitations. First, viewed from theresearch approach, during the past 20-30 years, research on peer victimization mainlyfocused on two aspects, one of which is its impact on the individual adaptation, andthe other of which is its related risk factors. In comparison, the previous research paidless attention to the other aspects of peer victimization, especially lacking in theexploration on its development. Secondly, viewed from the point of samples, previousresearch primarily focused on the peer victimization of infancy and childhood, andrelatively less on the peer victimization of adolescence. Finally, the majority ofprevious researches have been carried out in the western cultures. Only in recent years,a few researchers began to study Chinese children's peer victimization (Schwartz,Chang, & Farver, 2001; Zhang et al., 2009).Based on the considerations listed above, the major purpose of this dissertationwas aimed to explore the development of the young Chinese adolescents'peervictimization, its correlates and gender differences using a longitudinal design. Thispaper included three emprical studies as follows: the first study examined thedevelopmental trajectories of physical and relational victimization and their jointdevelopment; the second study explored the influence mechanism between peervictimization and its correlates (i.e. intrapersonal and interpersonal factors); and thethird study explored the developmental patterns of the aggressive victims and passivevictims. In these three studies, the gender differences of the development of peervictimization and gender-linked correlates were also examined.The participants were from a large-scale longitudinal study in China,including atotal of 2,164 adolescents (1,126 boys) followed from 5th grade to 8th grade, assessedevery year. Data of peer victimization, social withdrawnal, and anxiety/depression were collected via self-reports; and peer nomination was used to measure children'sphysical aggression, relational aggression and peer rejection. SPSS13.0 and MPLUS6.0 were used to analyze the data. The main findings of this dissertation were asfollows:1. In regarding to developmental characteristics of peer victimization, this studyshowed that:(1) During the early adolescence, both physical and relational victimizationshowed moderate stability, and linearly decreased with age.(2) As for physical victimization, four trajectories were identified respectively:persistently high victimization trajectory (1.5%), moderate-slightly decreasingvictimization trajectory (14.2%), persistently low victimization trajectory (51.8%),and no victimization trajectory (32.5%). For relational victimization, five trajectorieswere identified respectively: persistently high victimization trajectory (1.0%),high-decreasing victimization trajectory (4.8%), low-increasing victimizationtrajectory (8.3%), persistently low victimization trajectory (44.8%), and novictimization trajectory (41.1%).(3) Based on the trajectory analysis, three types, 11 possible joint developmentaltrajectories of physical and relational victimization were also identified. The threetypes were no or low victimization trajectories, non-joint-moderate/highdevelopmental victimization trajectories, and joint-moderate/high developmentalvictimization trajectories.(4) Gender differences were only found in terms of the level of peervictimization rather than the developmental trends.2. With regard to the correlates of peer victimization trajectories, the presentstudy showed that:(1) With higher levels of early physical aggression, relational aggression, socialwithdrawal, anxiety/depression, and peer rejection, the adolescents were more likelyto belong to high physical or relational victimization. The development trends of thecorrelates were independent of the decrease of relational victimization; while theincrease of relational victimization was related to the increase of physical aggression, relational aggression, social withdrawal, anxiety/depression, and peer rejection.(2) Physical aggression and social withdrawal were the typical characteristics ofdouble-form victims. However, on the condition of experiencing one single form,girls of high physical aggression were equally to experience physical and relationalvictimization; boys and girls of high social withdrawal were more likely to experiencerelational victimization.(3) The gender differences in the correlates of peer victimization showed thatphysical aggression only predicted girls'physical victimization trajectories, and socialwithdrawal only predicted boys'physical and relational victimization trajectories.3. In terms of the relationship between peer victimization and its correlates, thissutdy showed that:(1) Significant age effect and ecological transition effect were found for therelation between aggression and peer victimization. During the late years ofelementary school, aggression and peer victimization could not predict each other.However, strong transactional patterns were found during the ecological transition andmiddle school years. Specifically, physical aggression could positively predictphysical victimization one year later, and relational aggression could positivelypredict relational victimization one year later, vice versa.(2) Social withdrawal and peer rejection can positively predict physical andrelational victimization one year later unidirectionally; while relational victimizationcan positively predict anxiety/depression one year later unidirectionally.(3) Peer rejection mediated the relation between aggression and peervictimization longitudinally. The mediation role of peer rejection between socialwithdrawal and victimization were mixed, and such mediation effects were notconsistent across different grade span, which was only found between the span of 5thgrade to 7th grade.4. On the developmental characteristics of aggressive victims and passivevictims, the present study found that:(1) Totally, the prevalence for aggressive victims in forms of physicalvictimization were 6.1~8.6%, and 16.5~22.3% for passive ones; the prevalence for aggressive and passive victims in relational forms were 7.6~8.2% and 12.1~17.0%,respectively.(2) Further analysis showed that 38.4~49.6% of aggressive victims and38.5~51.4% of passive victims were stable in terms of physical victimization. Forrelational forms, a ratio of 42.3~52.1% of aggressive victims and 30.6~47.5% ofpassive ones were stable.(3) As a whole, during elementary and early middle school years, mostaggressive victims were stable and were more likely to transit into aggressors, passivevictims or normal children later. However, during ecological transition, aggressivevictims were equally likely to transit into stable aggressive victims, passive victims,aggressors or normal children later.(4) On the whole, no matter physical or relational victimization, during the threedevelopmental stages of early adolescence, passive victims were equally likely tokeep stable or transit into normal children, and these two types accounted for a largepercent (about 80~90%). But during ecological transition, approximate half of passivevictims were likely to transit into normal children, and only one third were stable.(5) Gender differences emerged in the different percents of aggressive andpassive victims. For both physical and relational victimization, there were more boysof aggressive victims than girls in every grade. For physical victimization, the numberof male passive victims was also larger than that of girls in every grade. Meanwhile,for relational victimization, there were more male passive victims than or equal tofemales in every grade. Moreover, gender similarities rather than differences werefound in regard to the developmental patterns of aggressive and passive victims.
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