Bullying Victimization And Aggression: The Mediating Role Of Difficulty In Emotional Expressio

Aggression is an intentional behavioral response or tendency to harm others.Aggression can seriously threaten an individual’s physical and mental health and social behavior,increase crime rates,etc.Therefore,the study of aggression is important.According to the motivation and manifestation of aggression,aggression can be divided into proactive and reactive aggression.Proactive aggression is the act of harming others for one’s own benefit,while reactive aggression is aggression that arises when provoked.For the exploration of the causes of aggression,bullying victimization is one of the influential factors that have received more attention recently,but the mechanism of its influence is still unclear,and the exploration of this issue will help explore the possible paths to reduce aggression.This paper seeks to reveal why bullying victimization experiences promote aggression in individuals from an emotional expression perspective and the mediating role of alexithymia in this process in two studies.Study 1 used a questionnaire to explore the relationship between bullying victimization experiences,alexithymia,and trait aggression.The results found that(1)alexithymia mediated the relationship between bullying victimization and proactive and reactive aggressive tendencies;(2)alexithymia were significantly and positively related to proactive and reactive aggressive tendencies;and(3)bullying victimization was significantly and positively related to proactive and reactive aggressive tendencies.Study 2 combined the laboratory measurement paradigm of aggression response to examine the differences in proactive aggression(reward-disturbance task)and reactive aggression(Talor currency paradigm)among individuals with different levels of bullying victimization from a state aggression perspective to further examine the mediating role of alexithymia between bullying victimization and state aggression.A one-factor(bullying victimization level: high/low)between-subjects design was used.Results found that(1)individuals with higher levels of bullying victimization had significantly more proactive aggression compared to individuals with low bullying victimization,and(2)alexithymia did not mediate the relationship between bullying victimization and proactive and reactive aggressive responses.In summary,the present study found that alexithymia mediated the relationship between bullying victimization and trait aggression,and that alexithymia were an important mechanism through which bullying victimization facilitated trait aggression.The results of this study enrich and improve the theoretical research in the field of bullying victimization and alexithymia,provide new ideas for exploring the relationship between bullying victimization and aggression,and provide references for guiding college students to respond properly to bullying victimization.