The Impact Of Childhood Maltreatment On Cyberbullying: The Mediation Of Anger Rumination And The Moderating Role Of Physiological Activit

As a mode different from traditional aggression,cyberbullying is related to psychological problems such as depression.According to different motivations of cyberbullying,it can be divided into instrumental cyberbullying and reactive cyberbullying.Existing studies have found that childhood maltreatment will increase the possibility of individual cyberbullying,and this increase in cyberbullying may be caused by cognitive processes related to anger rumination.However,whether anger rumination plays a mediating role in childhood maltreatment and two different types of cyberbullying is unknown.In addition,anger rumination as a cognitiveemotional process is affected by emotional regulation.Some studies have found that the HPA axis and the vagus nervous system play an important role in the process of individual emotion regulation,but no studies have comprehensively investigated the role of the HPA axis and the vagus nervous system in anger rumination and cyberbullying.HPA axis activity can be quantified by its final product cortisol,while vagus nerve activity can be measured by ECG and respiration.Therefore,in this study,we investigated the relationship between vagal tone and HPA axis activity during childhood maltreatment,anger rumination,and cyberbullying.In experiment 1,the levels of childhood maltreatment,anger rumination and cyberbullying were measured by the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire,the Anger Rumination Scale and the Online Aggressive Behavior Scale.The results showed that:(1)There was a significant positive correlation between childhood maltreatment and anger rumination,cyberbullying(instrumental cyberbullying and reactive cyberbullying).(2)childhood maltreatment positively predicted instrumental and reactive cyberbullying through anger rumination.In experiment 2,all participants were asked to sit in a quiet environment for 10 minutes to collect the physiological data under the baseline conditions.Meanwhile,We also collected questionnaire to explore the moderating effects of baseline vagal activity(through baseline RSA)in the path of childhood maltreatment-anger rumination-cyberbullying(instrumental and reactive cyberbullying).The results showed that baseline RSA did not moderate the relationship between anger rumination and cyberbullying(instrumental and reactive cyberbullying).In experiment 3,the Social Evaluated Pressor Cold Test(SEPCT)was used to collect physiological data under stress conditions.The levels of RSA reactivity and cortisol were calculated under stress.Current study explores the moderating role of RSA reactivity and cortisol in childhood maltreatment-anger rumination-cyberbullying(instrumental and reactive cyberbullying).The results showed that RSA reactivity moderated the relationship between anger rumination and instrumental cyberbullying,and cortisol response in stress moderated the relationship between anger rumination and instrumental cyberbullying.To sum up,current study examined the effects of childhood maltreatment,anger rumination,HPA axis and vagus nervous system on cyberbullying(instrumental and reactive cyberbullying).Our study found that anger rumination played a mediating role between childhood maltreatment and cyberbullying(instrumental and reactive cyberbullying);RSA reactivity and cortisol response in stress moderated the association between anger rumination and instrumental cyberbullying.High RSA reactivity attenuated the positive association between anger rumination and instrumental cyberbullying,while high cortisol response heightened the positive association between anger rumination and instrumental cyberbullying.The research results reveal the influencing factors of different types of cyberbullying from the perspective of environment,cognition and physiology,and also provide theoretical and empirical support for the prevention and intervention of different types of cyberbullying.