Does cost–benefit analysis or self-control predict involvement in bullying behavior by male prisoners?

✍ Scribed by John Archer; Natalie Southall

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2009
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 131 KB
• Volume: 35
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0096-140X
• DOI: 10.1002/ab.20283

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

The main aim of this study is to assess whether lack of self‐control or the perceived costs and benefits of aggression provide the better predictors of bullying behavior and victimization, and direct aggression perpetration, in a sample of 122 male British prisoners. We also assessed whether bullying was associated with height and weight. Zero‐order correlations showed that perceived benefits, self‐control, and perceived costs were most closely associated with perpetration of bullying, and that lack of self‐control was weakly associated with victimization. Height and weight were unrelated to bullying or victimization. In a standard regression analyses, perceived benefits was the strongest predictor of bullying perpetration, with lack of self‐control contributing further; all three variables made a significant contribution when direct aggression was the criterion. Mediation analysis showed that a combined cost–benefit measure partially mediated the association between self‐control and both bullying and direct aggression. The findings are discussed in relation to explanations of aggression based on impulse control or a cost–benefit analysis. Aggr. Behav. 35:31–40, 2009. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.