Forgiveness: Does It Improve Mental Health Among Victimized Adolescents?

• In Event: 31.029 - New Directions in Research on Bullying and Homophobic Behavior

Abstract

Objectives: This study provides the first examination of whether dispositional forgiveness buffers the relation between bullying victimization and emotional/behavioral problems.

Perspectives: Extensive research documents that bullying victimization experiences are associated with negative psychological consequences (Espelage & Holt, 2013), yet fewer studies have examined factors that might buffer such deleterious effects, such as forgiveness. Studies on forgiveness and mental health generally highlight the positive effects of forgiveness (Wade, Hoyt, Kidwell, & Worthington, 2014; Zhang & Wu, 2012), although other research suggests that feelings of revenge can lead to a sense of psychological satisfaction that may help maintain mental health functioning (e.g., Garrard & McNaughton, 2000). Within the bullying field, one study found that when targets forgave offenders this reduced bullying by 22.4% (Ahmed & Braithwaite, 2005), although it did not consider effects on the target’s mental health. This study extends existing research through considering whether dispositional forgiveness (Thompson & Synder, 2003) moderates the association between bullying victimization and mental health.

Methods: Sixth through eighth grade students (n = 265; 53% male) completed online surveys in Fall 2013 as part of a K-8 bullying assessment. The Boston University IRB approved secondary analysis of the data.

Data Sources: Students completed the California Bullying Victimization Survey (CBVS) (Felix, Sharkey, Green, Furlong, & Tanigawa, 2011); the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (Goodman, 2001); and the Forgiveness of Others Subscale from the Heartland Forgiveness Scale (HFS) (Thompson & Synder, 2003).

Results: Females reported higher levels of dispositional forgiveness than males (t = 3.02, p < .01), but that there were no differences in dispositional forgiveness by grade (F = 1.92, p > .05). Victims of bullying indicated lower levels of dispositional forgiveness than non-victims (t = 1.97, < .05). As expected, forgiveness was related to mental health. For instance, when youth were above the cut-off on the following SDQ scales they also reported lower levels of forgiveness: conduct problems (t = 3.23, p < . 01); prosocial difficulties (t = 3.86, p < .01); and total emotional/behavioral problems (t = 3.22, p < .01). A regression analysis was computed that controlled for sex to evaluate whether forgiveness moderated the association between bullying victimization and total emotional/behavioral problems. Both peer victimization (β = 1.07, p < .01) and the interaction between peer victimization and forgiveness (β = -0.78, p < .05) were significant predictors of emotional/behavioral difficulties. For adolescents who had experienced peer victimization, those with moderate levels of forgiveness reported somewhat fewer emotional/behavioral difficulties than those with low levels of forgiveness, and that there was an even more striking reduction in mental health problems for those with high levels of forgiveness. A similar pattern emerged for youth who reported no peer victimization.

Significance: This study extends current research on bullying and provides new evidence that among adolescents who are bullied, those who report more dispositional forgiveness also report fewer mental health problems.

Authors

• Cong Zhang, Boston University

• Melissa K. Holt, Boston University