Eva M. Romera and Rosario Ortega-Ruiz

University of Cordoba

Motivational, Individual and Peer Group Processes in the Involvement in Bullying and Cyberbullying

Participants: Manuel Carmona1; Rocío Luque1; Antonio Camacho1 and Ana Bravo1

1University of Cordoba

Symposium Summary

Four studies are presented which analyse how certain psychosocial, motivational and moral characteristics in peer contexts where aggressive behaviours are accepted or encouraged, would be associated with an increased risk of being involved in bullying or cyberbullying. This symposium arises with the aim of exploring how the interactive dynamics between personal and contextual factors and the involvement in peer aggression evolve. Through longitudinal studies with samples of primary and secondary school children, different types of analysis are used to respond to the study objectives, which include models of structural equations, mediation and moderation analysis and longitudinal networks analysis. In study 1 it is observed that the need for popularity influences the adjustment to convivencia norms and in the involvement in aggression towards others. The second study underlines how in victimization can be partly explained by the interaction between social adjustment, social anxiety and peer perception. The third study indicates that rumination with anger and moral disengagement mediate and moderate the relationship between cybervictimization and cyberaggression. The fourth study identifies selection and influence processes in the friendship network as a function of the levels of hetero-perceived popularity and the role of the victim's bully. The results are discussed in terms of the relevance of paying attention to the complex interactive dynamics that arise in bullying and cyberbullying, and it is highlighted the relevance of these studies for the design of peer aggression preventive programmes that fit with the advances in the understanding of psychosocial and group keys to relationships among schoolchildren.

Short CV

Eva M. Romera is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Psychology at the University of Cordoba and a member of the Study Laboratory on Convivence and Prevention of Violence (LAECOVI). She currently directs the Official Master's Degree in Psychology Applied to Education and Social Welfare. Her research activity is aimed at the study of interpersonal relationships, social and moral competence and peer aggression. She is PI of a project of the National Plan and another of European scope (H2020) aimed at the analysis of risk factors and protection of bullying and cyberbullying and the promotion of social competence to improve the mental health and well-being of schoolchildren. She has also directed a regional research project; whose objective was the development of competence for the management of the social life of schoolchildren.

She has a large number of papers in national and international impact journals. She has directed six doctoral theses and has authored and co-authored of several manuals aimed at the teacher and the educational community training for the promotion of interpersonal relationships. She is a member of the Scientific Committee of the International Observatory of School Violence and a member of the board of directors of The Scientific Association of Psychology and Education.

Rosario Ortega Ruiz, Professor of Psychology, is currently Emeritus Professor at the University of Cordoba (Spain) and Director of the Laboratory for the Study of Convivencia and Violence Prevention (www.laecovi.com). She has over 30 years of research experience on the field of international relations, socio-emotional and moral competence development, as well as on children play and social and moral cognition. On the last 25 years, she has led research on unjustified violence, school violence, bullying and cyberbullying, and dating violence and how it can harbour violence and lead to the psychogenesis of gender violence. She is author of over a hundred scientific journal articles, and fifteen books. Her academic activity has also focused on training young researchers, as well as preventing children and youth violence, through the development of evidence-based prevention models of psychoeducational intervention. 

She has supervised over 30 successful PhD Students. In 2005, she led the creation of the Department of Psychology at the University of Cordoba. In 2008 she led the development of a new Master of Research and Doctorate Programme. Her international work included more than ten European project and research and psychoeducational interventions in Latin America (sponsored by, among other, the Interamerican Bank of Development, UNESCO-Brazil, UK-DIFID for Nicaraguan Public Educational System).

Her experience in science management includes two terms in the Coordinating Commission Spanish National Agency for Academic Quality -ANECA and CNEAI- and one term in the Spanish National Agency for Research -AEI- and several time on the National Programme of I+D+i. She has been member of the evaluation panel of the European Commission -European Research Council, Starting Grants and Consolidator Grants-, as well as for the Research Council of Norway, Portugal and Chile, among other. She is currently member of the review panels of the European Science Foundation and the Spanish Foundation on Science and Technology -FECyT.

She is member of the Board of Directors of the Association for Scientific Research on Psychology and Education (ACIPE) https://acipe.es/acipe/junta-directiva and associate editor of the journal Educational Psychology https://journals.copmadrid.org/psed and co-director of the Psychology Society and Education http://ojs.ual.es/ojs/index.php/psye;

Further information available in https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2110-6931;

Scopus/Scimago: https://www.scopus.com/authid/detail.uri?authorId=7801614713;

WoS/Publons and Psyco-Web: https://publons.com/dashboard/summary/

Web Psycho: http://www.psy-wos.es and https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rosario Ortega-Ruiz

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