Does Deviant Peer Affiliation predict Cyberbullying Perpetration? Examining Moral Disengagement as a mediator and Neuroticism as a moderator

Deviant peer affiliation plays an important role in adolescents’ cyberbullying perpetration. However, the mediating and moderating mechanisms underlying this association remain largely unknown. Based on Social-ecological conceptual framework of cyberbullying (SECF-C), we tested a moderated mediating model that neuroticism moderated the mediating role of moral disengagement on the relation between deviant peer affiliation and cyberbullying perpetration. A sample of 777 adolescents (aged from 11 to 16 years) participated our survey. Moral disengagement partially mediated the connections between deviant peer affiliation and cyberbullying perpetration. Also, both the direct association between deviant peer affiliation and cyberbullying perpetration and the indirect effect of moral disengagement were moderated by neuroticism, in that these effects were stronger for adolescence with high neuroticism than for those with low neuroticism. These mechanisms have potential implications in preventing adolescents’ cyberbullying perpetration.