Baby Brian the Bully Got His Feelings Hurt

© 2021 Gwen Dewar, Ph.D., all rights reserved

Far from being social oafs, many bullies are confident, popular, and socially-savvy. So what's missing? Empathy, moral date, and a sense of responsibleness towards others.

Co-ordinate to an onetime stereotype, people slap-up others considering they have poor cocky-esteem and lack bones social skills. They don't know how to get what they desire through negotiation, so they use aggression instead.

Is it true?

Maybe — for some individuals. But many bullies — dubbed "pure bullies" past social scientists — opens in a new windoware confident and socially successful. They are pop, and considered "cool" by their peers (Guy et al 2019).

Some bullies may even exist quite skilled at "mind-reading," the ability to interpret the emotions, goals, and beliefs of others. They take a practiced grasp of social norms. They know what other people want, like, and look.

But you can be a proficient listen-reader and still be deficient in empathy. You lot tin understand social norms, and withal experience it'southward acceptable to violate them.

And here, perhaps, is where the boilerplate bang-up comes upwardly short.

For instance, in a report of over 700 American children, Gianluca Gini and his colleagues establish that bullies, despite existence quite competent at reasoning about beliefs, outcomes, and the moral permissibility of dissimilar deportment, were "woefully deficient" in moral compassion compared to victims and children who defend victims (Gini et al 2011).

And a study of Italian adolescents reports that boys who bullied were more likely to receive depression scores on a test of empathic reactivity (Gini et al 2007).

Worth taking seriously?

I remember so.

Studies suggest that some bullies are opens in a new windowmore likely than other kids to develop antisocial personality disorder, a psychiatric status characterized by a disregard for the rights and feelings of others.

And not surprisingly, many bullies have distinctive attitudes about violence, cruelty, and man nature. Let's accept a closer look.

How bullies feel about bullying

In a study of Italian and Spanish children, researchers asked 4th and 8th grade students to identify the bullies and victims in their classes.

Next, researchers presented each child with a visual story—told with cartoons—about peer bullying (Menesini et al 2003).

The story included 10 different scenes of bullying. Each scene portrayed an imbalance of power between cracking and victim. All characters were drawn with neutral expressions.

During the presentation, researchers asked kids to identify with the corking:

"If you were this boy or girl in the story" (pointing to the keen), "would you feel (guilty, aback, indifferent, or proud)? Why would you feel this fashion?"

Peer-nominated bullies were more than probable to say they would experience pride or indifference.

Bullies were also more than egocentric, explaining their emotional responses in terms of the positive consequences for themselves (Menesini et al 2003).

For example, bullies might justify their pride or indifference by saying

"I would feel bully because I got the attention of other kids" or
"I wouldn't feel guilty because it was a joke."

How practise bullies avoid feelings of shame and guilt?

Maybe some bullies suffer from a neurological arrears — a brain malfunction that prevents them from feeling or caring about the pain of others (Blair 2007).

But there are other possible explanations.

Perchance bullies are just good at rationalizing their misconduct.

Moral disengagement

Moral disengagement is the process past which people convince themselves that bad beliefs is morally adequate (Bandura 1991).

Stanford psychologist Albert Bandura has argued that aggressors may "plough off" their sense of guilt or shame by invoking one of several mechanisms of moral detachment, including

Blaming or/and dehumanizing the victim
Displacing or diffusing responsibleness (e.g., "He made me exercise it")
Euphemistic labeling, (e.g., "Just a bit of fun")
Exonerative comparison (e.thousand., "What I did isn't as bad as what others have done")

Practice bullies utilise such mechanisms? Gianluca Gini tested this idea by asking immature adolescents how strongly they agreed or disagreed with statements like

"Some kids deserve to be treated like animals," and
"Kids cannot be blamed for misbehaving if their friends pressured them to practice it."

Peer-identified bullies showed the highest levels of agreement. They were joined past kids who regularly helped bullies (by catching or holding the victim) and by kids who regularly laughed at victims.

The kids who wereleastlikely to concord with the statements were the defenders — kids whom other students identified as regularly standing upwards for the victims of bullying (Gini 2006).

Is this a common pattern?

Aye. Links between bullying and moral disengagement take been documented in many societies — in Europe, East Asia, Australia, and the North America (Teng et al 2020; Wang et al 2017; Runions et al 2019; Killer et al 2019).

And at that place's more than.

Machiavellian reasoning

Mechanisms of moral disengagement permit people to harm others without suffering the pangs of censor.

Merely what sensibilities govern the conscience?

In cultures throughout the world, it'due south normal for children to develop a sense of right and wrong that is grounded in fairness, kindness, and responsibility towards others.

This moral conscience acts as a restraint against taking deportment merely because they selfishly rewarding. You can't justify behavior merely because it pleasurable, or furthers your ain self-interests.

But of form people sometimes practice attempt to justify their behavior in this manner, arguing that it's acceptable to violate normal rules of morality equally long as it benefitsthem. As the political philosopher Niccolo Machiavelli infamously wrote, "The end justifies the ways."

Psychologists use the term "Machiavellianism" to refer to an private'southward tendency to endorse these attitudes, and to exploit and manipulate others for personal gain (Al Aïn et al 2013).

Machiavellian attitudes are very cynical, then you lot might non await them to develop until adulthood. Just — on the contrary — they are well-documented in kids every bit young every bit 9 or 10. How practice we know?

Considering of researchers like Eleni Andreou. Years ago, Andreou screened 186 elementary schoolhouse children in Hellenic republic. She presented the kids with a serial of questions about homo nature, and about the acceptability of manipulating people to become what you lot desire.

For instance, she asked kids how strongly they agreed or disagreed with statements nigh the intrinsic goodness of human beings. Examples:

"Most people are good and kind."
"Successful people are mostly honest and good."

She also asked kids to rate their understanding with statements about the acceptability of manipulating other people:

"Sometimes yous accept to hurt other people to get what you want."
"Sometimes you accept to cheat a little to get what you want."

What did kids say?

It depended — in role — on a child'south trend to dandy others.

Kids who were bullies wereless probable to agree with positive statements about homo nature.

And they weremore likely to embrace the acceptability of harming others, or otherwise engaging in manipulative beliefs (Andreou 2004).

Other studies — in Scotland, Chile, and Deutschland — have reported the same design. Non every child who endorses Machiavellian beliefs is a swell, but bullies are more likely to do and so (Sutton et al 2000; Allroggen et al 2016; Berger and Caravita 2016; Götz et al 2020).

What can we do?

It'southward hardly news that bullies lack compassion, or that they rationalize their cruelties. Simply this inquiry tells us something more: that children begin to bear witness these tendencieswhile they are nevertheless in elementary schoolhouse.

That'south troubling, of class. But it isn't reason to give up. Inquiry suggests we tin help children develop empathic awareness. Read more most information technology in my commodity, opens in a new window"Teaching empathy: Evidence-based tips for fostering empathy in children."

In addition, information technology'southward of import to sympathise that there are at least 2 different types of bully, and each may benefit from a different arroyo to handling. For more data, meet these Parenting Science articles

"Understanding pure bullies: Aggressors who are socially-savvy, popular, and smart"
When bullies get bullied by others: Understanding "bully-victims"

Baby Brian the Bully Got His Feelings Hurt

© 2021 Gwen Dewar, Ph.D., all rights reserved

How bullies feel about bullying

Moral disengagement

Machiavellian reasoning

What can we do?

More than reading about the development of morality

References: Bullies and moral reasoning

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