Social cognition and moral cognition in bullying: What's ... - DPSS

that is their thoughts, beliefs and intentions that guide social behavior. Our data are
consistent with results reported by Sutton et al. (1999b). Moreover, several authors share
the idea that victims show deficits in areas like social skills, social problem solving,
assertiveness, and emotional regulation (e.g., Champion, Vernberg, & Shipman, 2003;
Kochenderfer & Ladd, 1997; Mahady-Wilton, Craig, & Pepler, 2000; Olweus, 1993;
Perry, Kusel, & Perry, 1988). Finally, the results obtained in the social cognition task by
the defender group should be noted. These children, in fact, showed high levels of
performance in all the stories, and especially in the cognitive stories. Moreover, the
score in the defender scale of the PRQ correlated positively with all the scores in the
social cognition task, thus suggesting that the adoption of this kind of prosocial and
helpful behavior requires a high level of social ability and a well-developed
understanding of both cognitive and emotional states of others. However, the fact that
the bullying score also correlated with the social cognition task, again, confirms that
having a good theory of mind, by itself, does not necessarily mean that this ability will
be used to act prosocially (Arsenio & Lemerise, 2001).
Bullying and moral disengagement
As regards the third aim of the present study, the analysis of variance on moral
disengagement showed higher levels of the tendency to disengage self-sanctions and
justify the use of aggressive behaviors in all the aggressive roles and, in particular, in
bullies. These results confirmed the role of specific cognitive mechanisms in the
regulation of social conduct, such as the moral disengagement mechanisms that allow
the assumption of violent behaviors (Bacchini et al., 1998; Caprara et al., 1995;
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