ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Human Developmental Psychology
Developmental Pathway from Child Maltreatment to Children's Bullying: Sex Difference in the Longitudinal Dual-Process Model of Self-Esteem and Depression
Provisionally accepted
- 1College of Education & Institute for Education and Treatment of Problematic Youth, Ludong University, Yantai 264025, Shandong, China, College of Education, Ludong University, Yantai, China
- 2Youth Guidance Department，Myongji University，Seoul，03722，South Korea, Seoul, Republic of Korea
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Background: Bullying is potentially linked to childhood maltreatment, yet distinctions among maltreatment types and their underlying mechanisms remain under-examined. Objective: This study tested whether emotional and physical maltreatment predict children’s bullying perpetration through self-esteem and depressive symptoms, and whether these indirect pathways differ by gender. Method: In a three-wave longitudinal design spanning approximately 12 months, data were collected at baseline (T1, mid-December, n = 780), 6-month follow-up (T2, mid-June, n = 774), and 12-month follow-up (T3, mid-December, n = 706). Mediation models examined self-esteem and depression as parallel mediators between emotional/physical maltreatment (T1) and bullying (T3). Multi-group analyses and Wald tests compared path coefficients and indirect effects across boys and girls. Results: Longitudinal mediation revealed that the indirect effect of T1 emotional maltreatment on T3 bullying via T2 self-esteem (full mediation, βboys = 0.017, SE boys = 0.008, 95% CI [0.002, 0.032]) and the indirect effect of T1 physical maltreatment on T3 bullying via T2 depression (partial mediation, βboys = 0.029, SE boys = 0.013, 95% CI [0.005, 0.053]) were significant only among boys. Conclusion: The finding that distinct maltreatment types are linked to bullying through different, gender-specific psychological pathways highlights the need for tailored prevention strategies that account for both maltreatment type and gender.
Keywords: Child maltreatment (CM), Bullying, Self-Esteem (SE), Depression, Children
Received: 20 Jul 2025; Accepted: 24 Oct 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Duan, Zhang and Song. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Xianglan Zhang, xlzh1204@163.com
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