Spirituality and Cyberaggression: Mediating and Moderating Effect of Self-Control and School Climate

Abstract

Background: Cyberaggression is an essential topic to focus on when it comes to adolescents’ development. We focused on understanding the relationship between spirituality, self-control, school climate, and cyberaggression by examining the mediating and moderating effect of self-control and school climate. Methods: We examined 456 middle school students (M age = 13.45, SD = 1.07), 475 high school students (M age = 16.35, SD = 0.76), and 1117 college students (M age = 20.22, SD = 1.50). Results: Results indicated that the mediating effect of self-control was significant for the college sample on both types of cyberaggression and marginally significant for the high school and middle school sample on reactive cyberaggression. The moderating effect varied across the three samples. School climate moderated the first half of the mediation model for all three samples, the second half for middle school and college student samples on reactive cyberaggression, the direct path for middle school samples on reactive cyberaggression, and the college student sample on both types of cyberaggression. Conclusion: Spirituality has varying degrees of association with cyberaggression through the mediating role of self-control and the moderating role of school climate.