Skip to main content
Log in

Bullying Victimization and Adolescents’ Social Anxiety: Roles of Shame and Self-Esteem

  • Published:
Child Indicators Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The present study aimed to explore the mechanisms underlying the association between bullying victimization and social anxiety. A total of 4790 Chinese high school students were administered four scales, including the Delaware bullying victimization scale, a trauma-related shame inventory, a social anxiety scale, and a self-esteem scale. The results showed that bullying victimization was directly and positively associated with social anxiety. In addition, the positive association between bullying victimization and social anxiety was mediated by shame and self-esteem, respectively. Bullying victimization was also related to social anxiety through shame via self-esteem. These findings suggested that shame and self-esteem have important mediating effects in the relation between bullying victimization and social anxiety. More attention should be paid to addressing adolescents’ negative emotions and self-evaluation after being bullied.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2

Similar content being viewed by others

References

Download references

Acknowledgments

This study was supported by Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. LQ20C090006), We thank the students and teachers of the participating schools for their time and support.

Bullying Victimization and Adolescents’ Social Anxiety: Roles of Shame and Self-esteem.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rui Zhen.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of Interest

The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Additional information

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wu, X., Qi, J. & Zhen, R. Bullying Victimization and Adolescents’ Social Anxiety: Roles of Shame and Self-Esteem. Child Ind Res 14, 769–781 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-020-09777-x

Download citation

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12187-020-09777-x

Keywords

Navigation