Examining friendship and empathy in early adolescents' responses to teasing

Despite the frequent involvement of a bystander in teasing, research has yet to include the bystander. However, bystanders have been shown to potentially alter the interaction (Ginsburg, 1977; Twemlow et al., 2001). The current study examined thin middle school students. Friendship and empathy were included as possible factors influencing how a bystander would respond.; The current study initially included 273 participants, ages 11 to 14, and was reduced to 179 based on their responses to the Bryant's (1982) Empathy Scale far Children. Participants were categorized into thirds, with the high and low thirds being used for the analysis. Participants read vignettes depicting teasing and bullying episodes, with varying levels of friendship between the teaser, target, and bystander. Participants provided ratings for 6 responses for how they thought the bystander would respond to the teasing episode, with higher scores indicating more teaser alliance and lower scores indicating more target alliance. Results were analyzed using a 2 (conditions of friendship: friends with teaser vs. friends with target) X 2 (conditions of incident: teasing vs. bullying) X 2 (participant empathy level: high vs. low) X 2 (participant gender: male vs. female) mixed ANCOVA, with social desirability as covariate. Results indicated main effects of friendship and of incident. Further, results indicated an interaction effect of friendship X empathy and incident X friendship.; Participants were also asked to indicate why they thought the bystander would respond in such a way, given their responses to the vignette. Results were analyzed using a regression analysis and indicated that several motivations predicted overall response to the vignettes. Total response score for the vignettes in which the bystander was friends with the teaser was predicted by "the right thing to do" and "friendship." The total response score for the vignettes in which the bystander was friends with the target was predicted by "the right thing to do," "friendship," and "not Nicky's responsibility." In addition, the compiled factor of "social concern" was also a significant predictor of the response for these vignettes.; Implications and limitations of the current study are discussed as are possible avenues for future research.