Path Analysis Of Aggressive Behavior And Its Influencing Factors Among Adolescents

Background Aggressive behaviors are influenced by both environmental andindividual factors. There are significant relationship between aggressive behavior andsocial, family-related, psychological factors. But most researches on the relationshipsbetween influencing factors and aggressive behavior focus on single factor. Fewstudies examine the influencing factor as a mediator.Objectives To analyze the aggressive behavior of adolescents and its influencingfactors, and to explore the path of relationship between them, so as to providescientific theoretical references for preventing and reducing the occurrence ofaggressive behavior among adolescents.Methods A cross-sectional survey was conducted from Anhui Province of3Cities,four of junior high schools located in Huaibei city, four of which located inXuancheng city, and four of which located in Bengbu city. According to voluntaryparticipation,5892students had completed questionnaires validly. The participantswere aged between11and18years, with a mean age of14.7years (SD=1.84).Students were asked to complete the self-administer questionnaire to gatherinformation, which includes demography, aggressive behavior, attachment andemotion regulation. The Pearson chi-square retests were used to compare theproportions of the independent variables versus dependent variables. Logisticregression analysis was performed to estimate the odds of socio-demographic andrelated variables for aggressive behavior. Structural equation models were used toinvestigate the path between related variables and aggressive behavior.Results The prevalence of aggressive behavior among adolescents was9.9%. Therewere strong associations between various sociodemographic variables and aggressivebehavior. Logistic regression analysis showed that emotion regulation，social anxiety and attachment were associated with aggressive behavior, after adjusting for potentialconfounders, such as sex, grade, single child, family type, perceived socioeconomicstatus, educational methods, school environments, residence environments and so on.The odds ratio were0.777(95%CI:0.746to0.808) for emotion regulation,1.019(95%CI:1.008-1.029) for social anxiety,0.872(95%CI:0.825-0.920) formother-child attachment,0.940(95%CI:0.894-0.988) for father-child attachment and0.942(95%CI:0.927to0.957) for peer attachment, respectively. Results from SEMmanifested attachment influenced aggressive behavior through emotion regulation andsocial anxity.Conclusions Aggressive behavior is affected by multiple factors. There are strongassociations between aggressive behavior and emotion regulation, social anxiety,attachment among adolescents. Moreover, emotion regulation and social anxiety playa role in the relationship between attachment and aggressive behavior as mediators.However, more robust evidence is needed to demonstrate the above causalassociation.