Influences of adolescents' social capital and empathy on face-to-face, voice, and text-mediated bullying

The present study explores the influence of parents’ communication and adolescents’ empathy on their online and offline social capital, and the relationship between social capital and three types of bullying (face-to-face, voice-based, and text-based). In addition, the roles of adolescents’ psychological states such as stress, conformity, and social support were analyzed. Nationwide 1,200 Korean middle school students were sampled and surveyed using a face-to-face structured interview method. As a result, parents’ communication showed positive effects on adolescents’ empathy and offline social capital, and in particular, mothers’ communication had a strong effect on the development of adolescents’ offline bonding capital. Online bridging capital increased both perpetration and victimization; moreover, conformity and stress increased bullying, while offline bonding capital decreased victimization. The influence of online bridging capital on bullying behavior gradually decreased when it was performed through face-to-face, voice, and text (instant messaging, kakao-talk, & SNS) in turn, while the effect of bullying behavior on victimization gradually increased. Indirect means of bullying might decrease the cost on the part of the bullies, as well as decrease the victim’s opportunity to respond which may exacerbate the power imbalance between the bullying and the bullied.