PSY 5130 Week 4 Journal & Week 4 Assignment

E M P I R I C A L R E S E A R C H

Beyond the Deficit Model: Bullying and Trajectories of Character Virtues in Adolescence

Lacey J. Hilliard • Edmond P. Bowers • Kathleen N. Greenman •

Rachel M. Hershberg • G. John Geldhof • Samantha A. Glickman •

Jacqueline V. Lerner • Richard M. Lerner

Received: 12 September 2013 / Accepted: 15 January 2014 / Published online: 16 February 2014

� Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Abstract Previous work on peer victimization has

focused primarily on academic outcomes and negative

indicators of youth involved in bullying. Few studies have

taken a strength-based approach to examine attributes

associated with bullies and victims of bullying. As such,

we examined developmental trajectories of moral, perfor-

mance, and civic character components, and their links to

bully status using data from 713 youth (63 % female) who

participated in Wave 3 (approximately Grade 7) through

Wave 6 (approximately Grade 10) of the 4-H Study of

Positive Youth Development. Latent growth curve analyses

indicated that moral character was stable across waves,

whereas civic character increased slightly by Wave 6.

Trajectories for performance character varied; some youth

alternatively displayed positive versus negative growth.

Youth who reported bullying behavior reported lower ini-

tial levels of moral, performance, and civic character as

compared to youth not involved in bullying. Bully–victims

reported lower initial levels of moral and civic character as

compared to youth not involved in bullying. Implications

for future work examining character-related components in

the context of peer victimization are discussed.

Keywords Peer victimization � Bullying � Character � Positive youth development � Relational developmental systems � Latent growth curve � Adolescence

Introduction

Since the scientific study of adolescent development was

launched through the publication of Hall’s (1904) book on

this period of life, the deficit model of development remained

across much of the next century an important, and often

predominant, lens for theory and research (Lerner and

Steinberg 2004). Purporting that the biological changes

associated with puberty necessarily and universally created

among youth a developmental disturbance involving the

emergence of personal problems and socially problematic

behaviors (e.g., Anthony 1969; Freud 1969), this deficit

model regarded adolescents as ‘‘problems to be managed’’

(Roth and Brooks-Gunn 2003a, b). Despite evidence in the

middle decades of the twentieth century (e.g., Bandura 1960;

Douvan and Adelson 1966) that most youth showed devel-

opmental trajectories inconsistent with this deficit concep-

tion, another several decades would pass before a coherent

model of adolescent development that offered a different,

strength-based and positive model of adolescence, would

crystallize (Larson 2000; Lerner et al. 2007, 2013).

Positive Youth Development as a Framework

for Positive and Negative Behavior

The positive youth development (PYD) perspective was

derived in large part from relational developmental systems

L. J. Hilliard � E. P. Bowers � K. N. Greenman � R. M. Hershberg � S. A. Glickman � R. M. Lerner (&) Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development, Tufts

University, 309 Lincoln-Filene Building, Medford, MA 02155,

USA

e-mail: [email protected]

L. J. Hilliard

e-mail: [email protected]

G. J. Geldhof

Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR, USA

J. V. Lerner

Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA, USA

123

J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003

DOI 10.1007/s10964-014-0094-y

theories (Overton 2013; Overton and Muller 2012) that

emphasize that the basic process of adolescent develop-

ment involves mutually influential relationships between

the developing individual and the multiple levels of his or

her changing context. These bidirectional relationships

regulate the course of development (i.e., its pace, direction,

and outcomes). History, or temporality, is part of the

ecology of human development that is integrated with the

individual through these developmental regulations. As

such, there is always change and, as well, at least some

potential for systematic change (i.e., for relative plasticity),

across the life span (Baltes et al. 2006; Lerner 1984). Such

plasticity represents a fundamental strength of the adoles-

cent period (Lerner et al. 2009b), in that it reflects the

potential that systematic changes may result in more

positive functioning. Indeed, if adaptive developmental

regulations emerge or can be fostered between young

people and features of their context (e.g., the structure and

function of his or her family, school, peer group, and

community), then the likelihood will be increased that

youth may thrive (that is, manifest healthy, positive

developmental changes) across the adolescent decade. In

short, predicated on developmental systems theories, the

links among the ideas of relative plasticity, mutually ben-

eficial (i.e., adaptive; Brandstatter 1998) developmental

regulations, and thriving suggest that all young people have

strengths that may be capitalized on to promote thriving

across the adolescent years.

There is growing evidence that the PYD perspective is a

useful frame for understanding the processes linking youth

and features of their context across the adolescent years

and for accounting for outcomes of these individual-con-

text relationships that are associated with features of

positive development, for instance, the ‘‘Five Cs’’ of

positive development (Competence, Confidence, Charac-

ter, Connection, and Caring) and for the links between

these ‘‘C’’s and other indicators of thriving, for example, a

‘‘sixth C,’’ of youth Contribution to self, family, school,

and civil society (Lerner et al. 2005, 2010, 2011, 2013;

Zaff et al. 2010). Moreover, early formulations of the PYD

perspective (e.g., Pittman et al. 2001) contended that, as

PYD would increase across adolescence, then problem

behaviors would decrease across this period. However,

data derived from the 4-H Study of PYD indicated that

links between positive and problem or risk behaviors,

although reflecting an overall inverse relationship, indi-

cated also that the relationship was far from perfect

(Gestsdottir and Lerner 2008; Jelicic et al. 2007; Lerner

et al. 2005). In addition, studies of trajectories of positive

and risk or problem behaviors across adolescence sug-

gested that there were diverse patterns of change for both

types of attributes and that some youth (e.g., girls) could

have trajectories reflecting high levels of the Five Cs and

Contribution and trajectories of problematic behavior and

depressive symptoms (e.g., Phelps et al. 2007; Urban et al.

2009).

In turn, Ma and her colleagues found that another

problem behavior—bullying—was, under specific circum-

stances, linked to indicators of positive functioning. That

is, studying youth from the first and second waves of the

4-H Study (approximately Grades 5 and 6), Ma et al.

(2009a) found that the educational expectations of youth

and school engagement interacted in fostering academic

competence among bullies and victims of bullying. In turn,

among youth from the first three waves of the 4-H Study

(approximately Grades 5–7), Ma et al. (2009b) found that

parent and teacher support independently and positively

predicted self-perceived academic competence among both

bullies and victims.

The links between positive and problematic behaviors

found in the 4-H Study data set have several implications

for the PYD model and, as well, for applications derived

from it. First, the development of positive characteristics of

youth development does not imply for all youth that neg-

ative, problematic behaviors will therefore diminish in

likelihood. Therefore, despite initial claims to the contrary

(e.g., Pittman et al. 2001), extant data suggest that efforts to

promote positive behaviors should not ignore the need to

diminish problem behaviors. Youth development programs

need to engage in efforts to both promote (positive attri-

butes) and prevent (problematic attributes); prevention and

promotion need to be coupled in a comprehensive approach

to enhance health and psychosocial thriving among youth

(Maggs and Schulenberg 2001; Schwartz et al. 2007).

Therefore, the PYD model, although a strength-based

conception of adolescence, does not eliminate the need to

understand how the relational developmental system may

function to create the basis for person–context relations

that result in risk and problem behaviors in youth.

Second, the nuances in connections between patterns of

positive and problematic attributes across adolescence that

have been found in the 4-H Study (Ma et al. 2009a, b;

Phelps et al. 2007; Urban et al. 2009) suggest the need to

explore further the potentially diverse ways in which

positive and problematic attributes may be linked across

adolescence. Indeed, such information will be vital in

efforts to plan integrated promotion and prevention inter-

vention programs derived from answers to complex ques-

tions such as ‘‘what positive attributes come together with

what problematic attributes during what portions of ado-

lescence?’’ The findings of Ma et al. (2009a, b) suggest

that, at least for one problem behavior, bullying, links with

indicators of positive functioning (academic performance)

exist but vary in nuanced ways, that is, in regard to grade

level and to facets of individual functioning (e.g., school

engagement, expectations about academic success) and of

992 J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003

123

context (e.g., social support from either parents or teach-

ers). However, what remains unclear from the Ma et al.

(2009a, b) findings regarding bullying-positive behavior

links is why the links between problematic attributes and

particular facets of positive attributes exist. For instance,

why does bullying relate to, say, adult instances of social

support but not to instances of peer social support (Ma

et al. 2009b)? Other research related to risk behavior has

demonstrated that problem behaviors tend to be interrelated

and share common risk and protective factors (Donovan

et al. 1991; Jessor 1991).

The present study seeks to address this question and to

extend the literature on the nature of the associations

between positive and problematic attributes in adolescence.

We use the 4-H Study data set and, again, focus on bul-

lying. In turn, we assess also one specific facet of the Five

Cs model of PYD—character—because we think that

current scholarship about character presents the opportu-

nity to derive hypotheses pertinent to the conditions under

which the link between problematic attributes and positive

attributes will exist.

The Contemporary Study of the Development

of Character Virtues

Interest in character dates at least from Aristotle’s Nico-

machean Ethics, which discussed several moral virtues

(e.g., courage, generosity, gentleness, honesty, justice, and

fairness) associated with leading a good life. Nevertheless,

scientific attention to character virtues has waxed and

waned since the classic studies of honesty conducted by

Hartshorne and May (1928). However, across the past

25 years there has been an increasing interest in this

domain of human development (e.g., Damon 1988; Damon

and Lerner 2008; Eisenberg et al. 2006; Lapsley and

Narvaez 2006; Peterson and Seligman 2004). Particularly

relevant for the present research is the model of character

presented by Berkowitz (2011), which provides a means to

differentiate among domains of character. For instance,

character virtues 1

such as empathy, fairness, trustworthi-

ness, generosity, and compassion are aspects of the

capacity for interpersonal relationships (Berkowitz 2011;

Lickona and Davidson 2005; Nucci and Narvaez 2008).

These qualities make up what Berkowitz (2011) and other

researchers call ‘‘moral character.’’ In other words, moral

character consists of virtues relevant to striving for ethical

behavior in one’s relationships with other individuals and

include attributes like empathy and integrity (Noddings

1994; Pratt et al. 2009; Walker and Pitts 1998).

In turn, character virtues such as effort, initiative, dili-

gence, and perseverance constitute the capacity to work

well and productively (Duckworth and Seligman 2005;

Farrington et al. 2012; Lickona and Davidson 2005). These

qualities comprise ‘‘performance character,’’ as they enable

individuals to thrive in an environment conducive to

achievement (Seider et al. 2012). In other words, perfor-

mance character consists of virtues that allow individuals

to regulate their thoughts and actions in ways that support

their personal achievement in a particular endeavor

(Davidson et al. 2011; Seider et al. 2012; Sokol et al.

2010). Examples of such qualities include persistence and

self-discipline.

Scholars have also discussed character virtues related to

civic character, that is, attributes such as social skills and

social knowledge. These attributes thus enable responsible

and engaged citizenship (Boston et al. 2005; Seider 2012;

Shields 2011). In other words, civic character strengths

consist of the qualities relevant to active and engaged cit-

izenship and can be demonstrated through local or global

community perspective and involvement (Boston et al.

2005; Seider 2012; Shields 2011).

Although past research using the 4-H Study data set has

studied character as part of the Five Cs, and treated this

construct as global and undifferentiated, the differentiation

in contemporary scholarship about character into virtues

associated with morality, performance, and civic engage-

ment enables us to suggest that there may be distinct

associations between bullying and some, but not all,

character virtues. As expressed by Berkowitz (2011) and

Seider (2012) the attributes of performance character

involve mastery and achievement by an individual and do

not have the interpersonal fairness attributes associated

with moral character or the interpersonal/social duty attri-

butes associated with civic character. Indeed, Berkowitz

and Puka (2009) have noted that performance character

components are neither intrinsically good nor bad but

rather ‘‘derivative of the ends toward which they are

applied’’ (p. 108). In contrast, moral character strengths can

be understood as ‘‘interpersonal ethical imperatives’’ that

are intrinsically good independent of context (Berkowitz

and Puka 2009, p. 108). In turn, civic character is associ-

ated with experiences that connect youth positively to

others, and that can have a significant impact on youth to

broaden their perspectives toward social action (Seider

2007). Thus, it may be that if an aspect of positive devel-

opment is more individually oriented (as is the case with

performance character) than interpersonally or socially

oriented (as is the case with both moral and civic charac-

ter), then links to bullying may be expected to be more

1 In this article, we use the term ‘‘character virtues,’’ and not

‘‘character strengths,’’ although the latter term has been used in the

literature as well (e.g., see Lapsley and Narvaez 2006). However, in

the PYD literature, strengths are defined as developmental assets

(Benson et al. 2011), and we elected not to assume that the attributes

of character we were assessing were strengths. We chose to test their

empirical relationships with indicators of positive development.

J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003 993

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likely. Indeed, we can hypothesize that high relationships

between bullying and character virtues exist only in regard

to performance virtues; there should be no or low rela-

tionships between moral or civic virtues and bullying. The

nature of bulling by youth underscores the basis for these

expectations.

That is, youth bullying is inherently devoid of concern

for the welfare of or fairness to others. Bullying constitutes

peer victimization or peer harassment, and involves repe-

ated, unprovoked, harmful actions by one youth or multiple

youth towards others (Ma et al. 2009a, b; Olweus et al.

1999). The acts may be physical or psychological. Physical

or direct bullying includes hitting, kicking, pushing, grab-

bing items from other children, and engaging in very rough

and intimidating play (Olweus et al. 1999). Psychological

bullying includes name-calling, making faces, teasing,

taunting, and making threats. Indirect or less obvious and

less visible bullying includes exclusion and rejection of

children from a group (Olweus 1991; Smith et al. 1999).

Scholars of bullying further assert that an imbalance of

power between the bully and the victim is essential to

identifying bullying behavior and differentiating this

behavior from other forms of aggression (Solberg and

Olweus 2003). Victims are often put in a difficult position

where they are unable to defend themselves or find solu-

tions to the situations given the power imbalance. Con-

siderations of the power dynamics in peer relationships are

crucial to understanding the nature and impact of bullying

behavior and victimization.

Recent work has conceptualized the experience of bul-

lying as a process, rather than isolated incidences (e.g.,

Espelage and Swearer 2003; Nickerson et al. 2005); this

work is focused on identifying individual and contextual

factors that may buffer the effects of victimization and help

to understand youth who engage in bullying behavior.

Although our measurement tools are limited in the current

work to reported instances of behaviors, we nevertheless

recognize the importance of recognizing the dynamic

relationships between peers in our hypotheses and inter-

pretations. Based on the PYD theoretical framework and

the aforementioned work, we posit that scholars should aim

to extend research beyond cataloguing negative outcomes

of victimization, and instead, toward a more nuanced

examination of youth who engage in and experience bul-

lying behaviors.

The Current Study

Accordingly, we propose to examine the links between

bullying and character in adolescence by studying the

development of performance, civic, and moral character in

middle and high school aged youth in relation to their self-

reported bullying status. We examined trajectories of, and

possible interrelationships among, moral character, civic

character, and performance character trajectories. We then

assessed if bullying (or being in another category of bul-

lying—victim, bully–victim; Olweus et al. 1999) was dif-

ferentially associated with the trajectories for the three

character types.

We used the 4-H Study data set, assessing participants

across Wave 3 (approximately Grade 7) to Wave 6

(approximately Grade 10). Bullying status from Wave 3 was

used to correlate with the character trajectories. This time

period of adolescence was chosen given the peak of bullying

experiences in the middle school years, though persistence of

bullying behavior continues throughout the high school

years; that is, direct, physical bullying increases in elemen-

tary school, peaks in middle school and declines in high

school, whereas verbal abuse remains constant across high

school (Robers et al. 2010). A recent nationwide survey

showed that about 25 % of public schools reported that

bullying occurred among students on a daily or weekly basis;

middle schools reported daily or weekly occurrences of

bullying, a higher frequency than primary and high schools

(Eaton et al. 2010). Thus, our sample represented youth who

may be likely to be engaging in and/or experiencing frequent

peer victimization.

We predicted that the character trajectories would vary

by bully type. Specifically, it was hypothesized that bul-

lying would be negatively associated with moral and civic

character trajectories, but would be related to performance

character trajectories, given the nature of this type of

character and findings that bullies display performance

character strengths (Sutton et al. 1999). We also expected

that youth not involved in bullying would exceed bullies in

civic and moral character domains. We made no predic-

tions, however, regarding bully–victims (i.e., youth that

report high levels of both bullying behavior and instances

of being bullied).

Method

Full details of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development

have been presented elsewhere (Lerner et al. 2005, 2009a, b,

2010, 2011). Therefore, we present here only the features of

the methods relevant to the present research, which includes

data from Waves 3 through 6. A discussion of the overall

method of the 4-H Study is provided in the introductory

article of this special issue (Bowers et al. in press).

Participants

Our sample in Wave 3 included 713 youth, 90.4 % of

whom were in 7th Grade. These youth were 63.3 % female,

994 J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003

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with a mean age of 12.98 years (SD = 0.51). Of the youth

who reported their race, 70.4 % were European American,

8.6 % were Latino/a, 8.3 % were African American, 4.0 %

were Asian American, 4.3 % were Multiracial, and 2.0 %

were American Indian. An additional 24.8 % of the sample

did not provide information on their race.

Our sample in Wave 4 included 657 youth, 92.6 % of

whom were in 8th Grade. These youth were 63.0 % female,

with a mean age of 14.06 years (SD = 0.59). Of the youth

who reported their race, 71.5 % were European American,

8.7 % were Latino/a, 9.8 % were African American, 4.7 %

were Asian American, 3.2 % were Multiracial and 2.0 %

were American Indian.

Our sample in Wave 5 included 567 youth, 91.4 % of

whom were in 9th Grade. These youth were 63.3 % female,

with a mean age of 15.05 years (SD = 0.60). Of the youth

who reported their race, 64.8 % were European American,

12.4 % Latino/a, 9.6 % were African American, 4.8 %

were Asian American, 3.0 % were Multiracial and 2.8 %

were American Indian. An additional 39.3 % of the sample

did not provide information on their race.

Our sample in Wave 6 included 580 youth, of whom

79.0 % were in 10th Grade. These youth were 67.2 %

female, with a mean age of 15.98 years (SD = 0.77). Of

the youth who reported their race, 74.6 % were European

American, 8.0 % Latino/a, 8.0 % were African American,

2.8 % were Asian American, 3.3 % were Multiracial and

.7 % were American Indian. An additional 38.0 % of the

sample did not provide information on their race.

Measures

Bullying Status

We used the two global questions from the Olweus Bul-

lying Questionnaire (Olweus 1996) to assess an adoles-

cent’s bullying status. The Olweus Bullying Questionnaire

is, arguably, the most widely used tool for studying school

bullying and has good psychometric properties (Solberg

and Olweus 2003). As suggested by Olweus (1996), we

provided a short and readable introductory paragraph to

describe the main characteristics of bullying, including

power imbalance and intention to hurt. The common for-

mats of bullying, such as physical attack, cruel teasing, and

social exclusion, were also described in the introduction

paragraph. We then presented the two global questions

about bullying: (1) ‘‘How often have you taken part in

bullying another child or other children?’’ and (2) ‘‘How

often have you been bullied?’’ in the past couple of months.

Response alternatives are ‘‘never,’’ ‘‘only once or twice,’’

‘‘two or three times a month,’’ ‘‘about once a week,’’ and

‘‘several times a week.’’

Following the ‘‘two or three times a month’’ cutoff point

suggested by Solberg and (Olweus 2003), answers to these

two bullying questions were recoded into two dichotomous

variables: ‘‘bullying peers’’ and ‘‘being bullied by peers.’’

‘‘Bullying peers’’ = 1, if the answer to the first bullying

question is ‘‘two or three times a month,’’ ‘‘about once a

week,’’ or ‘‘several times a week;’’ and if the answer to the

first question is ‘‘never’’ or ‘‘only once or twice,’’ ‘‘bullying

peers’’ = 0. Similarly, ‘‘being bullied by peers’’ = 1, if the

answer to the second bullying question is ‘‘two or three

times a month,’’ ‘‘about once a week,’’ or ‘‘several times a

week;’’ if the answer to the second question is ‘‘never’’ or

‘‘only once or twice,’’ ‘‘bullying peers’’ = 0. In the 4-H

Study data set, the bullying questions demonstrated good

validity (Ma et al. 2009a). Higher scores on question 1

were correlated with higher problem behaviors, such as

alcohol and drug use (r = .34, p \ .01); higher delin- quency (r = .41, p \ .01); higher levels of depressive symptoms, as indexed by the Center for Epidemiological

Studies Depression Scale (Radloff 1977; r = .22, p \ .01); and lower sympathy, as indexed by Eisenberg’s Sympathy

Scale (Eisenberg et al. 1996; r = -.16, p \ .01). In turn, higher scores on the second question were associated with

higher levels of depressive symptoms (r = .25, p \ .01); lower social competence (r = -.22, p \ .01); and lower self-worth, as indexed by the Self-Perception Profile for

Children, (SPPC, Harter 1988; r = -.15, p \ .01). These correlations are consistent with the literature, and thus

provide evidence for the validity of the two questions about

experiences of bullying peers and being bullied by peers

(Nansel et al. 2001; Smith et al. 1999).

Three dummy variables were created to indicate an

adolescent’s bullying status: Bully (being a bully vs oth-

ers), Victim (being a victim vs others), and Bully–Victim

(being a bully and a victim vs others). The reference group

for these dummy variables is the comparison group, ‘‘none

of the above.’’ Although the study of the heterogeneity of

members of the comparison group, who are not directly

involved in bullying, is an interesting topic (O’Connell

et al. 1999; Smith 2004), it is beyond the scope of the

present study. As such, there are potentially four bullying

statuses measured in this study: bully, victim, bully–victim,

and comparison group.

Character

We selected specific scales—described below—to repre-

sent components of moral, performance, and civic char-

acter. These items reflect the RDS framework, focusing not

only on person-centered attributes, but also on attributes

that reflect bidirectional person–context interactions.

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Moral Character Moral character was measured by six

items from the Behavioral Conduct subscale form the Self-

Perception Profile for Adolescence (Harter 1988). This

questionnaire assesses adolescents’ perceptions of compo-

nents of self-concept. Youth are asked to record which of

two statements is most like them, and then rate how true

that statement is for them. Each item receives a score of

1–4, and responses are averaged within each subscale. The

Cronbach’s alpha for this scale was 0.78. The Behavioral

Conduct subscale measures the degree to which adoles-

cents do the right thing, act the way they are supposed to,

and avoid getting in trouble. An example of an item from

the Behavioral Conduct scale is ‘‘Some teenagers usually

do the right thing BUT Other teenagers often don’t do the

right thing.’’

Performance Character Performance character is defined

by persistence, self-discipline, and regulation; therefore,

items assessing orientation to and persistence in tasks

provide an appropriate index of performance character. To

assess this attribute, we used the Task Orientation subscale

from the child (self) version of the Revised Dimensions of

Temperament Survey (DTOR-S; Windle and Lerner 1986).

An example item from the Task Orientation subscale is

‘‘Once I am involved in a task, nothing can distract me

from it.’’ For each item, participants responded using a

four-point Likert-type scale ranging from 1 = usually false

to 4 = usually true. The sum of the items for each subscale

provides three temperament subscale scores. The Task

Orientation subscale has a maximum score of 32 and is

coded such that a higher score indicates greater persistence

and lower distractibility. Cronbach’s alpha for Waves 3

through 6 were and 0.77, .78, .81, and .80, respectively.

Civic Character Civic character was measured using 12

items that were weighted and summed to create a com-

posite score of contribution, as used in prior research

derived from the 4-H Study (Bowers et al. 2011; Jelicic

et al. 2007). These items were from four scales: leadership,

service, helping, and ideology. Items from the leadership,

service, and helping scales measured the frequency of time

youth spent helping others (e.g., friends or neighbors),

providing service to their communities, and acting in

leadership roles; together, the leadership, service, and

helping subsets comprise an action component of Contri-

bution. The ideology scale measured the extent to which

contribution was an important facet of participants’ iden-

tities (e.g., ‘‘It is important to me to contribute to my

community and society’’). These items are derived from

existing instruments with known psychometric properties

and used in large-scales studies of adolescents, that is, the

Profiles of Student Life-Attitudes and Behaviors Survey

(PSL-AB; Leffert et al. 1998) and the Teen Assessment

Project Survey Question Bank (TAP; Small and Rodgers

1992). The action and ideology components are weighted

equally to calculate the civic character scores. Cronbach’s

alphas range from .69 to .73.

Procedure

In Waves 1 through 3 of the 4-H Study, data collection

from youth was conducted by trained study staff or, at more

distant locations, hired assistants. A detailed protocol was

used to ensure that data collection was administered uni-

formly and to ensure the return of all study materials. After

Wave 1, youth who were absent on the day of the survey or

were from schools or programs that did not allow on-site

testing were contacted by e-mail, mail, or phone, and were

asked to complete and return the survey to us. Beginning in

Wave 5, youth completed the survey online unless they

requested a paper survey. Parents completed online or

paper surveys. Paper surveys were delivered to their homes

by their children or through the mail (in the latter case,

return postage was provided).

Analyses

In this article, we discuss self-reported bullying status and

its relationship to the joint development of performance,

civic, and moral character across four waves of the 4-H

Study (Waves 3 through 6; see Lerner et al., this volume

for details). We examined these relationships by fitting a

three-trajectory latent growth curve model (LGCM) that

specified separate quadratic growth trajectories for the

three instantiations of character described above. Each

trajectory included random intercepts and random linear

slopes, but fixed (i.e., not random) quadratic slopes.

To ensure that the fit of our model was not biased by

misfit of the data covariance matrix (for a discussion, see

Wu et al. 2009), we freely estimated single-lag autore-

gressive correlations for all indicators and estimated

covariances between all indicators measured within each

wave to account for potential time of testing effects (e.g.,

we estimated covariances between Wave 4 moral charac-

ter, civic character, and performance character). We

ensured that this model sufficiently fit our data before

additionally modeling the items’ mean structure. Non-

signficant means and level-two variances for our growth

parameters were then constrained to zero using a series of

single-degree-of-freedom likelihood ratio tests. We then

added self-reported bullying status at Wave 3 as a level-

two variable to determine if bullying was significantly

related to participants’ initial levels of character (as

approximated by the random intercepts) or to the rate of the

character measures’ development (i.e., the random linear

slopes).

996 J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003

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Results

The initial covariance structure model displayed adequate

fit (v2(24) = 39.89, p = .022; RMSEA = .01, 90 % CI [.01, .02]; CFI = 1.00; TLI = .99; BIC = 85,716.09),

suggesting that fit for our LGCM would not be biased by

misfit of the data covariance matrix. The addition of a

mean structure to this model significantly decreased model

fit (Dv2(3) = 68.07, p \ .001; DBIC = 43.23), however, suggesting that quadratic growth trajectories were not

sufficient to describe our data’s mean structure. Examina-

tion of the standardized residuals and modification indices

suggested an additional fixed linear slope for the devel-

opment of moral character during Waves 5 and 6, and a

model with this additional parameter fit the data statisti-

cally as well as our covariance structure model

(Dv2(2) = 0.73, p = .694; DBIC = -15.825). We then constrained the variance of the linear moral and civic

character slopes to zero and constrained the mean slope of

the moral character trajectory to zero without significantly

altering our model’s fit (i.e., p for all Dv2(1) tests [.001; BIC decreased after each constraint was added).

2

Details of our final LGCM are presented in Tables 1 and

2. Table 1 presents the estimated means and variance for

our growth trajectories and supplement the visual repre-

sentations of our growth trajectories presented in Figs. 1, 2,

3. As these results show, moral character was generally

stable across the four years considered, whereas civic

character increased slightly in Wave 6. The trajectories for

performance character varied such that some individuals

alternatively displayed positive versus negative growth.

Table 2 complements the information in Table 1 and

our figures by presenting the estimated correlations among

all freely varying latent growth parameters. This table

shows a relatively high correlation among all three random

intercepts, which, when taking the intercepts as a rough

proxy for initial standing on the three variables, suggests

that participants who scored higher on one of the character

measures at Wave 3 also tended to score higher on the

other forms of character. Only the linear slope of perfor-

mance character significantly varied across participants

and, although this slope did not strongly correlate with the

intercepts for civic or moral character, the random slope

displayed a strong negative correlation with the random

intercept of performance character. Thus, participants who

started higher on performance character tended to display

lower (potentially negative) linear slopes on that same

variable. Similarly, participants who started lower on per-

formance character tended to have higher slopes. These

results may suggest regression to the mean and should be

further examined in subsequent research.

In our last stage of analysis we tested whether self-

reported bullying status at Wave 3 significantly correlated

with the random growth parameters in our model. This final

model displayed acceptable fit (v2(65) = 103.59, p \ .001; RMSEA = .02, 90 % CI [.01, .02]; CFI = .98; TLI = .97)

and suggested very weak correlations between bullying

status and our growth parameters. Table 3 presents all

2 All analyses initially included tests for gender differences. None

were found, and therefore we report no results linked to gender.

40

50

60

70

80

3 4 5 6 Wave

Civic Character

Fig. 1 Development of civic character. Lines indicate the mean trajectory and trajectories with intercepts ±1 SD from the mean

Table 1 Means and variances for growth parameters

Parameter Mean (SE) Variance (SE)

Intercept

Moral 3.06 (.01)*** 0.18 (.01)***

Performance 21.50 (.10)*** 11.46 (2.59)***

Civic 55.93 (.36)*** 163.82 (7.31)***

Linear slope

Moral 0.00 (fixed) 0.00 (fixed)

Performance -0.89 (.16)*** 1.64 (.58)***

Civic -1.17 (.49)* 0.00 (fixed)

Quadratic slope

Moral -0.16 (.02)*** 0.00 (fixed)

Performance 0.24 (.05)*** 0.00 (fixed)

Civic 0.65 (.16)*** 0.00 (fixed)

Spline slope

Moral 0.70 (.06)*** 0.00 (fixed)

* p \ .05; ** p \ .01; *** p \ .001

Table 2 Correlations among growth parameters

1 2 3 4

1. Intercept—moral 1.00

2. Intercept—civic 0.53*** 1.00

3. Intercept—

performance

0.54*** 0.42*** 1.00

4. Slope—performance -0.13* -0.01 -0.57*** 1.00

* p \ .05; ** p \ .01; *** p \ .001

J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003 997

123

correlations from this model and shows that being a self-

reported bully negatively correlated with overall self-

reported levels of character (i.e., the random intercepts). As

with the negative correlation between the intercept and

slope of performance character, the slope of performance

character also weakly, but positively, correlated with being

a self-reported bully.

Discussion

Bullying is recognized as a significant issue affecting

youth, and it is thus imperative to examine youth

experiences and the characteristics of those affected by

bullying and peer victimization. The aim of the current

study was to explore the links between bullying and

character in adolescence by examining the development of

performance, civic, and moral character in middle and high

school aged youth related to their self-reported bullying

status. Specifically, we examined the trajectories and

relationships among moral, civic, and performance char-

acter and if bully status was differentially associated with

these character types.

Bullying Status and Character Virtues

Our results indicate that across middle adolescence, youth

moral character was relatively stable, whereas civic char-

acter increased slightly by Wave 6, and some young people

reported decreases or increases in performance character.

These results indicate that in general youth consistently see

themselves as relatively doing right or wrong actions

across middle adolescence, but they report slight increases

in behaviors reflective of active citizenship. In turn, some

youth reported increases in their ability to maintain focus

on a task, whereas others reported a loss in task orientation

over middle adolescence.

Findings showed that bullying status correlated with

initial levels of all three types of character and the slope of

performance character. Youth who reported being bullies

reported lower initial levels of moral, civic, and perfor-

mance character as compared to youth not involved in

bullying. Bully–victims reported lower initial levels of

moral and civic character as compared to youth not

involved in bullying. Bullies, on the other hand, reported

increases in performance character over time. That is,

youth identified as bullies were less likely than youth not

involved in bullying to report behaving well and treating

others well (moral-related character), and persisting and

staying focus on a task (performance-related character),

and thinking and acting to contribute to their communities

(civic-related character). Similarly, youth who reported

being bullies and being bullied by others (bully–victims)

reported lower levels of moral and contribution thoughts

and behaviors than youth not engaged in bullying situa-

tions. There were no differences in initial levels or changes

in moral, civic, or performance character between victims

and youth not involved in bullying.

Of note is the finding that bullies tended to show more

positive slopes for performance character than youth not

involved in bullying. It is possible that this finding reflects

motivations for bullying in middle school that have been

insufficiently researched in the bullying literature. Specif-

ically, if bullies have lower performance character when

they report occupying bully statuses, their bullying

behaviors may be a form of externalizing negative

Table 3 Correlations between self-reported bullying and growth parameters

Bully Victim Bully–Victim

1. Intercept—moral -.22 ***

-.06 -.17 ***

2. Intercept—civic -.11 **

.00 -.09 **

3. Intercept—performance -.16 ***

-.01 -.06

4. Slope—performance .12 *

.00 .03

* p \ .05; ** p \ .01; *** p \ .001

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

3 4 5 6

Wave

Performance Character

Fig. 3 Development of performance character. Lines indicate the mean trajectory and trajectories with intercepts and slopes ±1 SD

from the mean. Note that the intercept and slope were negatively

correlated in our results and the downward trajectory shown does not

necessarily reflect any single participant’s data

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

3 4 5 6 Wave

Moral Character

Fig. 2 Development of moral character. Lines indicate the mean trajectory and trajectories with intercepts ±1 SD from the mean

998 J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003

123

behaviors in response to poor academic skills and low

achievement (Anderson et al. 2002). Moreover, as research

has shown, when youth are struggling academically, they

are also likely to be experiencing low self-esteem and other

negative socio-emotional consequences (e.g., van Lier

et al. 2012).

In this study, we only captured youth bullying statuses at

one time point in 7th Grade. It is therefore possible that the

youth who self-identified as bullies in 7th Grade adopted

more adaptive social roles and experiences later in ado-

lescence. Thus, the 7th Grade bully with low performance

character in this study may have become a mature and

caring 10th Grader with high levels of performance char-

acter. The evidence of growth in performance character

may very well explain the pathway to changing bullying

statuses throughout adolescence—an area of bullying

research that deserves further exploration. Likewise, the

link between youth bullying behavior and performance

character may reflect misdirected strengths in use and

provide further evidence that youth can hold positive and

negative characteristics simultaneously (e.g., controversial

peer status; Newcomb et al. 1992; problematic behaviors;

Arbeit et al., this volume).

Findings related to bully status and character thus

illustrate the importance of understanding the diversity of

adolescence and assumptions about behavior and strengths.

Given the heterogeneity of youth who report bullying,

many of these youth may show high community engage-

ment, have a high moral orientation, or show diligence in

school. One might suspect that maintaining a higher peer

status (a component in defining bullies; Solberg and Olw-

eus 2003) may necessitate these high character virtues in an

effort to advance themselves and gain or hold their status.

Therefore, a more nuanced and comprehensive examina-

tion of these character virtues and how they are expressed

is necessary. Harnessing youth performance character

attributes through positive contexts, skilled mentorship,

and other important non-parental adult youth relationships

(e.g., with a coach, teacher, minister, aunt, uncle) may help

youth use these characteristics as strengths; adult mentors

may then be able to decrease the time youth spend bullying

and increase youth potential to contribute positively to their

contexts.

Character Virtue Trajectories

Regardless of whether youth reported increases or decreases

in performance character over time, initial performance

character at Wave 3 was significantly related to initial moral

and civic character. That is, participants who reported higher

levels of one type of character at Wave 3 tended to report

high levels of the other forms of character as well. In turn,

participants who reported higher levels of moral character

were also more likely to report lower slopes of performance

character over time. Similarly, participants who reported

higher levels of performance character at Wave 3 reported

lower slopes in performance character. It appears that youth

view whether they are behaving well or poorly, and how they

treat others, as stable across these years of adolescence. This

finding is potentially concerning for youth who bully as it

seems that young people do not view themselves as changing

in fundamental ways.

The results of these trajectory analyses are consistent

with prior work with data derived from the 4-H Study. For

example, prior research has shown that overall PYD is

relatively stable across time (Urban et al. 2009), just as

youth in our study did not report significant changes in our

index of moral character over middle adolescence. In

addition, prior work examining trajectories of intentional

self regulation (Bowers et al. 2011) found that some youth

reported increases in performance character over middle

adolescence, although other youth reported decreases in

performance character. Further, we found that youth

showed an increase in their attitudes and abilities to civ-

ically engage in their communities and to contribute pos-

itively over time. This finding is consistent with prior work

on active and engaged citizenship (Zaff et al. 2011). Per-

haps as youth mature, they are exposed to new ideas and

opportunities to contribute to their contexts. As these

experiences increase, youth may view themselves as more

competent and able to effect change.

Some youth also reported increases in performance

character over the four waves. As these youth progressed

through middle adolescence, they reported higher persis-

tence and lower distractibility when completing tasks.

Certain youth, however, reported decreases in task orien-

tation over time. Future work should examine possible

intraindividual and interindividual correlates of these

changes over time. New opportunities and domains

encountered by youth as they progress through adolescence

may promote or hinder their ability to persist and maintain

focus on their goals. Our hope would be that well-designed

classroom and out-of-school time activities could be

identified that promote the positive changes reported by

youth in both performance and civic character.

We did not find correlations between changes in the

three types of youth-reported character. This finding thus

poses a challenge to researchers and practitioners to

describe, explain, and optimize adolescent development

such that each seem to represent unique components of

character. In his work with three schools that have explicit

foci on moral-, performance-, and civic-related compo-

nents, Seider (2012) found that each school had levels of

success that differed according to the specific school-wide

emphasis. These schools’ achievements demonstrate the

successful promotion of positive qualities in youth through

J Youth Adolescence (2014) 43:991–1003 999

123

domain-specific initiatives, yet nonetheless highlight the

challenge of developing domain-general character educa-

tion programs.

Our results indicated that participants who reported

higher initial levels of moral character were also more

likely to report a very small, but significant decrease in the

slope of performance character over time. Similarly, par-

ticipants who reported higher levels of performance char-

acter at Wave 3 reported smaller slopes in performance

character. One could also argue that our results indicate

that the three types of character are interrelated as initial

levels are strongly correlated and the changes we report are

minor and may be practically insignificant. Future work

should examine additional indices of each type of character

as the associations we see may be due to the use of

instruments not designed specifically to index these types

of character and that each index was based on youth self-

reported items. In addition, there were no gender differ-

ences found in the present analyses. Nonetheless, future

research should explore whether individual differences

related to gender or background might exist in different

samples, especially ones that involve measurement models

other than the one involved in the present research.

Limitations of and Implications Beyond the Current

Study

Findings showed that youth who engaged in bullying

behavior demonstrated lower levels character virtues at the

initial assessment. In addition, youth moral character

stayed fairly constant over time, civic character showed an

increase over time, and performance character was variable

over time. Although findings from the current study add

valuably to our understanding of the function of character

virtues among youth across bully and victim subtypes, we

were necessarily methodologically limited by a reliance on

youth self-report. More confidence in such findings could

be gained by using a multi-informant approach or quali-

tative methods to more fully capture both the experience of

bullying, to provide a more in-depth assessment of moral,

performance, and civic character, and to capture the pro-

cess of bullying experiences and peer relations.

Despite the limitations, the current work has important

implications for programs and policies. Previous work in

the study of bullying has focused on negative associations

for those who engage in bullying. The current work is

grounded in the positive youth development framework

which, instead, posits that all youth (regardless of label)

have strengths that can be leveraged toward success. Thus,

findings from the current investigation suggest that work on

peer relations should examine individual profiles of stu-

dents related to having attributes such as being fair and

just, thorough and persistent, and community- and civic-

minded. Schools and youth programs addressing bullying

behavior should use these profiles and individual charac-

teristics to help youth develop the skills to effectively

capitalize on their strengths toward behavioral change and

positive peer communities.

Conclusion

The aims of the current study were to examine character

type trajectories and how bullying statuses may relate to

these trajectories across middle to high school, a devel-

opmental period marked by high instances of bullying.

Youth who reported being bullies and being bullied by

others (bully–victims) reported lower levels of moral and

civic character, and bullies reported more positive slopes

for performance character than youth not involved in bul-

lying. These findings highlight both the importance of

further examining components of character and children’s

moral, performance, and civic engagement, and the utility

of optimizing such developmental assets to promoting

positive development among adolescents who bully and

who are bullied. In this article, we have helped to identify

factors at work in exploring character strengths in youth

involved in bullying behavior across adolescence. The

present work builds on the principles of PYD and devel-

opmental systems approaches insofar as that all young

people have strengths that may be capitalized on to pro-

mote thriving across the adolescent years.

Acknowledgments This research was supported in part by grants from the National 4-H Council, the Altria Corporation, the Thrive

Foundation for Youth, and the John Templeton Foundation.

Author contributions L.J.H. conceived of the study, participated in its design and coordination, and drafted the manuscript; E.P.B. par-

ticipated in the design, interpretation of the data, and writing of the

manuscript; K.N.G. participated in the design and helped draft the

manuscript; R.M.H. participated in the design and helped draft the

manuscript; G.J.G. performed the statistical analysis and helped draft

the manuscript; S.A.G. helped draft the manuscript; J.V.L. is the

scientific director of the 4-H Study of Positive Youth Development,

helped conceive this article, and participated in the design; R.M.L. is

the PI of the 4-H Study, helped conceive this article, and assisted in

drafting the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final

manuscript.

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Lacey J. Hilliard is a research assistant professor at the Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development at Tufts University. Her

work integrates the study of positive youth development and gender

roles.

Edmond P. Bowers is a research assistant professor at Tufts University. He received his doctorate in Applied Developmental

and Educational Psychology from Boston College. His research

interests include a focus on important non-parental adults and the

various ways that these adults can promote positive development in

young people.

Kathleen N. Greenman is a doctoral student at the Institute for Applied Research in Youth Development at Tufts University. Her

research interests involve the study of positive youth development

and socioemotional development.

Rachel M. Hershberg is a research assistant professor and qualitative methodologist in the Institute for Applied Research in Youth

Development at Tufts University. Her research focuses on positive

development and on the development of critical consciousness in

diverse and migrant youth in the US.

G. John Geldhof is an assistant professor in Human Development and Family Sciences at Oregon State University. His research

emphasizes the integration of diverse theoretical approaches to self-

regulation and examines how self-regulation develops across the life

span.

Samantha A. Glickman graduated Tufts University with a BA in Child Development and Community Health. Samantha is currently a

2013 Teach for America Corps member working at a Headstart school

and is pursuing a Masters in Special Education through Loyola

Marymount University.

Jacqueline V. Lerner is a professor of Applied Developmental and Educational Psychology in the Department of Counseling, Applied

Developmental and Educational Psychology at Boston College. She

received her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the Pennsylvania

State University. Her research interests focus on the development of

children and adolescents in the contexts of family, school and

community, and the embedded relationships in these contexts that

contribute to positive development.

Richard M. Lerner is the Bergstrom Chair in Applied Develop- mental Science and the Director of the Institute for Applied Research

in Youth Development at Tufts University. He received his Ph.D. in

developmental psychology from the City University of New York.

His work integrates the study of public policies and community-based

programs with the promotion of positive youth development and

youth contributions to civil society.

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