Gender-specific co-developmental trajectories of emotional maltreatment among children: Relations to traditional bullying.

BACKGROUND: Emotional maltreatment (i.e., emotional abuse and emotional neglect) correlates significantly with traditional bullying perpetration and victimization in children; however, little is known about the co-developmental trajectories of these two forms of emotional maltreatment and their relations to traditional bullying. OBJECTIVE: This study examined gender-specific trajectories of emotional abuse and emotional neglect through parallel process latent class growth modeling and their relations to traditional bullying perpetration and victimization. PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING: The baseline sample included 2080 fourth-grade Chinese elementary school children (55.3% boys; Mage = 10.18, SD = 0.60). METHODS: Participants completed assessments of emotional abuse, emotional neglect, traditional bullying perpetration, and victimization on five occasions, with six-month intervals between assessments. RESULTS: Four trajectories were identified for boys: congruently low-decreasing (51.13%), low-decreasing emotional abuse & moderate-stable emotional neglect (28.76%), congruently moderate-increasing (10.97%), and low-stable emotional abuse & high-stable emotional neglect (9.14%). For girls, three trajectories were revealed: congruently low-decreasing (70.55%), low-stable emotional abuse & moderate-stable emotional neglect (20.28%), and moderate-increasing emotional abuse & moderate-stable emotional neglect (9.17%). Children in the congruently moderate-increasing group for boys and the moderate-increasing emotional abuse & moderate-stable emotional neglect group for girls showed the highest risk for traditional bullying perpetration and victimization. Compared with girls, boys exhibited a stronger relation between the trajectories of emotional maltreatment and traditional bullying. CONCLUSION: Findings elucidated statistically significant relations between the gender-specific trajectories of emotional maltreatment and traditional bullying, emphasizing the importance of differing interventions for subgroups to mitigate traditional bullying.