Maternal knowledge, adolescent personality, and bullying

Bullying may be adaptive for adolescents under the right combination of internal and external factors. The purpose of this study was to determine whether maternal knowledge and monitoring moderate the association between adolescent personality and bullying perpetration. A sample of 222 adolescents (120 boys, Mage = 14.07, SD = 1.54) completed measures on the HEXACO model of personality, bullying, and maternal knowledge and monitoring. As expected, mother knowledge (but not monitoring) moderated the association between bullying perpetration and Honesty-Humility, but not Emotionality and Agreeableness, even though a main effect was found for Agreeableness. Findings support bullying may be an evolutionary adaptation for adolescents who are lower in Honesty-Humility and face lower costs from mothers who lack knowledge about their activities.