Izabela Zych

• Associate Professor
• Professor (Associate) at University of Córdoba

This compact resource synthesizes current research on bullying in the schools while presenting strengths-based approaches to curbing this growing epidemic. Its international review of cross-sectional and longitudinal studies unravels the complex dynamics of bullying and provides depth on the range of negative outcomes for bullies, victims, enablers...

Bullying is an extremely damaging type of violence that is present in schools all over the world, but there are still many gaps in knowledge regarding different variables that might influence the phenomenon. Two promising research lines focus on empathy and callous–unemotional traits but findings from individual studies seem to be contradictory. Th...

Bullying and cyberbullying are present all over the world and have serious consequences for individuals and societies. The number of research studies on the topic has increased exponentially throughout the history, but many questions related to the phenomena remain unanswered. The current study is a systematic review of systematic reviews and meta-...

Bullying and cyberbullying are studied all over the world. Nevertheless, even though prevalence rates are extremely high in the poor countries, not much attention is paid to them. Similarly, unequal attention is being paid to different topics. Thus, this work is a review of the studies with the highest impact on the field, pointing out what is alre...

Research on cyberbullying started at the beginning of the 21st century and the number of studies on the topic is increasing very rapidly. Nevertheless, the criteria used to define the phenomenon and evaluation strategies are still under debate. Therefore, it is still difficult to compare the findings among the studies or to describe their prevalenc...

The Trait Meta-Mood Scale is widely used to assess individual differences in perceived emotional intelligence. This instrument measures self-reported emotional attention, clarity, and repair. The present study analyzed the psychometric properties, reliability, and validity of a Polish version of the TMMS-24 for adolescents, including a broad sample...

La etapa de tránsito de la escuela primaria a secundaria constituye un período crítico en los escolares que podría afectar a su ajuste y funcionamiento social. Esta investigación explora y describe las trayectorias de implicación, entre estas dos etapas educativas, en comportamientos de agresión y victimización de bullying y cyberbullying y su rela...

Research has shown that high self-esteem has numerous personal and social benefits, especially in adolescents. However, it is necessary to examine whether involvement, as aggressors or victims, in online and offline aggressive behaviours or the presence or absence of empathy, affective and cognitive, can influence adolescents’ self-esteem. The pres...

Research has shown that high self-esteem has numerous personal and social benefits, especially in adolescents. However, it is necessary to examine whether involvement, as aggressors or victims, in online and offline aggressive behaviours or the presence or absence of empathy, affective and cognitive, can influence adolescents’ self-esteem. The pres...

This is the protocol for a Campbell Collaboration systematic review. Our objective is to conduct an umbrella review to synthesize published and unpublished systematic reviews focused on risk and protective factors for child sexual abuse and effectiveness of interventions against child sexual abuse perpetration and victimization. Specific research q...

Introduction Expressions of cyberhate motivated by characteristics such as gender, ethnicity, and religious beliefs are now present and prevalent on social networks. Past research, both in online and offline contexts, has identified that, although there may be an overlap between victims and perpetrators of violence; this is not always the case. Nev...

Objectives of the research: Social and emotional competencies are crucial predictors of effective human psychosocial functioning. Although research on social and emotional competencies has been carried out for many years almost worldwide, in the current era of rapid social changes, further research is necessary. Thus, it is still essential to valid...

Human behavior in cyber space is extremely complex. Change is the only constant as technologies and social contexts evolve rapidly. This leads to new behaviors in cybersecurity, Facebook use, smartphone habits, social networking, and many more. Scientific research in this area is becoming an established field and has already generated a broad range...

The purpose of this research is to test the validity of commonly used measures of exposure to and production of online extremism. Specifically, we investigate if a definition of hate influences survey responses about the production of and exposure to online hate. To explore the effects of a definition, we used a split experimental design on a sampl...

Citation: Costello, M.; Hawdon, J.; Reichelmann, A.V.; Oksanen, A.; Blaya, C.; Llorent, V.J.; Räsänen, P.; Zych, I. Defending Others Abstract: This paper examines factors correlated with online self-help-an informal form of social control vis-à-vis intervention-upon witnessing a cyberhate attack. Using online surveys from 18-to 26-year-old responde...

Antisocial behavior is a worldwide problem that negatively affects individuals and societies, and it is influenced by contextual factors. The study of how antisocial behavior changes through time frames and among countries provides information of the extent to which the environment influences this problem, which could help to develop more accurate...

El uso problemático de Internet por parte de la población infantil y adolescente se ha incrementado en los últimos años, provocando consecuencias negativas en el desarrollo psicoemocional, físico, social y académico del menor. Sin embargo, pocos estudios han examinado el cambio en el uso problemático de Internet por parte de los menores tras la pan...

This study examined longitudinal links between several dimensions of parent–child relationship and adolescent substance use, and tested the role of self-control in mediating these. Data came from the Zurich Project on the Social Development from Childhood to Adulthood. Validated questionnaires were used to measure parent–child domains at age 11, se...

Background: Adolescent substance use has been widely related to different individual, school, family and community factors. Yet, the number of studies with all these variables together in a model from an ecological perspective is still low, and they rarely used a longitudinal design. The aim of this study was to explore, from an ecological perspec...

Research has shown that violent ideations (VIs) may play a key role in aggression and violence. However, there is no tool to measure this construct adapted to the Spanish language so far. The current study aims to translate and evaluate the psychometric properties of the Violent Ideations Scale (VIS) in European Spanish. This study counts with a co...

This article introduces and applies an integrative model of cyberharassment victimization. The model combines routine activity theory (RAT), the general theory of crime (GTC), and the personal resources approach to analyze risk factors for victimization while acknowledging the protective role of a sense of mastery. Survey respondents were aged 15 t...

La promoción de la convivencia escolar es una tarea imprescindible en las escuelas del siglo XXI, que, aparte de la enseñanza del contenido académico, están llamadas a preparar para la vida y prevenir la violencia. Aunque se reconozca la importancia de la convivencia escolar y se hayan implementado diversos programas para su promoción, todavía es n...

Increasing rule compliance in adolescents is one of the greatest challenges during the pandemic. Understanding how different variables are related to compliance with COVID-19 regulations in adolescents is needed to improve policy and practice against it. This study aims to analyze how sociodemographic and educational variables such as sex, age, soc...

Background Family‐related risk and protective factors are crucial for different antisocial behaviors, but their role in radicalization requires synthesis. Radicalization is likely to have a negative impact on families, and well‐designed and implemented family‐focused intervention programs have the potential to decrease radicalization. Objectives R...

The Basic Empathy Scale is widely used to measure cognitive and affective empathy in different age groups. Although empathy is studied throughout the world, research on this important psychological construct in Eastern European populations needs to be increased. In order to accomplish this, validated instruments to measure empathy are needed in thi...

Antisocial behavior and somatization are common problems in schools that have several consequences. However, the relation among these problems is not clear. This longitudinal research aims to better understand whether antisocial behavior is related to and predicts somatization, in order to prevent and reduce both disorders in young people. A longit...

Las competencias sociales y emocionales son cruciales para el éxito académico y social. Aunque existan programas para su promoción en las escuelas, no todo el profesorado está preparado para desarrollarlos. Este proyecto se centró en promover competencias sociales y emocionales en futuros maestros. Un total de 322 participantes fueron asignados a u...

Background: Cooperative learning and Project-Based Learning are methodologies that can promote learning environments and improve learning, school achievement, and social and emotional competencies. Method: A mixed combination of these two methodologies called Cooperative Project-Based Learning was designed, and a quasi-experimental evaluation st...

Prevalence rates of compliance with anti-COVID measures have been widely studied, but little is known about this issue in early adolescence. Moreover, the relation between substance use and compliance with anti-COVID regulations is still unexplored. Thus, this study aimed to determine the level of compliance with anti-COVID measures by adolescents...

The Internet, specifically social media, is among the most common settings where young people encounter hate speech. Understanding their attitudes toward the phenomenon is crucial for combatting it because acceptance of such content could contribute to furthering the spread of hate speech as well as ideology contamination. The present study, theore...

Studies show that different types of antisocial behaviors share similar risk and protective factors related to particular social, emotional and moral competencies. Nevertheless, little is known about the longitudinal relation of social, emotional and moral competencies with patterns of antisocial behaviors in youth. The present study aimed to disco...

Gambling is a potential hazard to life satisfaction, yet peer relationships online might buffer this risk. This study analyzed the ways problem gambling is associated with life satisfaction as well as the extent to which the use of online-gambling community participation and, alternatively, offline belonging affect this association. A web-based sur...

Background/Objective Substance use is one of the main risks for adolescent health. Many research projects have studied longitudinal patterns of use and risk/protective factors, but the number of studies focused on within-individual stability and change is low. The objective of this study was to discover specific longitudinal profiles of drug use an...

Bullying and cyberbullying have been intensively studied in many countries, and research on the topic has been fruitful. Nevertheless, it is still necessary to advance knowledge on bullying and cyberbullying in many geographical areas and to discover their risk and protective factors. The objective of this study was to describe and compare the invo...

This systematic review aims to answer the following research questions: (1) What are the family‐related risk and protective factors for radicalization? (2) What is the impact of radicalization on families? (3) To what extent are family‐based interventions against radicalization effective? The review will answer these research questions by systemati...

Background and aims: Loneliness and a low sense of mastery are associated with excessive gambling, but the underlying processes of these relationships remain unstudied. Because psychological distress can increase vulnerability to excessive gambling, we investigated its mediating role in these relationships among young people. To meet the need for...

This study compares childhood explanatory factors for adolescent offending according to official records obtained in three longitudinal projects conducted in three different countries: the Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development, the Pittsburgh Youth Study, and the Zurich Project on the Social Development from Childhood to Adulthood. This is the...

El número de estudios sobre la violencia escolar y juvenil ha aumentado en los últimos años y sus resultados resaltan el importante papel de las competencias socioemocionales a la hora de prevenir o intervenir en estas conductas. No obstante, los hallazgos científicos a menudo están desconectados entre sí y además no siempre son accesibles a los pr...

Some studies suggest that sexual and ethnic-cultural minority groups are at high risk of cyberbullying, but almost all of them focused on general cyberbullying without including specific bias-based behaviors. This study analyzed psychometric properties of a bias-based cyberbullying measure, described prevalence rates of bias-based cyberbullying in...

This study shows longitudinal predictors of involvement in different bullying roles, including mental health, individual, family, peer and school predictors. The analyses were based on a longitudinal prospective study with 916 students followed up from ages 7 to 17 with 7 waves of data. Participants were selected through random sampling and were en...

:La diversidad étnico-cultural es una realidad que está presente en los centros educativos, y debe ser analizada y estudiada en profundidad. En esta realidad se generan grupos de mayorías y minorías, donde estos últimos suelen ser grupos vulnerables dadas sus características sociales y económicas. La evidencia científica avala que la inteligencia e...

Background and aims Loneliness and a low sense of mastery have been associated with excessive gambling, but the underlying processes of these relationships remain unstudied. Because psychological distress can increase vulnerability to excessive gambling, we investigated its mediating role in these relationships among young people. To meet the need...

Based on lifestyle exposure theory (LET), this study examined online dating application (ODA) use and victimization experiences among adolescents using large cross-national samples of Finnish, American, Spanish, and South Korean young people between ages 15 and 18. According to logistic regression analyses in two substudies, ODA use was associated...

Cyberaggression is a harmful behavior, but cross-national studies on cyberaggression including relations among its individual and social predictors are limited. This study aimed to discover the direct and indirect relations among individual and social predictors of cyberaggression in socio-demographically balanced survey data set of 4816 15–25-year...

The Internet and technologies have increased gambling opportunities globally, normalizing gambling among young individuals. Youth are active Internet users and susceptible to group norms, but little is known about group behavior and norms in online interaction. This study examined if following perceived majority opinions about gambling content (i.e...

Problem gambling among young people is an emerging trend globally. The online environment in particular offers various possibilities for gambling engagement. This is the first cross-national survey study using the social ecological model to analyze problem gambling, especially in the online context. The study aimed to analyze how different social e...

Social media tends to gather users around social cliques consisting of similar-minded individuals and shared identities. These online group processes can have significant influence on user behavior, which is alarming when considering risky behaviors such as gambling. This study examined how online clique involvement predicts young people’s interest...

Problem gambling among young people is an emerging trend globally. The online environment in particular offers various possibilities for gambling engagement. This is the first cross-national survey study using the social ecological model to analyze problem gambling, especially in the online context. The aim was to analyze how different social ecolo...

Resumen Las políticas escolares están diseñadas para promover un clima escolar positivo, pero se sabe poco sobre su efectividad. Este estudio tiene como objetivo describir la relación entre la calidad de los documentos del plan de convivencia y las competencias socioemocionales, el acoso escolar y ciberacoso en los estudiantes. Este estudio ex post...

Some school policies are designed to promote a positive school climate, but little is known about their effectiveness. This study aims at describing the relation among the quality of school climate policy documents, social and emotional competencies, bullying and cyberbullying in students. This ex-post-facto cross-sectional and descriptive study wa...

Drugs are sold on both dark web services and on social media, but research investigating these drug purchases online is still emerging. The aim of this study is to analyze risk factors associated with buying drugs online. Utilizing theories of criminology and addiction research, it was hypothesized that social bonds, low levels of self-control, and...

Routine Activity Theory (RAT) and the general theory of crime have been widely employed to understand cybercrime victimization. However, there is a need to integrate these theoretical frameworks to better understand victimization from a cross-national perspective. A web-based survey was conducted among participants aged 15 to 25 years from the U.S....

La amplia literatura científica sugiere que en la adolescencia aumentan las conductas antisociales dentro y fuera de la escuela, incluso entre los estudiantes que hasta el momento habían tenido un comportamiento socialmente deseable. No obstante, el número de estudios que proporcionan una visión global sobre las conductas antisociales en estudiante...

The objective of this study was to examine if belonging to online communities and social media identity bubbles predict youth problem gambling. An online survey was administered to 15–25-year-old participants in the United States (N = 1212), South Korea (N = 1192), Spain (N = 1212), and Finland (N = 1200). The survey measured two dimensions of onli...

Information and communication technologies provide a new context for interpersonal relationships, learning and professional activities. Nevertheless, there are several risks related to technology use, including compulsive Internet use. Even though compulsive Internet use has been identified as an important problem behavior in young people, there ar...

It has previously been hypothesized that individuals with elevated attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) symptoms are at greater risk of bullying perpetration and victimization. Using autoregressive latent trajectory models with structured residuals (ALT-SR) and four waves (ages 11, 13, 15, and 17) of longitudinal data from the normative...

Although bullying and cyberbullying have been widely studied in diverse geographical areas, the number of studies in isolated regions, located in rainforests such as the Peruvian Amazonia, is low. Most research has been conducted in wealthy, Western countries, although disadvantaged areas are usually the most affected by various problems. Thus, the...

Decreasing violence is an important objective for the society. Although the topic has been addressed in different studies, most of them are cross-sectional, focus on one context or include few variables. This research aims to investigate to what extent moral disengagement and victimization are risk factors, and empathy and social and emotional comp...

Antisocial behaviors in adolescents are present and prevalent around the world and have harmful consequences for individuals and societies. The research focused on antisocial behaviors in young people has been very fruitful, but studies are usually fragmented and focused on specific problem behaviors either in school or outside of school. Although...

Illicit drugs are sold online. Besides cryptomarkets, young people today are also using social media to buy and sell different drugs. The aim of this nationwide study was to investigate the phenomenon of buying drugs from social media among American young people. Relatively few studies have investigated young people buying drugs online and, therefo...

Little is known about the relation between parental morality induction, moral functioning in children and children’s involvement in bullying and cyberbullying. This study aimed at advancing knowledge on parenting practices regarding morality induction. The Perceived Parental Moral Disengagement Induction Questionnaire was designed and validated. Th...

Inclusive education is a new pedagogical vision of the education system that fosters social cohesion and equality. There are numerous political initiatives to implement inclusive education in different educational stages, including university. However, the scope of these initiatives and the influence of the change agents, university faculty, are st...

Research shows identifying with online peer groups influences youth perceptions and behaviors contrarily to offline peer groups. Youths are active Internet users and easily find similar others to connect with online. Concurrently, gambling has increased in popularity among young individuals globally. Employing a social identity perspective, an onli...

Background: Desirable interpersonal interactions require literacy competence and social and emotional competencies, which are closely related to empathy. This study aimed to investigate whether social and emotional competencies and empathy predict literacy competence in Primary Education, assessing students’ socio-educational characteristics. Met...

This paper examines cross-national commonalities and differences in online hate speech content, exposure, and emotional reaction. Using online surveys from 18 to 25-year-old respondents in six countries, we find a majority of respondents were exposed to online hate in the preceding 3 months. Commonalities across countries are the platform where the...

It has previously been hypothesised that individuals with elevated ADHD symptoms are at greater risk of bullying perpetration and victimisation; however, a lack of high-quality longitudinal data has meant that this hypothesis is yet to be adequately tested. Using autoregressive latent trajectory models with structured residuals (ALT-SR) and three w...

We evaluated the factor structure, reliability, and discriminative capacity of the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS) questionnaire in four different samples: two general adult populations (N = 1,548, N = 964), one adolescent population (N = 1,044), and young people with depressive symptomatology (N = 307). Exploratory factor analyses (E...

Artykuł prezentuje wyniki badań na temat zjawiska występowania bullyingu i cyberbullyingu wśród dzieci i młodzieży w Polsce i Hiszpanii. W pierwszej części artykułu dokonano charakterystyki zagadnienia, oprócz genezy i definicji terminów oraz omówienia natury zjawiska zwrócono uwagę na negatywne konsekwencje, jakie pociąga za sobą tego rodzaju prze...

Social and emotional competencies have gained importance given their relation with high prosocial behavior and low violence. Social Networking Sites have become a key context for adolescents’ interpersonal relationships. Thus, it could be useful to discover if social and emotional competencies are expressed differently when using electronic devices...

Early childhood is a crucial period for the development of social and emotional competencies. Researchers point out that teachers need to have a high level of social and emotional competencies to enhance these competencies in their students but the number of programs to promote these competencies in pre-service teachers is small. The objective of t...

Aims: To examine the continuing role of daily popular social media use in youth hazardous alcohol consumption in four countries across continents. Methods: A web-based survey was given to youths aged 15-25 in the USA (n = 1212), South Korea (n = 1192), Finland (n = 1200) and Spain (n = 1212). Hazardous alcohol use (alcohol use disorders identifi...

RESUMEN Estudios científicos muestran que las competencias socioemocionales en los docentes se relacionan con el éxito educativo del alumnado. Tanto la UNESCO como la OCDE señalan que para que se dé una formación integral deben desarrollarse tanto áreas académicas como sociales y emocionales. Hay iniciativas políticas para incluir las competencias...

Information and communication technologies are used in education, leisure and working spaces. In those contexts, individuals interact through electronic devices daily, usually for several hours. Individuals and groups communicate, learn and work through cyberspace. They feel, think, act and make decisions while interacting online. Social and emotio...

Cybercrime involves offending act directed at individuals using computers and computer networks as mediating tools. Offending acts may range from cyberstalking and cyber harassment to hate crimes, identity theft, fraud, sexual and violent threats. Previous work on cybercrime victimization has been done predominantly from the perspective of Routine...

Involvement in bullying perpetration or victimization could be risk factors for perpetration or victimization in early romantic relationships that emerge within an evolving peer group. Nevertheless, research on this topic is still in its early stages. This study was conducted to fill these gaps in knowledge through a comprehensive research synthesi...

Background: Youth are known to be susceptible to peer influence and behavior models set by others. Since the emergence of social media, young individuals have adapted and been active users of many of its platforms. Correspondingly, social influence and behavioral diffusion are now taking place through the virtual world. This has been connected to t...

Studies on bullying as a group process are crucial to understand the nature and dynamics of face-to-face bullying, but little is known about different types of bystanders in cyberbullying. This cross-national study was conducted in Colombia and Spain to describe different groups of bystanders in cyberbullying and to design and validate the Cyberbul...

You may access and read this article in the following link: https://sciencetrends.com/emotional-competency-communication-and-bullying-in-adolescent-technology-use/

Trajectories of stability and change in bullying roles were examined through a longitudinal prospective study of 916 school students followed up biannually from age 11 to 17. Perpetrators and victims had relatively stable trajectories with most of the children remaining in the same role over time or becoming uninvolved. Bully/victim was the most un...

Information and communication technologies can be used for prosocial and educational purposes but they can also be misused or abused. Although technology abuse is a serious problem among youth, the number of studies on risk and protective factors against this problem behavior is still low. Thus, our aim was to describe and analyze the relations bet...

Research on bullying and cyberbullying is advancing at the international level, but there are some geographic areas where the number of studies on these topics still needs to be increased. More research about bullying and cyberbullying is needed in Poland and validated questionnaires to measure these two aggressive behaviors could be useful. This s...

Many intervention programs are conducted in different countries in order to promote social and emotional learning. Nevertheless, the number of instruments to evaluate these competencies is still low, and core social and emotional competencies are rarely included in a single questionnaire and measured as a single construct. Thus, this study was cond...

Bullying has damaging short-term and long-term consequences. Research suggests that perpetrators have low empathy and high moral disengagement, but relations between these variables are unclear and are rarely integrated in a single study. Thus, the objective of this study was to discover if empathy and moral disengagement mechanisms were related to...

Bullying and cyberbullying are extremely damaging violent behaviors present in schools. A promising research line focuses on social and emotional competencies in relation to bullying and cyberbullying. The aim of this study was to describe social and emotional competencies in Spanish adolescents in relation to age and gender and to find out if the...

Bullying and cyberbullying are damaging aggressive behaviors in which some children and adolescents intentionally inflict frequent and long term harm on peers who become victimized. The number of studies on bullying is high and a lot of knowledge has already been gathered. Nevertheless, there are still many gaps in knowledge that need to be address...