The relationship between childhood maltreatment and adolescents' cyberbullying victimization: The new phenomenon of a "cycle of victimization"

Background: The research community is showing an increasing concern about the adverse out-comes of childhood maltreatment for adolescents. However, whether childhood maltreatment is associated with cyberbullying victimization and what the underlying mechanisms of this rela-tionship are remain to be identified. Objective: We aimed to examine the relationship between childhood maltreatment and cyber-bullying victimization and whether self-compassion and fear of missing out (FoMO) can simul-taneously moderate this relationship among adolescents. Participants and setting: A sample of 1025 Chinese adolescents (50.8 % male participants, age = 15.50 +/- 0.52 years) completed questionnaires regarding childhood maltreatment, cyberbullying victimization, self-compassion, and FoMO.Methods: Our hypotheses were tested by correlation analysis and Model 3 of the PROCESS macro. Results: Childhood maltreatment significantly predicted adolescents' cyberbullying victimization (beta = 0.28, p < .001). High self-compassion weakened the relationship between childhood maltreatment and cyberbullying victimization (beta =-0.10, p < .001). Furthermore, self -compassion and FoMO simultaneously interacted with childhood maltreatment to predict cyberbullying victimization (beta = 0.08, p < .001). Specifically, high FoMO weakened the moderating effect of self-compassion on the relationship between childhood maltreatment and cyberbullying victimization. Childhood maltreatment significantly predicted cyberbullying victimization among adolescents high in FoMO, regardless of self-compassion levels. In contrast, childhood maltreatment non-significantly predicted cyberbullying victimization when adoles-cents were high in self-compassion and low in FoMO. Conclusions: Childhood maltreatment is positively associated with cyberbullying victimization. Moreover, increasing self-compassion and decreasing FoMO can mitigate the effect of childhood maltreatment on cyberbullying victimization.