TY - JOUR

T1 - I enjoy hurting my classmates

T2 - On the relation of boredom and sadism in schools

AU - Pfattheicher, Stefan

AU - Lazarević, Ljiljana B.

AU - Nielsen, Yngwie Asbjørn

AU - Westgate, Erin C.

AU - Krstić, Ksenija

AU - Schindler, Simon

N1 - This research was partially funded by the Velux Foundations ( PN38727 ) Publisher Copyright: © 2022 The Authors

PY - 2023/2/1

Y1 - 2023/2/1

N2 - Schools can be a place of both love and of cruelty. We examined one type of cruelty that occurs in the school context: sadism, that is, harming others for pleasure. Primarily, we proposed and tested whether boredom plays a crucial role in the emergence of sadistic actions at school. In two well-powered studies (N = 1038; student age range = 10-18 years) using both self- and peer-reports of students' boredom levels and their sadistic tendencies, we first document that sadistic behavior occurs at school, although at a low level. We further show that those students who are more often bored at school are more likely to engage in sadistic actions (overall r = .36, 95% CI [0.24, 0.49]). In sum, the present work contributes to a better understanding of sadism in schools and points to boredom as one potential motivator. We discuss how reducing boredom might help to prevent sadistic tendencies at schools.

AB - Schools can be a place of both love and of cruelty. We examined one type of cruelty that occurs in the school context: sadism, that is, harming others for pleasure. Primarily, we proposed and tested whether boredom plays a crucial role in the emergence of sadistic actions at school. In two well-powered studies (N = 1038; student age range = 10-18 years) using both self- and peer-reports of students' boredom levels and their sadistic tendencies, we first document that sadistic behavior occurs at school, although at a low level. We further show that those students who are more often bored at school are more likely to engage in sadistic actions (overall r = .36, 95% CI [0.24, 0.49]). In sum, the present work contributes to a better understanding of sadism in schools and points to boredom as one potential motivator. We discuss how reducing boredom might help to prevent sadistic tendencies at schools.

KW - Aggression

KW - Boredom

KW - Bullying

KW - HEXACO

KW - Multitrait-multimethod

KW - Sadism

KW - Schools

KW - Psychology

KW - Social Work and Social Pedagogics

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85146364655&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.jsp.2022.10.008

DO - 10.1016/j.jsp.2022.10.008

M3 - Journal articles

C2 - 36641224

AN - SCOPUS:85146364655

VL - 96

SP - 41

EP - 56

JO - Journal of School Psychology

JF - Journal of School Psychology

SN - 0022-4405

ER -