Bullying/victimization experiences, post-traumatic stress disorder, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescent students

Bullying/victimization experiences, post-traumatic stress disorder, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescent students | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Research Article Bullying/victimization experiences, post-traumatic stress disorder, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescent students Vassiliki Makrydaki, Eleni Andreou This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-6769677/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract The present study was designed to investigate the association between post-traumatic stress, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescents involved in bullying incidents at school. It also examined whether there are differences between: a) boys and girls and b) victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and students non-involved in bullying, in terms of levels of post-traumatic stress, resilience and self-compassion. A total of 658 students, 277 boys (42%) and 381 girls (58%), attending the first grade of 17 different high schools in Thessaly, Greece, participated in the study by completing a series of self-report questionnaires. The results indicated higher scores for girls compared to boys on PTSD, “self-efficacy and ability to achieve” (sub-scale of mental resilience) and “self-kindness” (sub-scale of self-compassion). Moreover, victims and bully/victims showed higher levels of PTSD compared to bullies, observers and students non-involved in bullying. Observers showed higher levels of mental resilience compared to victims and bully/victims. Observer and non-involved students showed higher levels of self-compassion compared to victims and bully/victims. Finally, mental resilience was positively correlated to self-compassion and PTSD was negatively correlated to mental resilience and self-compassion. These findings may significantly contribute toward designing interventions for strengthening mental resilience and cultivating self-compassion to address bullying. bullying/victimization adolescents PTSD mental resilience self-compassion Introduction According to the well-known definition, school bullying refers to the implicit and repeated aggression by one student (bully) against another student (victim), between whom there is an inequality of power (Juvonen & Graham, 2014 ; Olweus, 1993 ). Forms of school bullying are verbal (e.g., name-calling), physical (e.g., kicking and hitting), relational (e.g., rumor spreading and social exclusion) and cyberbullying through messages and/or social media posts (Olweus et al., 2019 ; Rettew & Pawlowski, 2016 ). Revised definition of school bullying and cyberbullying refers to the damaging social process that is characterized by an imbalance of power driven by social norms (O'Higgins Norman et al., 2024 ). This implies the absence of effective response and care from peers and/or adults to victims and the involvement of perpetrators in bullying because of group dynamics rather than their intention to harm the victim. Additionally, bullying is repeated, but repetition is not only linked to the number of times that incidents of bullying occur, but it also relates to the effect on the victim who may fear that a once-off event might be repeated or re-shared online. Finally, bullying manifests as an unwanted interpersonal behavior among students that causes physical, social, and emotional harm to the victim(s) and the wider school community (O'Higgins Norman et al., 2024 ). PTSD in Victims and Bully/victims Indicatively, some negative consequences identified for victims include high levels of anxiety (Garnefski & Kraaij, 2014 ; Valera-Pozo et al., 2021 ), social phobia and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Andreou et al., 2021 ; Kurniawan et al., 2022 ; Makrydaki et al., 2024 ; Moore et al., 2017 ). PTSD concerns a specific pattern of symptoms as a result of the traumatic event, such as re-experiencing trauma memories, avoidance of cues that remind the individual of the trauma, negative emotions and thoughts, and hyperarousal (APA, 2013). PTSD symptoms later in victims’ lives suggest that bullying is a form of interpersonal trauma (Evans et al., 2017). In particular, Idsoe et al. ( 2021 ) suggest that Developmental Trauma Disorder and Complex PTSD capture better the complexity of the symptoms associated with bullying than PTSD. The level of PTSD symptoms among the bullied children is high, especially within the groups of girls and bully/victims (Idsoe et al., 2012 ). The research on bullying makes a distinction between victims and bully/victims, youth who involved in both perpetration and victimization. In particular, Kennedy ( 2021 ) highlights that there is significant diversity within the group of youth who experience both perpetration and victimization in relation to trauma symptoms, i.e. youth, aged 5 to 17 years, who involved equally in high rates of perpetration and victimization experienced more trauma symptoms than the victimization predominant bully/victims, the aggression predominant bully/victims and the bully/victims who only occasionally involved in perpetration and victimization. However, other research does not support gender differences in PTSD (Andreou et al., 2021 ) or differences between victims and bully/victims (Andreou et al., 2021 ; Sterzing et al., 2020 ). Self-compassion in Victims and Bully/victims The results from a longitudinal design study showed that stressful bullying victimization weakens self-compassion, leading to trauma-related shame, thus influencing college students to exhibit more cyber aggression and less prosocial behavior (Xu et al., 2024 ). However, this study did not examine the differences between bullying victimization roles (e.g. victims, bully/victims). Adolescent victims with low self-compassion are more likely to experience feelings of anxiety (Chu et al., 2018 ). Even though a great deal of the literature on school bullying has focused on negative consequences for victims and bully/victims, such as PTSD, a growing body of literature has paid attention to victims’self-compassion. Self-compassion entails being kind and understanding toward oneself in instances of pain or failure rather than being harshly self-critical, perceiving one’s experiences as part of the larger human experience rather than seeing them as separating and isolating, and holding painful thoughts and feelings in balanced awareness rather than over-identifying with them (Neff, 2003 ). Self-criticism is a strong predictor of the role of victim of bullying, i.e. the adolescent with a high level of self-criticism explains to himself/herself the experience of bullying as his/her own fault, especially the self is seen as defective, inappropriate and undesirable, therefore he/she is less likely to be able to overcome the position of the victim (Zăbavă, 2020 ). One possible explanation of the negative association between bullying and self-compassion is that growing up in a hostile peer environment may hinder the development of self-compassion and erode the capacity of treating oneself kindly (Múzquiz et al., 2023 ). On the other hand, adolescents with higher levels of self-compassion show kindness toward themselves, understand their victimization experiences rather than harshly criticizing or blaming themselves and cope more successfully with painful thoughts and feelings resulting from victimization, i.e., self-compassion is an adaptive coping mode (e.g., positive cognitive restructuring) (Chu et al., 2018 ). Similarly, university students, former victims of bullying, with high self-compassion feel less shame about the experience of bullying victimization in adulthood (Beduna & Perrone-McGovern, 2019 ). In addition, a longitudinal study found that self-compassion mediates the relationship between victimization and depression in victims, i.e., victims with greater self-compassion treat themselves better when they are bullied (Yan et al., 2022 ), but this research is limited to victimized adolescents from China, who lived in rural areas with their grandparents. Mental resilience in Victims and Bully/victims Research has shown that children and adolescents with a higher level of resilience experience fewer symptoms of anxiety under bullying victimization, i.e. resilience plays a prominent mediating role in the association between bullying victimization and anxiety (Fang et al., 2022 ). Resilience is a dynamic process of effectively negotiating, adapting to, or managing significant sources of stress or trauma (Rutter, 2006 ). Concerning resilience, boys reported higher levels than girls (Andreou et al., 2020 ; Saaduddin et al., 2023 ) and bully/victims were found to be less resilient compared to victims and bullies (Bunnett, 2021 ). Švecová et al. ( 2023 ) supported that the protective effect of resilience was moderated by bullying in several types of psychopathology; specifically, the respondents who were bullied had higher scores in somatization, obsessive-compulsive disorder, interpersonal sensitivity, depression and psychoticism. On the other hand, a longitudinal study found that adolescents who have experienced bullying, both as victims and bully/victims, usually have a higher risk of depression and suicidal thoughts and that resilience can offer protection against depression (Lin et al., 2022 ). Moreover, victims’ perceived social/family support and interpersonal assistance (Fang et al., 2022 ; Makrydaki et al., 2024 ) and their personal assets, such as emotional regulation (Fang et al., 2022 ), social competence, structured style, self-reliance, and optimism about the future, seemed to act as a counterbalance to the traumatic victimization they experienced and as an essential protective factor against PTSD (Makrydaki et al., 2024 ). Additionally, self-esteem affects the resilience of students who are victims of bullying, i.e. students with high self-esteem are more able to face challenges and failures and confident in overcoming difficulties (Saaduddin et al., 2023 ; Sapouna & Wolke, 2013 ). Moreover, self-efficacy, social support and resilience were found to partially mediate the effect of previous bullying experience on current well-being and mental illness in university students from China and Germany (Lin et al., 2020 ). As it is evident, a large number of studies have focused on former victims of school bullying concerning their mental resilience (e.g. Lin et al., 2020 ; Makrydaki et al., 2024 ; Švecová et al., 2023 ) and self-compassion (e.g. Beduna & Perrone-McGovern, 2019 ; Xu et al., 2024 ). Although a clear moderating effect of resilience on the relationship between students’ victimization and well-being cannot be claimed (Andreou et al., 2020 ), resilience has been linked to other positive outcomes after the bullying experience. To the authors’ knowledge, only one study has investigated the association between bullying victimization, mental resilience and self-compassion in students, which is limited to 130 junior high school participants of two schools in Bangkok metropolitan area, with females constituting the majority of the sample (Bowornkittikun et al., 2021 ). The Present Study The present quantitative study was designed to address the above gaps in the literature by exploring holistically the association between post-traumatic stress, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescents involved in bullying incidents at school. It also examined whether there are differences between: a) boys and girls and b) victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and students non-involved in bullying, in terms of levels of post-traumatic stress, resilience and self-compassion. Ιt was expected a negative association between PTSD symptoms, mental resilience, and self-compassion. Moreover, it was hypothesized that girls would experience higher levels of PTSD symptoms than boys (Idsoe et al., 2012 ), while boys would experience higher levels of mental resilience and self-compassion than girls (e.g. Andreou et al., 2020 ; Saaduddin et al., 2023 ). Victims and bully/victims were also expected to experience more PTSD symptoms than other groups of students (Anderou et al., 2021; Sterzing et al., 2020 ), while non-involved students to exhibit higher levels of mental resilience and self-compassion than the other groups of students (Bunnett, 2021 ). Method Participants A total of 658 students, 277 boys (42%) and 381 girls (58%), attending the first grade of 17 different high schools in Thessaly, Greece, participated in the study by completing a series of self-report questionnaires. 30% of the participants (Ν = 196) were identified as victims by their responses regarding frequency of reported physical and verbal bullying, harassment and theft of personal belongings at school, 9% (N = 56) as bullies, 19% (N = 127) as bully/victims, 27% (N = 180) observers and, 15% (N = 99) as non-involved in bully/victim higher levels of incidents. Measures School bullying : The questionnaire “Exposure to Aggression and Violence incidents at School, in the Neighborhood and at Home Checklist” developed by Makri-Botsari ( 2010 ) was used to explore bullying experiences. The scale consists of 75 multiple-choice questions which explore experiences of aggressive/violent behaviors that someone has either received as a victim, or manifested as bully against others, or witnessed as an observer at school, at home and in the neighborhood. Responses were related to the frequency [4-point scale; never (0), only once (1), sometimes (2), often (3)] with which students involve in physical (e.g., “How often have you been badly beaten up at your school?”), verbal attacks (e.g.,“At your school, how often have you been verbally or emotionally abused or insulted and made to feel afraid or uncomfortable?”) and in actions such as theft of personal belongings (e.g.,“Have you been robbed at school?”). For the purposes of this study, we were only interested in frequency of participants’ involvement in bullying (aggression/violence) incidents at school as victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and non-involved students. Students were classified, following the procedure used by Dodge et al. ( 1997 ), into four groups: 1) low bully and high victim–victim only group, 2) high bully and low victim–bully only group, 3) high bully and high victim–bully/victim group, and 4) low bully and low victim–not involved group. Specifically, a respondent is considered a victim if they report being bullied in one or more of the above ways “ sometimes ” or “ often ”. Moreover, a respondent is considered a bully if they report having bullied others in one or more of the above ways “ sometimes ” or “ often ”. A respondent is considered a bully/victim if they report both being bullied and having bullied others in one or more of the above ways “ sometimes ” or “ often ”. A respondent is considered as not to be involved if they do not mention at all that they have been bullied or have bullied others or observed bullying incidents. Finally, students were classified as observers, following the procedure used by Makri-Botsari ( 2010 ): a respondent is considered as observer if they report having observed physical and/or verbal bullying incidents “ sometimes ” or “ often ”in the relevant 8 items of the questionnaire. For this sample, the internal consistency of the sub-scales, as defined by the Makri-Botsari ( 2010 ), was strong: a) victims’ group (Cronbach’s alpha = .78), b) bullies’ group (Cronbach’s alpha = .85) and c) observers’ group (Cronbach’s alpha = .83). Post-traumatic stress disorder symptomatology : Symptoms of PTSD were assessed using the Children’s Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder-Reaction Index (CPTSD-RI) (Pynoos et al., 1987 ), which was adapted in Greek by Kolaitis et al. ( 2011 ). The questionnaire contains 20 questions that compose three factors: “intrusiveness/numbing/avoidance”, “fear/anxiety symptoms” and “disturbances in sleep and concentration”. Items are rated on a 4-point scale ranging from none of the time (0) to most of the time (4). Higher scores indicate more severe PTSD symptoms. In the present study, an exploratory factor analysis was conducted (using Principal Component Analysis) and suggested three factors:1) “intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal” (12 items, e.g., “Repeated, disturbing, and unwanted memories of the bullying experience?”), 2) “negative rumination”, i.e. negative changes in cognitive functions/disposition resulting from "intentional" thinking, not from intrusive thinking (5 items, e.g., “Feeling very scared or upset when you thinking about bullying experience?”) and 3) “changes in daily life”, such as disturbances in sleep and concentration (3 items e.g., “Loss of interest in activities that you used to enjoy after the school bullying incident(s)?”). The overall Cronbach’s alpha was strong (.89). The internal consistency of the sub-scales was: Cronbach’s alpha = .91 for “intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal”, .71 for “negative rumination”, and .52 for “changes in daily life”. Mental resilience An adapted version of the Resilience Scale (Wagnild & Young, 1993) modified by Neill and Dias ( 2001 ) and translated into Greek by Leontopoulou ( 2010 ) was used to measure mental resilience. The scale consists of 15 items that are positively worded and responses ranged from agree (1) to disagree (7). An exploratory factor analysis was conducted (using Principal Component Analysis) and suggested two factors; 1) “personal strength and structured style” (9 items, e.g. “I have self-discipline”) and 2) “self-efficacy and ability to achieve” (6 items, e.g. “Manage one way or other”). In the present study, the overall Cronbach’s alpha was strong .92. The internal consistency of the sub-scales was also strong (Cronbach’s alpha = .89 for “personal strength and structured style” and .83 for “self-efficacy and ability to achieve”). Self-compassion Participants were given the Greek version of the 26-item Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) (Neff, 2003 ) which was translated by Mantzios et al. ( 2015 ). The SCS includes the 5 item “self-kindness” sub-scale, the 5-item “self-judgment” sub-scale, the 4-item “common humanity” sub-scale, the 4-item “isolation” sub-scale, the 4-item “mindfulness” sub-scale and the 4-item “over identification” sub-scale. Responses are given on a 5-point scale almost never (1) to almost always (5). Mean scores on the six sub-scales are then averaged (after reverse-coding negative items) to create an overall self-compassion score ranging from 26 to 130. Higher scores indicate higher levels of self-compassion. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted (using Principal Component Analysis) and suggested four factors; 1) “self-judgment” (13 items, e.g. “I'm disapproving and judgmental about my own flaws and inadequacies”), 2) “self-kindness” (6 items e.g. “I try to be loving towards myself when I'm feeling emotional pain”), 3) “common humanity” (4 items, e.g. “When I'm down and out, I remind myself that there are lots of other people in the world feeling like I am”) and 4) “mindfulness” (3 items, e.g. “When something upsets me, I try to keep my emotions in balance”). In the present study, the overall Cronbach’s alpha was strong (.79). The internal consistency of the sub-scales was also strong, .91 for “self-judgment”, .82 for “self-kindness” and.72 “common humanity”, except from “mindfulness” .65, because of 3 items. Design An invitation letter was sent to school principals requesting participation of students in the study. The letter fully explained to principals and teachers the purpose of the study. The educational staff of each school that was interested and agreed, communicated with the researchers and arranged an in-person meeting between teachers, students and researchers in order to inform the students about the research purpose. The parents (and their children) who were interested also read and signed a consent form, which briefly explained the rationale of the research and informed them about their children’s anonymity. Data were collected online in the computer lab of each school. Ethical approval was obtained by the responsible Ethics Committee. Αll the statistical analysis was performed using IBM SPSS Statistics 26. Firstly, One – Way ANOVAs were conducted to examine differences in PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion scores between boys and girls. One – Way ANOVAs were also conducted to examine differences in PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion scores among victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and students not involved in bullying incidents. Pearson’s correlations were subsequently run to investigate relations between PTSD symptoms, mental resilience and self-compassion. Results Gender Differences As shown in Table 1 , statistically significant differences in the overall PTSD scale (η 2 = .02) and its sub-scales, “intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal” (η 2 = .02), and “negative rumination” (η 2 = .05) between boys and girls were found, with girls exhibiting statistically significant more symptoms than boys. On the sub-scale of mental resilience, “self-efficacy and ability to achieve”, girls showed higher scores (η 2 = .02) compared to boys. Moreover, girls showed higher scores (η 2 = .01) compared to boys on the sub-scale of self-compassion, “self-kindness”. Boys showed higher scores in the overall self-compassion scale (η 2 = .02), as well as on its’ sub-scale, “self-judgment”, (η 2 = .05) compared to girls. Table 1 Means and SDs for group differences between boys and girls on PTSD symptoms, mental resilience and self-compassion Measure Total (N = 658) Boys (N = 277) Girls (N = 381) F (1,656) η 2 M SD M SD M SD Post-traumatic stress 38.45 12.41 36.35 11.50 39.97 12.84 13.92* .02 Intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal 19.40 8.61 18.03 7.50 20.39 9.21 12.26* .02 Negative rumination 10.93 3.69 9.92 3.42 11.66 3.71 37.40* .05 Changes in daily life 8.13 3.11 8.40 3.31 7.93 2.94 3.75 .01 Mental resilience 80.53 16.74 79.92 19.65 80.97 14.27 .64 .00 Personal strength and structured style 46.59 11.22 47.14 12.36 46.20 10.32 1.13 .00 Self-efficacy, ability to achieve 33.94 6.68 32.78 8.11 34.78 5.26 14.63* .02 Self-compassion 77.35 13.84 79.36 10.15 75.89 15.85 10.23* .02 Self-judgment 41.08 12.19 44.18 11.23 38.83 12.38 32.37* .05 Self-kindness 16.86 5.64 16.16 5.73 17.37 5.53 7.39* .01 Common humanity 10.65 3.84 10.34 3.98 10.87 3.73 3.08 .01 Mindfulness 8.76 3.04 8.68 3.17 8.82 2.95 .36 .00 * p < .05. Differentiation of Bully and Victim Groupings As shown in Table 2 , statistically significant differences in the overall PTSD scale (η 2 = .15) and its sub-scales, “intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal” (η 2 = .12), “negative rumination” (η 2 = .11), and “changes in daily life” (η 2 = .06) between the five groups of students were found. Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that victims showed higher overall PTSD than bullies (p = .00), observers (p = .00) and students not involved (p = .00). Similarly, Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that bully/victims showed higher overall PTSD than bullies (p = .00), observers (p = .00) and students not involved (p = .00). Moreover, Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that victims showed more “intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal” than bullies (p = .05), observers (p = .00) and students not involved (p = .00). They also revealed that bully/victims showed more “intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal” than bullies (p = .00), observers (p = .00) and the students not involved (p = .00). Additionally, Bonferroni’s comparisons revealed higher “negative rumination” for victims compared to bullies (p = .00), observers (p = .00) and students not involved (p = .00) and higher “negative rumination” for bully/victims compared to bullies (p = .00), observers (p = .00) and students not involved (p = .00). Finally, they showed that victims, bullies, bully/victims and observers had more “changes in daily life” than the students not involved (p < .05). Statistically significant differences in overall mental resilience (η 2 = .04) and its sub-scales, “personal strength and structured style” (η 2 = .04), and “self-efficacy and ability to achieve” (η 2 = .04) were found among the five groups of students. Specifically, Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that victims (p = .01) and bully/victims (p = .00) had lower overall mental resilience than observers. They also revealed that victims (p = .00) and bully/victims (p = .00) had lower “personal strength and structured style” than observers. Finally, bullies (p = .00), bully/victims (p = .00), and students not involved (p = .00) had lower“self-efficacy and ability to achieve” than observers. Statistically significant differences in overall self-compassion (η 2 = .06) and its sub-domains, “self-judgment” (η 2 = .07), and “self-kindness” (η 2 = .02) were found among the five groups of students. Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that bully/victims scored significantly lower on overall self-compassion than bullies (p = .04). Victims (p = .00) and bully/victims (p = .00) scored significantly lower on overall self-compassion than observers. Finally, victims (p = .00) and bully/victims (p = .00) scoredsignificantly lower on overall self-compassion than students not involved. Moreover, Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that bullies scored significantly higher on “self-judgment” than victims (p = .02), victims significantly lower than observers (p = .00) and students not involved significantly higher than victims (p = .00) and bully/victims (p = .00). Finally, Bonferroni’s comparisons showed that observers had higher scores on “self-kindness” than bully/victims (p = .01). Associations between PTSD symptoms, mental resilience and self-compassion Αs shown in Table 3 overall mental resilience was positively correlated to overall self-compassion and its sub-scales “self-kindness”, “common humanity” and “mindfulness”. The sub-scale of mental resilience, “personal strength and structured style”, was significantly positively associated to overall self-compassion and its four sub-scales. Moreover, the sub-scale of mental resilience, “self-efficacy and ability to achieve”, was also significantly positively associated to the overall self-compassion and its sub-scales “self-kindness”, “common humanity” and “mindfulness”. Additionally, the sub-scale of PTSD, “changes in daily life”, was also significantly positively associated to overall mental resilience, and its two sub-scales. The sub-scale of PTSD, “negative rumination”, was also significantly positively associated to mental resilience sub-scale, “self-efficacy and ability to achieve”. PTSD sub-scales, “negative rumination” and “changes in daily life”, were also significantly positively associated to self-compassion sub-scales, “self-kindness”, “common humanity” and “mindfulness”. Finally, overall PTSD was also significantly positively associated to the self-compassion sub-scale, “common humanity”. Overall PTSD was negatively correlated to overall mental resilience scale and its sub-scale “personal strength and structured style”. Moreover, overall PTSD was negatively correlated to overall self-compassion and its sub-scale, “self-judgment”. The sub-scale of PTSD, “intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal”, was negatively correlated to overall mental resilience and its two sub-scales. The sub-scale of PTSD, “negative rumination”, was negatively correlated to mental resilience sub-scale, “personal strength and structured style”. The sub-scales of PTSD, “intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal” and “negative rumination”, were negatively correlated to overall self-compassion and its sub-scale, “self-judgment”. The sub-scale of PTSD, “changes in daily life”, was negatively correlated to self-compassion sub-scale, “self-judgment”. Finally, the sub-scale of mental resilience, “self-efficacy and ability to achieve”, was negatively correlated to self-compassion sub-scale, “self-judgment”. Table 3 Correlations (Pearson r) between post-traumatic stress, mental resilience and self-compassion in terms of total scores and their individual factors 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 1. Post-traumatic stress 1.00 2. Intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal .94 ** 1.00 3. Negative rumination .84 ** .71 ** 1.00 4. Changes in daily life .40 ** .13 ** .19 ** 1.00 5. Mental resilience − .13** − .25 ** − .05 .20 ** 1.00 6. Personal strength and structured style − .19** − .29 ** − .13 ** .17 ** .96 ** 1.00 7. Self-efficacy, ability to achieve − .01 − .13 ** .11 ** .21 ** .89 ** .73 ** 1.00 8. Self-compassion − .32 ** − .35 ** − .31 ** .04 .42 ** .50 ** .22 ** 1.00 9. Self-judgment − .42 ** − .38 ** − .46 ** − .09 * .01 .10 * − .15 ** .64 ** 1.00 10. Self-kindness .02 − .05 .08 * .11 ** .51 ** .51 ** .43 ** .56 ** − .21 ** 1.00 11. Common humanity .11 ** .05 .17 ** .12 ** .37 ** .35 ** .33 ** .37 ** − .37 ** .66 ** 1.00 12. Mindfulness .04 − .05 .09 * .19 ** .48 ** .47 ** .42 ** .47 ** − .23 ** .68 ** .65 ** 1.00 Note: *p < .05 (2-tailed), **p < .01 (2-tailed). 1: Post-traumatic stress, 2: Intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal, 3: Negative rumination, 4: Changes in daily life, 5: Mental resilience, 6: Personal strength and structured style, 7: Self-efficacy, ability to achieve, 8: Self-compassion, 9: Self-judgment, 10: Self-kindness, 11: Common humanity, 12: Mindfulness. Discussion This study extends prior research by examining factors associated with adolescents' bullying victimization, PTSD, resilience, and self-compassion. More specifically, the present study aimed to a) examine gender and students’ roles (i.e. victim, bully, bully/victim, observer, not involved) differences on PTSD, resilience, and self-compassion; and b) investigate the association between PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescents involved in bullying incidents at school. Concerning gender differences, in line with evidence from previous studies (Idsoe et al., 2012 ), girls exhibited greater PTSD symptoms, “intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal”, and“negative rumination”than boys. One possible explanation is that emotional responses may be conditioned by gender identity, where boys tend to show themselves as less affected by what happens. Concerning self-compassion, boys reported higher levels than girls. This result is partly consistent with those of Yan et al. ( 2022 ) concerning that only males were found to reduce depression levels through self-compassion. Yan et al. ( 2022 ) supported that when females experience bullying, they may blame themselves and therefore cannot further suppress depression symptoms through self-compassion. Nevertheless, the present study showed that boys reported higher “self-judgment”compared to girls, and that girls showed higher “self-kindness” scores. Additionally, in contrast with previous literature (Andreou et al., 2020 ; Saaduddin et al., 2023 ), girls reported higher levels of mental resilience, especially “self-efficacy and ability to achieve”, compared to boys. Therefore, the relevant hypothesis is disproved. We propose one hypothesis to explain these results: both boys and girls are negatively affected, but differently, by the experience of bullying and cope differently with its negative effect. Specifically, when PTSD symptoms have been upsetting girls enough, but without causing them dysfunction, they utilize adaptive coping styles, such as mental resilience, “belief in self-efficacy” and “self-kindness”, in order to deal with them. Besides, self-efficacy and resilience partially mediate the effect of bullying experience on mental illness (Lin et al., 2020 ). On the other hand, exposure to bullying may enhance boys’ “self-judgment” and hinder their capacity of treating themselves kindly (see Múzquiz et al., 2023 ), so they try to counterbalance the self-judgment attitude through other aspects of self-compassion, such as perceiving their difficulties as part of the larger school community experience and/or holding painful thoughts and feelings in balanced awareness. Concerning PTSD symptoms, “intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal”, “negative rumination”, “changes in daily life”, our findings are in line with evidence from previous studies (Idsoe et al., 2012 ; Kennedy, 2021 ) victims and bully/victims reported higher levels than bullies, observers and students not involved. In other words, bully/victims are similar to victims regarding PTSD (see Andreou et al., 2021 ; Sterzing et al., 2020 ), and both seem to be the most burdened groups of students in terms of PTSD symptoms. Τhe above result is supported by the fact that firstly, observers showed higher mental resilience than victims and bully/victims, and secondly observers and students not involved had more self-compassion and/or “self-kindness” than victims and bully/victims. Additionally, bullies and observers showed higher levels of negative “changes in daily lives” compared to students not involved. Consequently, less involvement (Kennedy, 2021 ) or non-engagement in bullying incidents appeared to serve as a protective factor against PTSD symptoms. Moreover, less complex roles in bullying incidents appeared to be associated with higher self-compassion, i.e.bullies had more self-compassion than bully/victims. Similarly, Bunnett ( 2021 ) supported that bully/victims were found to be less resilientcompared to bullies. Our results also showed that bullies and observers reported higher “self-judgment” than victims. These findings are opposed to Zăbavă’s ( 2020 ) research evidence, according to which “self-judgment” is a strong predictor of the victim role. However, revised definition of school bullying highlighted that imbalance of power is due to social norms (O'Higgins Norman et al., 2024 ), i.e., bullies who are likely to bully for reasons related to group dynamics and observers who do not effectively intervene to bullying incidents are likely to be more self-critical of themselves than victims. Similarly, the high rates of “self-judgment” in students who do not engage in bullying may be linked to the emotional damage that bullying causes in the wider school community (see O'Higgins Norman et al., 2024 ). Moreover, our results confirmed the positive association between mental resilience and self-compassion, found in previous studies (Bowornkittikun et al., 2021 ). This suggests that adolescents with a high level of self-compassion are more likely to have a high level of resilience. Therefore, adolescents with more “personal strength, structured coping style”, “belief in their self-efficacy and ability to achieve” would demonstrate inner support regarding their experiences of bullying, successfully cope with painful thoughts and feelings and recognize that these thoughts and feelings connect rather than separate them from other peers. Additionally, our results showed that PTSD was negatively associated with mental resilience and self-compassion. Specifically, adolescents with higher level of self-compassion and resilience were more likely to experience fewer PTSD symptoms, and vice versa. As this finding is in accordance with previous evidence (Chu et al., 2018 ; Fang et al., 2022 ; Xu et al., 2024 ), it could be argued that involvement in bullying incidents that cause severe PTSD symptoms weaken students’ personal asserts, like self-compassion and resilience, while students’ improved ability to cope with difficult situations and maintain an attitude of kindness towards themselves contributes to the reduction of PTSD symptoms. On the other hand, our results showed that, despite the negative association between PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion, some of its sub-scales were positively correlated. This is consistent with past empirical studies found that negative consequences, like PTSD, and positive changes, such as resilience and post-traumatic growth, coexisted after the school bullying experience (Andreou et al., 2021 ; Makrydaki et al., 2024 ). Specifically, when students face a school life challenge, such as bullying, they get carried away by their negative thoughts and emotions, but also believe in their ability to confront the difficult situation. Additionally, students seem to experience negative thoughts and changes in their daily life, such as disturbances in sleep and concentration, loss of interest in activities they enjoyed before experiencing bullying, but they can recruit the three adaptive components of self-compassion tobalance the negative consequences. Finally, PTSD was negatively correlated to “self-judgment”. A possible explanation for the negative association between the two constructs is that girls, victims and bully/victims reported higher levels of PTSD symptoms than boys, bullies, observers and the students not involved, respectively, while boys, bullies and observers reported higher “self-judgment” than girls and victims, respectively. In other words, the negative association between PTSD and “self-judgment”, in the present study, maybe explained by the fact that “self-judgment” is linked with the male gender and the roles of bullies and observers, and PTSD is linked with the female gender and the roles of victims and bully/victims. Meanwhile, students’ high “self-efficacy, and ability to achieve” seem to act as counterbalance at the emergence of “self-judgment”. Findings from the current study shed light on the understanding of the traumatic dimension of the bullying experience and contributed to the very limited literature on school bullying regarding the association between mental resilience and self-compassion. Despite this, several limitations must be noted. Issues like frequency and types of victimization were not addressed in the current study as well as the moderation and mediation effects of PTSD and resilience to self-compassion. Future research should focus on investigating longitudinally the role of resilience and self-compassion in exploring positive and negative outcomes of school bullying. Conclusion In conclusion, resilience and self-compassion have shown to be effective protective factors against PTSD symptoms that occur due to school bullying. The above findings could be used in the counseling process with students who involved in bullying incidents and in intervention programs at school community level. It seems that enhancing mental resilience and self-compassion can help to address bullying. Specifically, considering the role of students in bullying and their gender, the goals of interventions may not be to target resistant symptoms or inner critical voice, but to enhance students’ mental resilience and self-kindness. Abbreviations PTSD post-traumatic stress disorder Declarations Declarations Ethics Approval and Consent to Participate Approval for the study was obtained from the University of Thessaly Research Ethics Committee. Written informed consent was obtained from the parents and legal guardians. All students consent to participate in the study. Consent for Publication Not applicable. Funding: The research is conducted in the operating framework of the University of Thessaly Innovation, Technology Transfer Unit and Entrepreneurship Center "One Planet Thessaly", under the “Scholarship Grants to University of Thessaly Doctoral Candidates” and is funded by the Special Account of Research Grants of the University of Thessaly. Author Contribution All authors reviewed the manuscript. Acknowledgement The authors wish to express their gratitude to all the students, parents, teachers, and school principals who enabled the research process. 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Journal of Interpersonal Violence , 35 (5–6), 1311–1333. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886260517696864 Švecová, J., Furstova, J., Kaščáková, N., Hašto, J., & Tavel, P. (2023). The effect of childhood trauma and resilience on psychopathology in adulthood: Does bullying moderate the associations? BMC Psychology , 11 (1), 230–342. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40359-023-01270-8 Valera-Pozo, M., Flexas, A., Servera, M., Aguilar-Mediavilla, E., & Adrover-Roig, D. (2021). Long-term profiles of bullying victims and aggressors: a retrospective study. Frontiers in Psychology , 12 , 631276. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.631276 Walgnild, G., & Young, H. (1993). Development and psychometric evaluation of the Resilience Scale. Journal of Nursing Measurement , 1 (2), 165–178. Xu, X., Li, Y., Liu, S., & Wang, W. (2024). Longitudinal relationships between bullying victimization and dual social behaviors: the roles of self-compassion and trauma-related shame. Psychology Research and Behavior Management , 17 , 1463–1475. https://doi.org/10.2147/PRBM.S450013 Yan, R., Xie, R., Jiang, M., Li, J., Lin, X., & Ding, W. (2022). Longitudinal Relationship Between Bullying Victimization and Depression Among Left-Behind Children: Roles of Negative Thoughts and Self-Compassion. Frontiers in Psychology , 13 , 852634–852634. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.852634 Zăbavă, T. (2020). The Compassion Dimension in Bullying in High School Students. Journal of Experiential Psychotherapy , 23 (3), 25–37. Table 2 Table 2 is available in the Supplementary Files section. Additional Declarations No competing interests reported. Supplementary Files Table2.docx Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. 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Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-6769677","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Research Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":469722803,"identity":"3c307f97-b437-40b9-8d8c-eec29889d1a1","order_by":0,"name":"Vassiliki Makrydaki","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAAzklEQVRIiWNgGAWjYJCCAwwMCTz8IFZCAQlaZCQbQFoMiLcowcbgAIgmRovB8eMPD/zMSeMxPr868cMDAwZ5frEDBLScyTE42Lsth8fsxtvNEkCHGc6cnYBfi2RDDsMB3m0VQC1nN4C0JBjcJqSl//mDg3+BWoxnnN38gygt/ECTD/MCHWbA37uNOFv4Jd4YHJbdlsYjcYN3m0WCgQRhv7Dxpz/++HZbsj1//9nNN39U2MjzSxPQggASYJUSxCoHO/EAKapHwSgYBaNgJAEA41ZGQLJC0hYAAAAASUVORK5CYII=","orcid":"","institution":"University of Thessaly","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Vassiliki","middleName":"","lastName":"Makrydaki","suffix":""},{"id":469722806,"identity":"f695083a-c4bb-45c7-9c79-d524be2dd668","order_by":1,"name":"Eleni Andreou","email":"","orcid":"","institution":"University of Thessaly","correspondingAuthor":false,"prefix":"","firstName":"Eleni","middleName":"","lastName":"Andreou","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-05-28 15:53:07","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":"","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-6769677/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-6769677/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":84562641,"identity":"7af9b1d8-be3e-4353-9d72-59a0a39ddf48","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-06-13 13:26:48","extension":"pdf","order_by":0,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":938270,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"manuscript.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-6769677/v1/b0b666a1-4b53-493b-a4bb-6acba2df713c.pdf"},{"id":84561386,"identity":"3faf5357-c76a-4836-96ba-5c93afcb190d","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-06-13 13:10:48","extension":"docx","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"supplement","size":21217,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Table2.docx","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-6769677/v1/8a24fa22cc72e209fe59d73d.docx"}],"financialInterests":"No competing interests reported.","formattedTitle":"Bullying/victimization experiences, post-traumatic stress disorder, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescent students","fulltext":[{"header":"Introduction","content":"\u003cp\u003eAccording to the well-known definition, school bullying refers to the implicit and repeated aggression by one student (bully) against another student (victim), between whom there is an inequality of power (Juvonen \u0026amp; Graham, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR13\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2014\u003c/span\u003e; Olweus, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR28\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1993\u003c/span\u003e). Forms of school bullying are verbal (e.g., name-calling), physical (e.g., kicking and hitting), relational (e.g., rumor spreading and social exclusion) and cyberbullying through messages and/or social media posts (Olweus et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR29\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2019\u003c/span\u003e; Rettew \u0026amp; Pawlowski, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR31\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2016\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eRevised definition of school bullying and cyberbullying refers to the damaging social process that is characterized by an imbalance of power driven by social norms (O'Higgins Norman et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR27\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). This implies the absence of effective response and care from peers and/or adults to victims and the involvement of perpetrators in bullying because of group dynamics rather than their intention to harm the victim. Additionally, bullying is repeated, but repetition is not only linked to the number of times that incidents of bullying occur, but it also relates to the effect on the victim who may fear that a once-off event might be repeated or re-shared online. Finally, bullying manifests as an unwanted interpersonal behavior among students that causes physical, social, and emotional harm to the victim(s) and the wider school community (O'Higgins Norman et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR27\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003ePTSD in Victims and Bully/victims\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIndicatively, some negative consequences identified for victims include high levels of anxiety (Garnefski \u0026amp; Kraaij, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR10\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2014\u003c/span\u003e; Valera-Pozo et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR37\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e), social phobia and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR3\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e; Kurniawan et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR16\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e; Makrydaki et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e; Moore et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR23\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2017\u003c/span\u003e). PTSD concerns a specific pattern of symptoms as a result of the traumatic event, such as re-experiencing trauma memories, avoidance of cues that remind the individual of the trauma, negative emotions and thoughts, and hyperarousal (APA, 2013). PTSD symptoms later in victims\u0026rsquo; lives suggest that bullying is a form of interpersonal trauma (Evans et al., 2017). In particular, Idsoe et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR12\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e) suggest that Developmental Trauma Disorder and Complex PTSD capture better the complexity of the symptoms associated with bullying than PTSD.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe level of PTSD symptoms among the bullied children is high, especially within the groups of girls and bully/victims (Idsoe et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2012\u003c/span\u003e). The research on bullying makes a distinction between victims and bully/victims, youth who involved in both perpetration and victimization. In particular, Kennedy (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR14\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e) highlights that there is significant diversity within the group of youth who experience both perpetration and victimization in relation to trauma symptoms, i.e. youth, aged 5 to 17 years, who involved equally in high rates of perpetration and victimization experienced more trauma symptoms than the victimization predominant bully/victims, the aggression predominant bully/victims and the bully/victims who only occasionally involved in perpetration and victimization. However, other research does not support gender differences in PTSD (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR3\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e) or differences between victims and bully/victims (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR3\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e; Sterzing et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR35\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec3\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eSelf-compassion in Victims and Bully/victims\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe results from a longitudinal design study showed that stressful bullying victimization weakens self-compassion, leading to trauma-related shame, thus influencing college students to exhibit more cyber aggression and less prosocial behavior (Xu et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR39\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). However, this study did not examine the differences between bullying victimization roles (e.g. victims, bully/victims). Adolescent victims with low self-compassion are more likely to experience feelings of anxiety (Chu et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR7\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e). Even though a great deal of the literature on school bullying has focused on negative consequences for victims and bully/victims, such as PTSD, a growing body of literature has paid attention to victims\u0026rsquo;self-compassion.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eSelf-compassion entails being kind and understanding toward oneself in instances of pain or failure rather than being harshly self-critical, perceiving one\u0026rsquo;s experiences as part of the larger human experience rather than seeing them as separating and isolating, and holding painful thoughts and feelings in balanced awareness rather than over-identifying with them (Neff, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR25\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2003\u003c/span\u003e). Self-criticism is a strong predictor of the role of victim of bullying, i.e. the adolescent with a high level of self-criticism explains to himself/herself the experience of bullying as his/her own fault, especially the self is seen as defective, inappropriate and undesirable, therefore he/she is less likely to be able to overcome the position of the victim (Zăbavă, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR41\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e). One possible explanation of the negative association between bullying and self-compassion is that growing up in a hostile peer environment may hinder the development of self-compassion and erode the capacity of treating oneself kindly (M\u0026uacute;zquiz et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR24\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOn the other hand, adolescents with higher levels of self-compassion show kindness toward themselves, understand their victimization experiences rather than harshly criticizing or blaming themselves and cope more successfully with painful thoughts and feelings resulting from victimization, i.e., self-compassion is an adaptive coping mode (e.g., positive cognitive restructuring) (Chu et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR7\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e). Similarly, university students, former victims of bullying, with high self-compassion feel less shame about the experience of bullying victimization in adulthood (Beduna \u0026amp; Perrone-McGovern, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR4\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2019\u003c/span\u003e). In addition, a longitudinal study found that self-compassion mediates the relationship between victimization and depression in victims, i.e., victims with greater self-compassion treat themselves better when they are bullied (Yan et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e), but this research is limited to victimized adolescents from China, who lived in rural areas with their grandparents.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eMental resilience in Victims and Bully/victims\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eResearch has shown that children and adolescents with a higher level of resilience experience fewer symptoms of anxiety under bullying victimization, i.e. resilience plays a prominent mediating role in the association between bullying victimization and anxiety (Fang et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR9\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e). Resilience is a dynamic process of effectively negotiating, adapting to, or managing significant sources of stress or trauma (Rutter, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR32\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2006\u003c/span\u003e). Concerning resilience, boys reported higher levels than girls (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e; Saaduddin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR33\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e) and bully/victims were found to be less resilient compared to victims and bullies (Bunnett, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR6\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eŠvecov\u0026aacute; et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR36\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e) supported that the protective effect of resilience was moderated by bullying in several types of psychopathology; specifically, the respondents who were bullied had higher scores in somatization, obsessive-compulsive disorder, interpersonal sensitivity, depression and psychoticism. On the other hand, a longitudinal study found that adolescents who have experienced bullying, both as victims and bully/victims, usually have a higher risk of depression and suicidal thoughts and that resilience can offer protection against depression (Lin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR18\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eMoreover, victims\u0026rsquo; perceived social/family support and interpersonal assistance (Fang et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR9\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e; Makrydaki et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e) and their personal assets, such as emotional regulation (Fang et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR9\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e), social competence, structured style, self-reliance, and optimism about the future, seemed to act as a counterbalance to the traumatic victimization they experienced and as an essential protective factor against PTSD (Makrydaki et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). Additionally, self-esteem affects the resilience of students who are victims of bullying, i.e. students with high self-esteem are more able to face challenges and failures and confident in overcoming difficulties (Saaduddin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR33\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e; Sapouna \u0026amp; Wolke, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR34\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2013\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eMoreover, self-efficacy, social support and resilience were found to partially mediate the effect of previous bullying experience on current well-being and mental illness in university students from China and Germany (Lin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR19\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e). As it is evident, a large number of studies have focused on former victims of school bullying concerning their mental resilience (e.g. Lin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR19\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e; Makrydaki et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e; Švecov\u0026aacute; et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR36\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e) and self-compassion (e.g. Beduna \u0026amp; Perrone-McGovern, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR4\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2019\u003c/span\u003e; Xu et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR39\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). Although a clear moderating effect of resilience on the relationship between students\u0026rsquo; victimization and well-being cannot be claimed (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e), resilience has been linked to other positive outcomes after the bullying experience. To the authors\u0026rsquo; knowledge, only one study has investigated the association between bullying victimization, mental resilience and self-compassion in students, which is limited to 130 junior high school participants of two schools in Bangkok metropolitan area, with females constituting the majority of the sample (Bowornkittikun et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR5\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eThe Present Study\u003c/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe present quantitative study was designed to address the above gaps in the literature by exploring holistically the association between post-traumatic stress, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescents involved in bullying incidents at school. It also examined whether there are differences between: a) boys and girls and b) victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and students non-involved in bullying, in terms of levels of post-traumatic stress, resilience and self-compassion. Ιt was expected a negative association between PTSD symptoms, mental resilience, and self-compassion. Moreover, it was hypothesized that girls would experience higher levels of PTSD symptoms than boys (Idsoe et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2012\u003c/span\u003e), while boys would experience higher levels of mental resilience and self-compassion than girls (e.g. Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e; Saaduddin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR33\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e). Victims and bully/victims were also expected to experience more PTSD symptoms than other groups of students (Anderou et al., 2021; Sterzing et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR35\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e), while non-involved students to exhibit higher levels of mental resilience and self-compassion than the other groups of students (Bunnett, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR6\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e"},{"header":"Method","content":"\u003cdiv id=\"Sec7\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eParticipants\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eA total of 658 students, 277 boys (42%) and 381 girls (58%), attending the first grade of 17 different high schools in Thessaly, Greece, participated in the study by completing a series of self-report questionnaires. 30% of the participants (Ν\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;196) were identified as victims by their responses regarding frequency of reported physical and verbal bullying, harassment and theft of personal belongings at school, 9% (N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;56) as bullies, 19% (N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;127) as bully/victims, 27% (N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;180) observers and, 15% (N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;99) as non-involved in bully/victim higher levels of incidents.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eMeasures\u003c/b\u003e\u003cem\u003eSchool bullying\u003c/em\u003e: The questionnaire \u0026ldquo;Exposure to Aggression and Violence incidents at School, in the Neighborhood and at Home Checklist\u0026rdquo; developed by Makri-Botsari (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR20\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2010\u003c/span\u003e) was used to explore bullying experiences. The scale consists of 75 multiple-choice questions which explore experiences of aggressive/violent behaviors that someone has either received as a victim, or manifested as bully against others, or witnessed as an observer at school, at home and in the neighborhood. Responses were related to the frequency [4-point scale; \u003cem\u003enever\u003c/em\u003e (0), \u003cem\u003eonly once\u003c/em\u003e (1), \u003cem\u003esometimes\u003c/em\u003e (2), \u003cem\u003eoften\u003c/em\u003e (3)] with which students involve in physical (e.g., \u0026ldquo;How often have you been badly beaten up at your school?\u0026rdquo;), verbal attacks (e.g.,\u0026ldquo;At your school, how often have you been verbally or emotionally abused or insulted and made to feel afraid or uncomfortable?\u0026rdquo;) and in actions such as theft of personal belongings (e.g.,\u0026ldquo;Have you been robbed at school?\u0026rdquo;). For the purposes of this study, we were only interested in frequency of participants\u0026rsquo; involvement in bullying (aggression/violence) incidents at school as victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and non-involved students.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eStudents were classified, following the procedure used by Dodge et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR8\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1997\u003c/span\u003e), into four groups: 1) low bully and high victim\u0026ndash;victim only group, 2) high bully and low victim\u0026ndash;bully only group, 3) high bully and high victim\u0026ndash;bully/victim group, and 4) low bully and low victim\u0026ndash;not involved group. Specifically, a respondent is considered a victim if they report being bullied in one or more of the above ways \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003esometimes\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003eoften\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo;. Moreover, a respondent is considered a bully if they report having bullied others in one or more of the above ways \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003esometimes\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003eoften\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo;. A respondent is considered a bully/victim if they report both being bullied and having bullied others in one or more of the above ways \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003esometimes\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003eoften\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo;. A respondent is considered as not to be involved if they do not mention at all that they have been bullied or have bullied others or observed bullying incidents. Finally, students were classified as observers, following the procedure used by Makri-Botsari (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR20\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2010\u003c/span\u003e): a respondent is considered as observer if they report having observed physical and/or verbal bullying incidents \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003esometimes\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo; or \u0026ldquo;\u003cem\u003eoften\u003c/em\u003e\u0026rdquo;in the relevant 8 items of the questionnaire. For this sample, the internal consistency of the sub-scales, as defined by the Makri-Botsari (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR20\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2010\u003c/span\u003e), was strong: a) victims\u0026rsquo; group (Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.78), b) bullies\u0026rsquo; group (Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.85) and c) observers\u0026rsquo; group (Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.83).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cem\u003ePost-traumatic stress disorder symptomatology\u003c/em\u003e: Symptoms of PTSD were assessed using the Children\u0026rsquo;s Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder-Reaction Index (CPTSD-RI) (Pynoos et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR30\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e1987\u003c/span\u003e), which was adapted in Greek by Kolaitis et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR15\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2011\u003c/span\u003e). The questionnaire contains 20 questions that compose three factors: \u0026ldquo;intrusiveness/numbing/avoidance\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;fear/anxiety symptoms\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;disturbances in sleep and concentration\u0026rdquo;. Items are rated on a 4-point scale ranging from \u003cem\u003enone of the time\u003c/em\u003e (0) to \u003cem\u003emost of the time\u003c/em\u003e (4). Higher scores indicate more severe PTSD symptoms. In the present study, an exploratory factor analysis was conducted (using Principal Component Analysis) and suggested three factors:1) \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal\u0026rdquo; (12 items, e.g., \u0026ldquo;Repeated, disturbing, and unwanted memories of the bullying experience?\u0026rdquo;), 2) \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;, i.e. negative changes in cognitive functions/disposition resulting from \"intentional\" thinking, not from intrusive thinking (5 items, e.g., \u0026ldquo;Feeling very scared or upset when you thinking about bullying experience?\u0026rdquo;) and 3) \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo;, such as disturbances in sleep and concentration (3 items e.g., \u0026ldquo;Loss of interest in activities that you used to enjoy after the school bullying incident(s)?\u0026rdquo;). The overall Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha was strong (.89). The internal consistency of the sub-scales was: Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.91 for \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal\u0026rdquo;, .71 for \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;, and .52 for \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cstrong\u003eMental resilience\u003c/strong\u003e \u003cp\u003eAn adapted version of the Resilience Scale (Wagnild \u0026amp; Young, 1993) modified by Neill and Dias (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR26\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2001\u003c/span\u003e) and translated into Greek by Leontopoulou (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR17\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2010\u003c/span\u003e) was used to measure mental resilience. The scale consists of 15 items that are positively worded and responses ranged from \u003cem\u003eagree\u003c/em\u003e (1) to \u003cem\u003edisagree\u003c/em\u003e (7). An exploratory factor analysis was conducted (using Principal Component Analysis) and suggested two factors; 1) \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo; (9 items, e.g. \u0026ldquo;I have self-discipline\u0026rdquo;) and 2) \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo; (6 items, e.g. \u0026ldquo;Manage one way or other\u0026rdquo;). In the present study, the overall Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha was strong .92. The internal consistency of the sub-scales was also strong (Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.89 for \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo; and .83 for \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo;).\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cstrong\u003eSelf-compassion\u003c/strong\u003e \u003cp\u003eParticipants were given the Greek version of the 26-item Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) (Neff, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR25\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2003\u003c/span\u003e) which was translated by Mantzios et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR22\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2015\u003c/span\u003e). The SCS includes the 5 item \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; sub-scale, the 5-item \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; sub-scale, the 4-item \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo; sub-scale, the 4-item \u0026ldquo;isolation\u0026rdquo; sub-scale, the 4-item \u0026ldquo;mindfulness\u0026rdquo; sub-scale and the 4-item \u0026ldquo;over identification\u0026rdquo; sub-scale. Responses are given on a 5-point scale \u003cem\u003ealmost never\u003c/em\u003e (1) to \u003cem\u003ealmost always\u003c/em\u003e (5). Mean scores on the six sub-scales are then averaged (after reverse-coding negative items) to create an overall self-compassion score ranging from 26 to 130. Higher scores indicate higher levels of self-compassion. An exploratory factor analysis was conducted (using Principal Component Analysis) and suggested four factors; 1) \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; (13 items, e.g. \u0026ldquo;I'm disapproving and judgmental about my own flaws and inadequacies\u0026rdquo;), 2) \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; (6 items e.g. \u0026ldquo;I try to be loving towards myself when I'm feeling emotional pain\u0026rdquo;), 3) \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo; (4 items, e.g. \u0026ldquo;When I'm down and out, I remind myself that there are lots of other people in the world feeling like I am\u0026rdquo;) and 4) \u0026ldquo;mindfulness\u0026rdquo; (3 items, e.g. \u0026ldquo;When something upsets me, I try to keep my emotions in balance\u0026rdquo;). In the present study, the overall Cronbach\u0026rsquo;s alpha was strong (.79). The internal consistency of the sub-scales was also strong, .91 for \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;, .82 for \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; and.72 \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo;, except from \u0026ldquo;mindfulness\u0026rdquo; .65, because of 3 items.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec8\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eDesign\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eAn invitation letter was sent to school principals requesting participation of students in the study. The letter fully explained to principals and teachers the purpose of the study. The educational staff of each school that was interested and agreed, communicated with the researchers and arranged an in-person meeting between teachers, students and researchers in order to inform the students about the research purpose. The parents (and their children) who were interested also read and signed a consent form, which briefly explained the rationale of the research and informed them about their children\u0026rsquo;s anonymity. Data were collected online in the computer lab of each school. Ethical approval was obtained by the responsible Ethics Committee.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eΑll the statistical analysis was performed using IBM SPSS Statistics 26. Firstly, One \u0026ndash; Way ANOVAs were conducted to examine differences in PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion scores between boys and girls. One \u0026ndash; Way ANOVAs were also conducted to examine differences in PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion scores among victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and students not involved in bullying incidents. Pearson\u0026rsquo;s correlations were subsequently run to investigate relations between PTSD symptoms, mental resilience and self-compassion.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e"},{"header":"Results","content":"\u003cdiv id=\"Sec10\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eGender Differences\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eAs shown in Table\u0026nbsp;\u003cspan refid=\"Tab1\" class=\"InternalRef\"\u003e1\u003c/span\u003e, statistically significant differences in the overall PTSD scale (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.02) and its sub-scales, \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.02), and \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.05) between boys and girls were found, with girls exhibiting statistically significant more symptoms than boys. On the sub-scale of mental resilience, \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo;, girls showed higher scores (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.02) compared to boys. Moreover, girls showed higher scores (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.01) compared to boys on the sub-scale of self-compassion, \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo;. Boys showed higher scores in the overall self-compassion scale (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.02), as well as on its\u0026rsquo; sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;, (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.05) compared to girls.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"gridtable\"\u003e\u003ctable float=\"Yes\" id=\"Tab1\" border=\"1\"\u003e \u003ccaption language=\"En\"\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"CaptionNumber\"\u003eTable 1\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"CaptionContent\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eMeans and SDs for group differences between boys and girls on PTSD symptoms, mental resilience and self-compassion\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003c/caption\u003e \u003ccolgroup cols=\"9\"\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c1\" colnum=\"1\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c2\" colnum=\"2\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c3\" colnum=\"3\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c4\" colnum=\"4\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c5\" colnum=\"5\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c6\" colnum=\"6\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c7\" colnum=\"7\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c8\" colnum=\"8\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c9\" colnum=\"9\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cthead\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eMeasure\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colspan=\"2\" nameend=\"c3\" namest=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eTotal\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e(N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;658)\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colspan=\"2\" nameend=\"c5\" namest=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eBoys\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e(N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;277)\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colspan=\"2\" nameend=\"c7\" namest=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eGirls\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e(N\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;381)\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eF\u003c/em\u003e(1,656)\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eη\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003c/thead\u003e \u003ctbody\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eM\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eSD\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eM\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eSD\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eM\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eSD\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003ePost-traumatic stress\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e38.45\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12.41\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e36.35\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e11.50\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e39.97\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12.84\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e13.92*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.02\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eIntrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e19.40\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.61\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e18.03\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e7.50\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e20.39\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e9.21\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12.26*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.02\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eNegative rumination\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.93\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.69\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e9.92\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.42\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e11.66\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.71\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e37.40*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.05\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eChanges in daily life\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.13\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.11\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.40\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.31\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e7.93\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e2.94\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.75\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.01\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eMental resilience\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e80.53\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e16.74\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e79.92\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e19.65\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e80.97\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e14.27\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.64\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003ePersonal strength and structured style\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e46.59\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e11.22\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e47.14\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12.36\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e46.20\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.32\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.13\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eSelf-efficacy, ability to achieve\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e33.94\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e6.68\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e32.78\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.11\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e34.78\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e5.26\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e14.63*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.02\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eSelf-compassion\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e77.35\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e13.84\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e79.36\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.15\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e75.89\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e15.85\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.23*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.02\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eSelf-judgment\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e41.08\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12.19\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e44.18\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e11.23\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e38.83\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12.38\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e32.37*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.05\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eSelf-kindness\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e16.86\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e5.64\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e16.16\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e5.73\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e17.37\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e5.53\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e7.39*\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.01\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eCommon humanity\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.65\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.84\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.34\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.98\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10.87\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.73\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.08\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.01\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eMindfulness\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.76\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.04\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.68\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3.17\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8.82\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e2.95\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.36\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003c/tbody\u003e \u003c/colgroup\u003e \u003c/table\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e*\u003cem\u003ep\u003c/em\u003e\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.05.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec11\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eDifferentiation of Bully and Victim Groupings\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eAs shown in Table\u0026nbsp;\u003cspan refid=\"Tab2\" class=\"InternalRef\"\u003e2\u003c/span\u003e, statistically significant differences in the overall PTSD scale (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.15) and its sub-scales, \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.12), \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.11), and \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.06) between the five groups of students were found. Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that victims showed higher overall PTSD than bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00). Similarly, Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that bully/victims showed higher overall PTSD than bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eMoreover, Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that victims showed more \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u0026rdquo; than bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.05), observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00). They also revealed that bully/victims showed more \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u0026rdquo; than bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and the students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAdditionally, Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons revealed higher \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo; for victims compared to bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and higher \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo; for bully/victims compared to bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00). Finally, they showed that victims, bullies, bully/victims and observers had more \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo; than the students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.05).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eStatistically significant differences in overall mental resilience (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.04) and its sub-scales, \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.04), and \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.04) were found among the five groups of students. Specifically, Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.01) and bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) had lower overall mental resilience than observers. They also revealed that victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) had lower \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo; than observers. Finally, bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00), and students not involved (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) had lower\u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo; than observers.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eStatistically significant differences in overall self-compassion (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.06) and its sub-domains, \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.07), and \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; (η\u003csup\u003e2\u003c/sup\u003e\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.02) were found among the five groups of students. Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that bully/victims scored significantly lower on overall self-compassion than bullies (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.04). Victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) scored significantly lower on overall self-compassion than observers. Finally, victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) scoredsignificantly lower on overall self-compassion than students not involved.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eMoreover, Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that bullies scored significantly higher on \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; than victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.02), victims significantly lower than observers (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and students not involved significantly higher than victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00) and bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.00). Finally, Bonferroni\u0026rsquo;s comparisons showed that observers had higher scores on \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; than bully/victims (p\u0026thinsp;=\u0026thinsp;.01).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cdiv id=\"Sec12\" class=\"Section2\"\u003e \u003ch2\u003eAssociations between PTSD symptoms, mental resilience and self-compassion\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eΑs shown in Table\u0026nbsp;\u003cspan refid=\"Tab3\" class=\"InternalRef\"\u003e3\u003c/span\u003e overall mental resilience was positively correlated to overall self-compassion and its sub-scales \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;mindfulness\u0026rdquo;. The sub-scale of mental resilience, \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo;, was significantly positively associated to overall self-compassion and its four sub-scales. Moreover, the sub-scale of mental resilience, \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo;, was also significantly positively associated to the overall self-compassion and its sub-scales \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;mindfulness\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAdditionally, the sub-scale of PTSD, \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo;, was also significantly positively associated to overall mental resilience, and its two sub-scales. The sub-scale of PTSD, \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;, was also significantly positively associated to mental resilience sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo;. PTSD sub-scales, \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo;, were also significantly positively associated to self-compassion sub-scales, \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;mindfulness\u0026rdquo;. Finally, overall PTSD was also significantly positively associated to the self-compassion sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;common humanity\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOverall PTSD was negatively correlated to overall mental resilience scale and its sub-scale \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo;. Moreover, overall PTSD was negatively correlated to overall self-compassion and its sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe sub-scale of PTSD, \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal\u0026rdquo;, was negatively correlated to overall mental resilience and its two sub-scales. The sub-scale of PTSD, \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;, was negatively correlated to mental resilience sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;personal strength and structured style\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe sub-scales of PTSD, \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing and hyperarousal\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;, were negatively correlated to overall self-compassion and its sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;. The sub-scale of PTSD, \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo;, was negatively correlated to self-compassion sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;. Finally, the sub-scale of mental resilience, \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo;, was negatively correlated to self-compassion sub-scale, \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"gridtable\"\u003e\u003ctable float=\"Yes\" id=\"Tab3\" border=\"1\"\u003e \u003ccaption language=\"En\"\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"CaptionNumber\"\u003eTable 3\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"CaptionContent\"\u003e \u003cp\u003eCorrelations (Pearson r) between post-traumatic stress, mental resilience and self-compassion in terms of total scores and their individual factors\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003c/caption\u003e \u003ccolgroup cols=\"13\"\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c1\" colnum=\"1\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c2\" colnum=\"2\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c3\" colnum=\"3\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c4\" colnum=\"4\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c5\" colnum=\"5\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c6\" colnum=\"6\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c7\" colnum=\"7\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c8\" colnum=\"8\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c9\" colnum=\"9\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c10\" colnum=\"10\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c11\" colnum=\"11\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c12\" colnum=\"12\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv align=\"left\" class=\"colspec\" colname=\"c13\" colnum=\"13\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003cthead\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e2\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e4\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e5\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e6\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e7\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e9\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e11\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003cth align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/th\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003c/thead\u003e \u003ctbody\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1. Post-traumatic stress\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e2. Intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.94\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e3. Negative rumination\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.84\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.71\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e4. Changes in daily life\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.40\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.13\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.19\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e5. Mental resilience\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.13**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.25\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.05\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.20\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e6. Personal strength and structured style\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.19**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.29\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.13\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.17\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.96\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e7. Self-efficacy, ability to achieve\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.01\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.13\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.11\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.21\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.89\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.73\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e8. Self-compassion\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.32\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.35\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.31\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.04\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.42\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.50\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.22\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e9. Self-judgment\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.42\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.38\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.46\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.09\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e*\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.01\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.10\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e*\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.15\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.64\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e10. Self-kindness\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.02\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.05\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.08\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e*\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.11\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.51\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.51\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.43\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.56\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.21\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e11. Common humanity\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.11\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.05\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.17\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.12\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.37\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.35\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.33\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.37\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.37\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.66\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003ctr\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c1\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e12. Mindfulness\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c2\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e.04\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c3\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.05\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c4\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.09\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e*\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c5\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.19\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c6\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.48\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c7\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.47\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c8\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.42\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c9\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.47\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c10\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u0026minus;\u0026thinsp;.23\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c11\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.68\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c12\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e.65\u003c/b\u003e\u003csup\u003e\u003cb\u003e**\u003c/b\u003e\u003c/sup\u003e\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003ctd align=\"left\" colname=\"c13\"\u003e \u003cp\u003e1.00\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/td\u003e \u003c/tr\u003e \u003c/tbody\u003e \u003c/colgroup\u003e \u003ctfoot\u003e \u003ctr\u003e\u003ctd colspan=\"13\"\u003eNote: *p\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.05 (2-tailed), **p\u0026thinsp;\u0026lt;\u0026thinsp;.01 (2-tailed).\u003c/td\u003e\u003c/tr\u003e \u003c/tfoot\u003e \u003c/table\u003e\u003c/div\u003e \u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e1: Post-traumatic stress, 2: Intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal, 3: Negative rumination, 4: Changes in daily life, 5: Mental resilience, 6: Personal strength and structured style, 7: Self-efficacy, ability to achieve, 8: Self-compassion, 9: Self-judgment, 10: Self-kindness, 11: Common humanity, 12: Mindfulness.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e"},{"header":"Discussion","content":"\u003cp\u003eThis study extends prior research by examining factors associated with adolescents' bullying victimization, PTSD, resilience, and self-compassion. More specifically, the present study aimed to a) examine gender and students\u0026rsquo; roles (i.e. victim, bully, bully/victim, observer, not involved) differences on PTSD, resilience, and self-compassion; and b) investigate the association between PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescents involved in bullying incidents at school.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eConcerning gender differences, in line with evidence from previous studies (Idsoe et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2012\u003c/span\u003e), girls exhibited greater PTSD symptoms, \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u0026rdquo;, and\u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;than boys. One possible explanation is that emotional responses may be conditioned by gender identity, where boys tend to show themselves as less affected by what happens. Concerning self-compassion, boys reported higher levels than girls. This result is partly consistent with those of Yan et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e) concerning that only males were found to reduce depression levels through self-compassion.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eYan et al. (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR40\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e) supported that when females experience bullying, they may blame themselves and therefore cannot further suppress depression symptoms through self-compassion. Nevertheless, the present study showed that boys reported higher \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;compared to girls, and that girls showed higher \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; scores. Additionally, in contrast with previous literature (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR2\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e; Saaduddin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR33\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e), girls reported higher levels of mental resilience, especially \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo;, compared to boys. Therefore, the relevant hypothesis is disproved.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eWe propose one hypothesis to explain these results: both boys and girls are negatively affected, but differently, by the experience of bullying and cope differently with its negative effect. Specifically, when PTSD symptoms have been upsetting girls enough, but without causing them dysfunction, they utilize adaptive coping styles, such as mental resilience, \u0026ldquo;belief in self-efficacy\u0026rdquo; and \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo;, in order to deal with them. Besides, self-efficacy and resilience partially mediate the effect of bullying experience on mental illness (Lin et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR19\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e). On the other hand, exposure to bullying may enhance boys\u0026rsquo; \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; and hinder their capacity of treating themselves kindly (see M\u0026uacute;zquiz et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR24\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2023\u003c/span\u003e), so they try to counterbalance the self-judgment attitude through other aspects of self-compassion, such as perceiving their difficulties as part of the larger school community experience and/or holding painful thoughts and feelings in balanced awareness.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eConcerning PTSD symptoms, \u0026ldquo;intrusive thoughts, numbing, hyperarousal\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;negative rumination\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;changes in daily life\u0026rdquo;, our findings are in line with evidence from previous studies (Idsoe et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR11\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2012\u003c/span\u003e; Kennedy, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR14\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e) victims and bully/victims reported higher levels than bullies, observers and students not involved. In other words, bully/victims are similar to victims regarding PTSD (see Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR3\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e; Sterzing et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR35\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e), and both seem to be the most burdened groups of students in terms of PTSD symptoms. Τhe above result is supported by the fact that firstly, observers showed higher mental resilience than victims and bully/victims, and secondly observers and students not involved had more self-compassion and/or \u0026ldquo;self-kindness\u0026rdquo; than victims and bully/victims.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAdditionally, bullies and observers showed higher levels of negative \u0026ldquo;changes in daily lives\u0026rdquo; compared to students not involved. Consequently, less involvement (Kennedy, \u003cspan citationid=\"CR14\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e) or non-engagement in bullying incidents appeared to serve as a protective factor against PTSD symptoms. Moreover, less complex roles in bullying incidents appeared to be associated with higher self-compassion, i.e.bullies had more self-compassion than bully/victims. Similarly, Bunnett (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR6\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e) supported that bully/victims were found to be less resilientcompared to bullies.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOur results also showed that bullies and observers reported higher \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; than victims. These findings are opposed to Zăbavă\u0026rsquo;s (\u003cspan citationid=\"CR41\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2020\u003c/span\u003e) research evidence, according to which \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; is a strong predictor of the victim role. However, revised definition of school bullying highlighted that imbalance of power is due to social norms (O'Higgins Norman et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR27\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e), i.e., bullies who are likely to bully for reasons related to group dynamics and observers who do not effectively intervene to bullying incidents are likely to be more self-critical of themselves than victims. Similarly, the high rates of \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; in students who do not engage in bullying may be linked to the emotional damage that bullying causes in the wider school community (see O'Higgins Norman et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR27\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e).\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eMoreover, our results confirmed the positive association between mental resilience and self-compassion, found in previous studies (Bowornkittikun et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR5\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e). This suggests that adolescents with a high level of self-compassion are more likely to have a high level of resilience. Therefore, adolescents with more \u0026ldquo;personal strength, structured coping style\u0026rdquo;, \u0026ldquo;belief in their self-efficacy and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo; would demonstrate inner support regarding their experiences of bullying, successfully cope with painful thoughts and feelings and recognize that these thoughts and feelings connect rather than separate them from other peers.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eAdditionally, our results showed that PTSD was negatively associated with mental resilience and self-compassion. Specifically, adolescents with higher level of self-compassion and resilience were more likely to experience fewer PTSD symptoms, and vice versa. As this finding is in accordance with previous evidence (Chu et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR7\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2018\u003c/span\u003e; Fang et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR9\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2022\u003c/span\u003e; Xu et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR39\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e), it could be argued that involvement in bullying incidents that cause severe PTSD symptoms weaken students\u0026rsquo; personal asserts, like self-compassion and resilience, while students\u0026rsquo; improved ability to cope with difficult situations and maintain an attitude of kindness towards themselves contributes to the reduction of PTSD symptoms.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eOn the other hand, our results showed that, despite the negative association between PTSD, mental resilience and self-compassion, some of its sub-scales were positively correlated. This is consistent with past empirical studies found that negative consequences, like PTSD, and positive changes, such as resilience and post-traumatic growth, coexisted after the school bullying experience (Andreou et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR3\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2021\u003c/span\u003e; Makrydaki et al., \u003cspan citationid=\"CR21\" class=\"CitationRef\"\u003e2024\u003c/span\u003e). Specifically, when students face a school life challenge, such as bullying, they get carried away by their negative thoughts and emotions, but also believe in their ability to confront the difficult situation. Additionally, students seem to experience negative thoughts and changes in their daily life, such as disturbances in sleep and concentration, loss of interest in activities they enjoyed before experiencing bullying, but they can recruit the three adaptive components of self-compassion tobalance the negative consequences.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eFinally, PTSD was negatively correlated to \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;. A possible explanation for the negative association between the two constructs is that girls, victims and bully/victims reported higher levels of PTSD symptoms than boys, bullies, observers and the students not involved, respectively, while boys, bullies and observers reported higher \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; than girls and victims, respectively. In other words, the negative association between PTSD and \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;, in the present study, maybe explained by the fact that \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo; is linked with the male gender and the roles of bullies and observers, and PTSD is linked with the female gender and the roles of victims and bully/victims. Meanwhile, students\u0026rsquo; high \u0026ldquo;self-efficacy, and ability to achieve\u0026rdquo; seem to act as counterbalance at the emergence of \u0026ldquo;self-judgment\u0026rdquo;.\u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003eFindings from the current study shed light on the understanding of the traumatic dimension of the bullying experience and contributed to the very limited literature on school bullying regarding the association between mental resilience and self-compassion. Despite this, several limitations must be noted. Issues like frequency and types of victimization were not addressed in the current study as well as the moderation and mediation effects of PTSD and resilience to self-compassion. Future research should focus on investigating longitudinally the role of resilience and self-compassion in exploring positive and negative outcomes of school bullying.\u003c/p\u003e"},{"header":"Conclusion","content":"\u003cp\u003eIn conclusion, resilience and self-compassion have shown to be effective protective factors against PTSD symptoms that occur due to school bullying. The above findings could be used in the counseling process with students who involved in bullying incidents and in intervention programs at school community level. It seems that enhancing mental resilience and self-compassion can help to address bullying. Specifically, considering the role of students in bullying and their gender, the goals of interventions may not be to target resistant symptoms or inner critical voice, but to enhance students\u0026rsquo; mental resilience and self-kindness.\u003c/p\u003e"},{"header":"Abbreviations","content":"\u003cdiv class=\"DefinitionList\"\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"DefinitionListEntry\"\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"Term\"\u003ePTSD\u003c/div\u003e \u003cdiv class=\"Description\"\u003e \u003cp\u003epost-traumatic stress disorder\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003c/div\u003e \u003c/div\u003e"},{"header":"Declarations","content":"\u003ch2\u003eDeclarations\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cstrong\u003e \u003cb\u003eEthics Approval and Consent to Participate\u003c/b\u003e \u003c/strong\u003e \u003cp\u003e Approval for the study was obtained from the University of Thessaly Research Ethics Committee. Written informed consent was obtained from the parents and legal guardians. All students consent to participate in the study.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/p\u003e \u003cp\u003e \u003cstrong\u003eConsent for Publication\u003c/strong\u003e \u003cp\u003eNot applicable.\u003c/p\u003e \u003c/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eFunding:\u003c/h2\u003e \u003cp\u003eThe research is conducted in the operating framework of the University of Thessaly Innovation, Technology Transfer Unit and Entrepreneurship Center \"One Planet Thessaly\", under the \u0026ldquo;Scholarship Grants to University of Thessaly Doctoral Candidates\u0026rdquo; and is funded by the Special Account of Research Grants of the University of Thessaly.\u003c/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eAuthor Contribution\u003c/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eAll authors reviewed the manuscript.\u003c/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eAcknowledgement\u003c/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe authors wish to express their gratitude to all the students, parents, teachers, and school principals who enabled the research process.\u003c/p\u003e\u003ch2\u003eData Availability\u003c/h2\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe data presented in this study are available upon request to the corresponding author.\u003c/p\u003e"},{"header":"References","content":"\u003col\u003e\u003cli\u003e\u003cspan\u003eAmerican Psychological Association (2015). 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Longitudinal Relationship Between Bullying Victimization and Depression Among Left-Behind Children: Roles of Negative Thoughts and Self-Compassion. \u003cem\u003eFrontiers in Psychology\u003c/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003e13\u003c/em\u003e, 852634\u0026ndash;852634. \u003cspan class=\"ExternalRef\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"RefSource\"\u003ehttps://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.852634\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan address=\"10.3389/fpsyg.2022.852634\" targettype=\"DOI\" class=\"RefTarget\"\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/li\u003e \u003cli\u003e\u003cspan\u003eZăbavă, T. (2020). The Compassion Dimension in Bullying in High School Students. \u003cem\u003eJournal of Experiential Psychotherapy\u003c/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003e23\u003c/em\u003e(3), 25\u0026ndash;37.\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/li\u003e\u003c/ol\u003e"},{"header":"Table 2","content":"\u003cp\u003eTable 2 is available in the Supplementary Files section.\u003c/p\u003e"}],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":true,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":false,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":false,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":false,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"bullying/victimization, adolescents, PTSD, mental resilience, self-compassion","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-6769677/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-6769677/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"The present study was designed to investigate the association between post-traumatic stress, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescents involved in bullying incidents at school. It also examined whether there are differences between: a) boys and girls and b) victims, bullies, bully/victims, observers and students non-involved in bullying, in terms of levels of post-traumatic stress, resilience and self-compassion. A total of 658 students, 277 boys (42%) and 381 girls (58%), attending the first grade of 17 different high schools in Thessaly, Greece, participated in the study by completing a series of self-report questionnaires. The results indicated higher scores for girls compared to boys on PTSD, “self-efficacy and ability to achieve” (sub-scale of mental resilience) and “self-kindness” (sub-scale of self-compassion). Moreover, victims and bully/victims showed higher levels of PTSD compared to bullies, observers and students non-involved in bullying. Observers showed higher levels of mental resilience compared to victims and bully/victims. Observer and non-involved students showed higher levels of self-compassion compared to victims and bully/victims. Finally, mental resilience was positively correlated to self-compassion and PTSD was negatively correlated to mental resilience and self-compassion. These findings may significantly contribute toward designing interventions for strengthening mental resilience and cultivating self-compassion to address bullying.","manuscriptTitle":"Bullying/victimization experiences, post-traumatic stress disorder, mental resilience and self-compassion in adolescent students","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":1,"date":"2025-06-13 13:10:44","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-6769677/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"ad3730ae-0372-4ea1-8453-365327824177","owner":[],"postedDate":"June 13th, 2025","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"posted","subjectAreas":[],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2026-05-09T17:08:39+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2025-06-13 13:10:44","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v1","identity":"rs-6769677","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-6769677","identity":"rs-6769677","version":["v1"]},"buildId":"8U1c8b4HqxoKbykW_rLl7","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}