RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EMPATHY, MORAL DISENGAGEMENT AND BYSTANDER BEHAVIORS IN SCHOOL

Abstract

The current study will examine the relationship between empathy, moral disengagement and bystander behaviors in school bullying. It is hypothesized that (1) Empathy will likely to positively predict defender behavior while negatively predict reinforce behavior and outsider behavior of the students and (2) Moral disengagement will likely to negatively predict defender behavior while positively predict reinforce behavior and outsider behavior of the students. Sample will be comprised of 100 students which will be selected through convenient sampling from different public and private schools of Lahore. Data will be collected by using Toronto empathy questionnaire (Spreng et al., 2009), Moral disengagement in bullying scale (Thornberg&Jungert, 2014)and extended version of Student bystander behavior scale (Thornberg&Jungert, 2014).After computing descriptive statistics of the data and reliability analysis for each scale, Pearson Product Moment correlation will be used to assess the relationships between study variables while hierarchical regression analysis will be used to assess the hypotheses of prediction.