Parental attachment and cyberbullying victims: the mediation effect of gelotophobia

This study investigates whether the fear of being laughed at (gelotophobia) mediates the relationship between cyberbullying victimisation and parental attachment in a sample of young Italian adults (N = 328; mean age: 20 years). The aim of the study was threefold: to consider gelotophobia, cyberbullying victimisation and parental attachment, as a whole, namely to test the mediating role of gelotophobia between parental attachment and cyberbullying victimisation; to evaluate the connections among the three variables against an understudied age target, namely young adults; to verify whether the association between gelotophobia and face-to-face bullying victimisation extends to cyberbullying perpetrations. The PhoPhiKat<30> questionnaire, the Cyber-Victimization through Mobile Phone and Internet Scale (CYB-VIC) test and the Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment (IPPA) scale were used to assess the levels of gelotophobia, cyberbullying victimisation and quality of parental attachment, respectively. Two main results were obtained: (1) Gelotophobia proved to be a mediator variable between cyberbullying victimisation and father attachment and (2) gelotophobia was found to be positively associated with cyberbullying victimisation. The current research adds new evidence on how the three aforementioned variables relate to one another in a range of ages (i.e. young adulthood) and in a cultural context (i.e. the Italian context), which was poorly investigated until now. The paper concludes with a discussion on practical implications.