Adolescence is a critical period for the development of undesirable, aggressive, and high-risk behavior (Smith et al., 2014). Previous research has suggested that adolescent aggression is influenced by environmental factors, such as use of an authoritarian parenting style and bad peer relationships (Kim & Nho, 2017; López et al., 2008). According to Boivin and colleagues (2010), individuals who experience negative peer status, such as peer rejection, may display future aggressive and bullying behaviors. Recently, scholars have begun to pay attention to the impact of internal factors, such as empathic ability, personality traits, and cognitive function, on individual aggression (Boivin et al., 2010; Cohen et al., 2015; L. Zhang & Yin, 2017). Although aggressive behavior is usually regarded as a response to setbacks, an individual’s interpretation of their environment will also affect their subsequent behavior (Berkowitz, 1989; Hiemstra et al., 2019). Researchers have found that resilience acts as a mediator in the relationship between coping and aggression among adolescents (Ng et al., 2012; Xiang et al., 2020).

 

Resilience refers to a dynamic process by which individuals successfully adapt within the context of significant adversity (Masten, 2014; Rutter, 1987). Research on resilience usually includes two aspects: adversity and positive adaptation. Adversity refers to the various difficulties and unfavorable environmental factors individuals encounter, including those from family, school, and society. Positive adaptation means effectively coping with adversity through a positive mindset, behavioral strategies, and resource utilization, thereby achieving personal growth and psychological resilience. For example, among adolescents living in a violent environment, resilient individuals show less aggressive behavior (Yule et al., 2019). In a cross-sectional study, Chen and Qin (2020) found empirical evidence that resilience is negatively related to aggression among young adults. J. Zhang et al. (2023) revealed in a longitudinal study that there is a close association between self-esteem and the development of both adolescent aggression and resilience. When individuals adopt an optimistic and resilient attitude toward objective events and challenges, they tend to make positive attributions, which, in turn, help protect their inner selves and maintain higher self-esteem, reducing the likelihood of aggressive behavior (Ronen, 2021).

 

The contribution of this study lies in providing a clearer understanding of the personality factors that lead to aggression in adolescents, offering novel approaches for intervention. Specifically, we proposed that enhancing adolescents’ resilience would enable them to cope proactively with difficulties and misfortunes, thereby maintaining higher levels of self-esteem and effectively reducing aggression. Therefore, we put forward our first hypothesis:

Hypothesis 1: Resilience will be negatively associated with aggression in adolescents.

Self-esteem refers to an individual’s positive evaluation and experience of self-worth obtained in the process of socialization (Orth & Robins, 2014). Self-esteem includes feelings of self-acceptance and self-respect, and previous studies have shown that adolescents with high levels of self-esteem display better mental health and fewer problem behaviors (Arslan, 2019; Jiang, 2020). For example, Babore and colleagues (2017) found that low self-esteem was related to increased aggression among adolescents aged 14–19 years. Marsh et al. (2001) also observed in their longitudinal study that low self-esteem was a significant predictor of adolescents’ aggressive behavior. According to terror management theory, individuals are motivated to pursue positive self-evaluation, because self-esteem buffers anxiety about danger (Greenberg et al., 1986). Therefore, adolescents with high self-esteem will experience more positive emotions and higher self-evaluation when they get along with others, thus reducing the occurrence of defensive behaviors such as aggression. Psychological resilience means teenagers can function well after stress, setbacks, or trauma, and that they can competently handle danger. Rodgers and Rose (2002) found that teenagers with high resilience tend to focus on positive information, which helps them to avoid fixating on negativity and impulsive behavior. Therefore, resilience buffers negative forces or pressures encountered in daily life, promoting adolescents’ positive self-evaluation and allowing them to experience more positive emotions (Greeno et al., 2019; Rodgers & Rose, 2002; Shahram et al., 2021). For example, Veselska et al. (2009) found that increased positive self-esteem was related to adolescents’ resilience. Therefore, we put forward the following hypothesis:

Hypothesis 2: Self-esteem will mediate the negative relationship between resilience and aggression in adolescents.

School campus violence among adolescents is becoming more common, which has negative outcomes for individuals, families, and society (Kokkinos et al., 2017). It is necessary to explore the influencing factors and mechanism of adolescent aggression in order to maintain adolescent mental health and prevent campus violence. Our findings will increase understanding of the mechanism by which resilience influences adolescents’ aggression through the mediator of self-esteem. The hypothesized model is shown in Figure 1.

Participants comprised 513 Chinese adolescents from six middle schools (three junior schools and three senior schools). After excluding invalid questionnaires (straight-lining and nondifferentiation response patterns), we retained 462 valid forms for an effective response rate of 90.06%. Among the respondents, 51.7% (n = 239) were girls and 48.3% (n = 223) were boys, and the age range was between 11 and 18 years (M = 15.10, SD = 1.32). This study was approved by the Ethics Committee of Liaoning Normal University. Before the start of the study we obtained written informed consent from the parents of the participants and from the participants themselves, in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.

All measures were translated from English into Chinese by bilingual researchers to ensure semantic equivalence across the two cultures.

 

Aggression was assessed with the revised Buss–Perry Aggression Questionnaire, proposed by Buss and Perry (1992), which consists of 29 items divided across four dimensions: physical aggression (nine items, e.g., “Once in a while I can’t control the urge to strike another person”), verbal aggression (five items e.g., “When people annoy me, I may tell them what I think of them”), anger (seven items, e.g., “I have trouble controlling my temper”), and hostility (eight items e.g., “I sometimes feel that people are laughing at me behind my back”). Items are rated on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree. The higher the score, the stronger the aggression level of the individual. Satisfactory reliability and validity have been reported among Chinese samples (Pan & Gao, 2016). In this study Cronbach’s alpha was .87.

 

Self-esteem was assessed using the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (Rosenberg, 1965), which is a 10-item self-report measure of global self-esteem. Items are rated on a 4-point Likert scale that ranges from 1 = strongly disagree to 4 = strongly agree. Total scores range from 10 (low level of self-esteem) to 40 (high level of self-esteem). A sample item is “Ultimately, I tend to feel like a failure.” Satisfactory reliability and validity have been shown among Chinese samples (Shi et al., 2017; Zhao et al., 2012). In this study Cronbach’s alpha was .91.

 

This study adopted the Connor–Davidson Resilience Scale (Connor & Davidson, 2003) to measure resilience. The scale consists of 25 items divided into three dimensions: toughness (13 items, e.g., “You can achieve your goals”), powerful (eight items, e.g., “You tend to bounce back after illness or hardship”), and optimism (four items, e.g., “You see the humorous side of things”). Items are rated on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1 = not at all to 5 = always. A higher score indicates a better level of resilience. Satisfactory reliability and validity have been shown among Chinese samples (Yu & Zhang, 2007). In this study Cronbach’s alpha was .89.

Data were analyzed using SPSS 22.0. First, we calculated the bivariate correlations between variables. Second, we tested the mediating effects using hierarchical regression analysis, controlling for age and gender. Finally, we used the bias-corrected bootstrapping method (5,000 samples) to test the 95% confidence interval of the mediating effect.

Table 1 shows there was a positive correlation between resilience and self-esteem, while a negative correlation existed between resilience and aggression. Thus, Hypothesis 1 was supported. Self-esteem was negatively correlated with aggression. Additionally, in the statistical analysis of different aspects of resilience, we found that toughness, power, and optimism exhibited significant positive correlations with self-esteem. Aggression showed a negative correlation with toughness and optimism, although the correlation between aggression and power was not significant. Finally, self-esteem was negatively correlated with anger, hostility, and verbal aggression, but there was no significant correlation between self-esteem and physical aggression.

To test the mediating role of self-esteem between resilience and aggression, we used hierarchical regression modeling. The mediating effect results are shown in Table 2, with gender and age as control variables. The results show that resilience negatively predicted aggression and positively predicted self-esteem; in addition, after incorporating resilience and self-esteem into the model, resilience had no significant predictive effect on aggression. However, the effect of self-esteem on aggression was significant. Thus, self-esteem played a full mediating role between resilience and aggression.

Consistent with our second hypothesis, self-esteem played an intermediary role in the influence of resilience on adolescent aggression. We conducted a bootstrapping analysis to test the significance of the mediating effect in the proposed model. As can be seen in Table 3, the mediating effect of self-esteem was significant, with a 95% confidence interval not containing zero. After controlling for self-esteem, the direct effect of resilience on adolescent aggressiveness was nonsignificant, with a 95% confidence interval including 0. Therefore, self-esteem alone played a mediating role in the relationship between resilience and aggression. The mediation model is shown in Figure 1.

This study employed mediation modeling to test the relationship between adolescents’ resilience and aggression. Our results show that self-esteem played a mediating role in this association. Overall, the study findings provide evidence that self-esteem is an important mechanism linking resilience and aggression in adolescents. This has implications for prevention and intervention efforts.

Resilience and aggression were found to have a significant negative correlation, which is consistent with previous research (Veselska et al., 2009; Wang & Zhong, 2015). We also found that there was a significant positive correlation between self-esteem and resilience, indicating that higher self-esteem in adolescents was associated with greater resilience. Thus, self-esteem and resilience mutually supported each other, affirming the protective role of self-esteem in individual development (Dumont & Provost, 1999).

 

Our result that self-esteem and aggression were significantly and negatively related aligns with various scholars’ findings (Babore et al., 2017; Donnellan et al., 2005). However, some studies have reported finding a positive correlation (Baumeister et al., 1996), indicating the influence of additional moderating factors. These factors, involving environmental and psychological elements, warrant further in-depth investigation to fully understand their impact.

The results of this study are consistent with our research model’s assumptions, with self-esteem serving as a mediator of the relationship between resilience and adolescent aggression. In practical terms, the tenacity, strength, and optimism elements of resilience do not directly change the aggressive behavior of adolescents, but, rather, change their attitude and attribution methods to influence their self-esteem. When individuals tend to have an optimistic, resilient attitude toward objective events and difficulties, they will make positive attributions, so that the inner self is not threatened, self-esteem is maintained at a high level, and aggression will decrease (Hu et al., 2023). Adolescents with high levels of resilience who are facing difficult events and unfortunate encounters will adopt positive measures and attitudes, which will be beneficial for maintaining a higher level of self-esteem, effectively reducing the occurrence of aggression. In contrast, adolescents with low levels of resilience face life difficulties and cannot cope effectively. Over time, this will increase their sense of learned helplessness (Kesting et al., 2013), decrease their inner self-evaluation, and increase the likelihood of adopting negative coping methods to maintain self-esteem (J. Zhang & Zhang, 2019).

 

We recommend establishing programs in schools to cultivate psychological resilience and enhance self-esteem among adolescents, and improving parents’ scientific parenting skills, especially by conducting regular home–school interaction activities, to reduce aggressive behavior in adolescents. Developing resilience interventions will be useful in schools with unfavorable socioeconomic contexts. Furthermore, existing long-term interventions should be redesigned to improve their effectiveness (Llistosella et al., 2023). Homeroom teachers and mental health professionals should conduct psychological crisis intervention training for students. It is particularly important to screen for and intervene in tendencies toward aggressive behavior. Behavioral and cognitive behavioral techniques are key components of nearly all effective school interventions, whether these are directed by students or teachers (Waschbusch et al., 2019). Schools should set up special funds for the implementation of intervention projects. Government grants, private donations, or cooperation with other educational institutions could also provide funding to support these projects.

This study has limitations. First, caution is needed when interpreting causality in the role of self-esteem as a mediator between resilience and aggression in a cross-sectional study. Future research could use longitudinal studies to investigate causal relationships. Second, this study focused only on the impact and mechanism of resilience on aggression, but resilience is multifaceted, including aspects like optimism, self-efficacy, and social support (Herrman et al., 2011; Masten, 2004). Subsequent studies could explore how specific types of resilience affect adolescents’ problem behaviors. Last, this study relied solely on self-report measures for data collection, which may have introduced social desirability bias into the dataset. For example, the questionnaire may have measured respondents’ inclination toward aggression rather than specific aggressive behaviors. Therefore, future studies could benefit from using alternative measures of aggression, such as experimental studies (Mischkowski et al., 2012).

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