Longitudinal and Reciprocal Effects in the Association Between School Bullying and Homicidal Ideation During Early Adolescence

Several cross-sectional studies indicated a positive association between school bullying and homicidal ideation during early adolescence. However, few longitudinal studies investigated this association. This study examined whether a bi-directional relationship exists within the longitudinal association between bullying victimization or bullying perpetration and homicidal ideation among early adolescents using a Random Intercept Cross-Lagged Panel Model. A total of 1611 early adolescents (39.5% girls; M_age = 12.50 years, SD = 0.50) were recruited from the Chinese Early Adolescents Cohort study. Data on bullying victimization, bullying perpetration, and homicidal ideation collected during three time points (September 2019, September 2020, and September 2021) were used. Bullying victimization showed a significant positive association with homicidal ideation at the between-person level. Bullying victimization and bullying perpetration had a bi-directional relationship with homicidal ideation at the within-person level. Additionally, this study considered the impact of biological sex-based differences and bullying types on adolescents' homicidal ideation. Based on these findings, school bullying might exhibit unique reciprocal associations with homicidal ideation.