Relational aggression is defined as harming peers’ relationships through exclusion, rumors, and manipulation. Seminal work on adolescent relational aggression has documented its prevalence across diverse cultural settings. However, efforts to investigate the impact of cultural norms on relational aggression are limited. The purpose of the present review is to present the existing research on relational aggression across cultures during adolescence, a developmental period where the importance of peer relations peaks. Emphasis was placed on gender differences in relational aggression cross-culturally. A systematic literature search between 2010 and 2022 yielded 76 published studies, classified according to studies’ characteristics (participants, information source, study’s design), gender differences and relational aggression’s prevalence. Adolescents in European and American countries reported low scores on relational aggression, while the majority of the studies that were conducted in Asia indicated higher engagement in relational aggression. In Africa and Australia, the findings were inconclusive regarding the prevalence of relational aggression. One third of the studies found non-significant gender differences in adolescent relational aggression. The majority of the studies in Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe showed that males scored higher on relational aggression, while in America most of the research demonstrated higher scores for females. Future comparative research on relational aggression during adolescence across cultures is suggested.

The current study investigated the indirect effects of anger on the four forms and functions of relational aggression (i.e., proactive indirect, proactive direct, reactive indirect, reactive direct) through anger rumination in a sample of 1020 Greek adolescents (504 boys). Males used more proactive direct and indirect relational aggression, whereas girls used more anger rumination. Structural equation modeling revealed that anger rumination mediated the link between anger and all forms and functions of relational aggression. Results highlight the importance of studying the impact of cognitive and emotional manifestations on youths’ relational behavior. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

The present study investigated the relationship between Big Five traits-based profiles and humor styles in a sample of 426 Greek preadolescents. Latent Profile Analysis yielded three distinct personality profiles: resilients, average, and undercontrollers. These profiles exhibited significant group differences in humor styles. The resilient profile displayed the highest scores on the two benign humor styles and the lowest on the two malign styles. On the contrary, the under controllers scored lowest on the two benign humor styles and highest on self-defeating humor. Findings showed that the patterns identified in the extant literature between humor, personality, and adjustment generalize to preadolescents. These are discussed with reference to prior work and relevant theoretical implications.

The present study investigated the indirect effects of personality (Big Five) on shyness through two emotion regulation strategies – emotion suppression and cognitive reappraisal – in a community sample of 256 Greek pre-adolescents. Results showed that shyness was positively predicted by both regulation strategies, with emotion suppression constituting the link between shyness and low scores on extraversion and openness. Neuroticism also positively predicted shyness but had no effect through emotion regulation. These associations between personality, emotion regulation and shyness are discussed with respect to the extant literature and relevant theoretical implications.