The mediation of self-esteem and hostility in the relationship between social support and dating violence

The aim of this study was to investigate whether self-esteem and hostility mediated the relationship between social support and online and offline dating violence (DV) in 479 university students. All types of social support (family, friends and relevant people) were positively related to self-esteem and negatively related to almost all types of violence. In addition, self-esteem correlated inversely with levels of hostility, and the latter was positively related to online and offline perpetrated DV. Path analyses showed that lower levels of self-esteem and higher levels of hostility mediated the relationship between family social support and online and offline DV. However, social support from friends and significant others only had a direct effect on online DV. Despite the limitations of the cross-sectional design, social support, self-esteem and hostility appear to be important aspects in the prevention and treatment of DV.