An Ecological Approach to Examining Cumulative Violence Exposure Among Urban, African American Adolescents
- PDF / 209,509 Bytes
- 17 Pages / 439.37 x 666.142 pts Page_size
- 96 Downloads / 236 Views
An Ecological Approach to Examining Cumulative Violence Exposure Among Urban, African American Adolescents Angie C. Kennedy
Published online: 27 November 2007 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2007
Abstract Using an ecological approach, this study examined experiences with community, family, and partner violence within a sample of 280 urban, African American high school students. The prevalence of each type of violence by gender, associations between severe violence exposure, and the rate of exposure to multiple types of violence were examined. Findings include high rates of exposure to each type of violence, with significant gender differences on several indicators of community violence and intimate partner violence victimization; among the female students, associations between each type of severe violence exposure; and a very high rate of exposure to two or more types of violence. Implications for social work practice are discussed. Keywords Cumulative violence exposure Urban adolescents Community violence Family violence Intimate partner violence
Introduction Over the past 20 years, researchers have increasingly begun to examine youths’ experiences with violence in their communities, families, and intimate partner relationships. Exposure to these different types of violence has been associated with myriad poor outcomes among children and adolescents, including mental and physical health problems, substance use, delinquent behaviors, poor academic performance, homelessness, elevated risk of revictimization, and adolescent A. C. Kennedy School of Social Work, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA A. C. Kennedy (&) 254 Baker Hall, East Lansing, MI 48824, USA e-mail: [email protected]
123
26
A. C. Kennedy
pregnancy and parenthood (Haber and Toro 2004; Kennedy 2006; Saunders 2003). While research on these different forms of violence in the lives of young people has burgeoned, relatively few studies have examined cumulative exposure to community, family, and partner violence among adolescents, despite evidence suggesting that exposure to multiple types of violence is more common than previously understood. For example, results from the National Survey of Adolescents (NSA) indicated that 20% of adolescents between the ages of 12 and 17 were exposed to at least two types of violence, defined in the study as witnessing family and community violence, physical abuse, physical assault, and sexual assault (Saunders 2003); findings from the Developmental Victimization Survey, a national longitudinal study of multiple victimizations among children and adolescents, showed that nearly a quarter of adolescents (ages 10–17) reported exposure to at least four types of victimization within the year (Finkelhor et al. 2007). Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological approach to human development is very useful in trying to understand how cumulative violence exposure across different domains affects youths, as it emphasizes the ongoing interaction of a developing child within multiple, nested contexts. These
Data Loading...
