Objective: The impact of exposure to violence must be considered within the context of a larger constellation of nonviolent life stressors faced by youth in underresourced communities. This study examined nonviolent life stressors, two types of violence exposure, and their associations with trauma-related distress and problem behaviors. Method: Participants were a predominantly African American (80%) sample of early adolescents (Mage = 12.9 years) living in communities with high rates of crime. Structural equation models examined the extent to which nonviolent life stressors and violence exposure (witnessing violence and physical victimization) were associated with adolescents’ frequencies of trauma-related distress (reexperiencing traumatic events, avoidance, and hyperarousal) and problem behaviors (physical aggression, delinquent behavior, and substance use). Results: Nonviolent life stressors, witnessing violence, and physical victimization were each significantly associated with all three symptoms of trauma-related distress and with each of the three problem behaviors. In each case, stronger relations with trauma-related distress and problem behaviors were found for nonviolent life stressors than for physical victimization. After controlling for nonviolent life stressors, both types of violence exposure remained significantly associated with problem behaviors but differed in their patterns of association with trauma-related distress. No gender differences were found among these relations. Conclusion: These findings highlight the need to control for nonviolent life stressors when examining the impact of violence exposure on adjustment. Furthermore, mental health providers may be missing important information related to adolescents’ symptomatology if they fail to inquire about trauma-related distress when adolescents deny exposure to violent and life-threatening events.

The purpose of this study was to identify subgroups of adolescents with distinct perceptions of parental messages supporting fighting and nonviolence. Latent class analysis identified four subgroups among 2,619 urban middle school students (90% African American; 52% female): messages supporting fighting (32%), messages supporting nonviolence (29%), mixed messages (23%), and no messages (16%). We found significant differences across subgroups in their frequency of physical aggression and peer victimization and beliefs about the use of aggressive and nonviolent responses to peer provocation. Beliefs significantly mediated the relation between parental messages subgroups and both aggression and victimization. Findings illustrate the heterogeneity in the messages urban adolescents perceive from their parents, as well as relations with adolescents’ beliefs and behavior.

Introduction: This study examined the degree to which peers can serve as a protective factor to mitigate the negative effects of exposure to violence (i.e., victimization, witnessing violence) on adolescents' physical aggression. Four speciic dimensions of peer inluence were examinedfriends' support for nonviolence, friends' support for ighting, peer pressure for ighting, and friends' delinquent behavior. Methods: Analyses were conducted on four waves of data collected every 3 months (i.e., fall, winter, spring, summer) from a predominantly African-American (78%) sample of 2575 sixth, seventh, and eighth graders attending three public middle schools in the United States. The sample was 52% female, with a mean age of 12.3 years (SD = 1.00). Results: Findings for relations with victimization differed by sex. For boys, low levels of friends' delinquent behavior attenuated the relation between victimization and changes in physical aggression across all three waves. The protective effect of low levels of peer pressure for ighting was only evident in the winter for boys, whereas the protective effect of friends' support for nonviolence was only evident in the summer. For girls, high levels of friends' support for nonviolence attenuated the relation between victimization in the winter and changes in physical aggression in the spring. In contrast, none of the peer factors moderated the relation between witnessing violence and physical aggression. Conclusions: Findings suggest that prevention and interventions that increase positive peer inluences and decrease negative peer inluences may beneit adolescents by reducing risks associated with victimization.Adolescents in underserved communities experience high rates of violence exposure (Richards et al., 2015), which has been associated with a variety of negative outcomes (see review by Fowler et al., 2009). Exposure can occur directly through experiencing victimization or indirectly by witnessing violence (Buka et al., 2001). This is an important distinction based on indings indicating that the strength of relations between violence exposure and adjustment dificulties varies based on the form of exposure. This was highlighted in a meta-analysis by Fowler et al. (2009) that found that although all forms of violence exposure were positively associated with externalizing behavior (e.g., aggressive and delinquent behavior), being a victim of community violence was a stronger predictor than being a witness or hearing about violence. The high prevalence of violence exposure and its adverse consequences highlight the need for research to identify protective factors that may reduce negative consequences experienced by adolescents in communities that place them at increased risk for violence exposure. The purpose of this study was to examine peers as a potential

The purpose of this study was to examine whether adults moderated the relations between youths' community violence exposure and subsequent physical aggression. Participants were 2575 middle school students (Mage = 12.3, SD = 1.00; 52% female) in the southeastern U.S. who completed surveys collected in the fall, winter, spring, and summer. The sample was predominantly African American (72%). High adult support was associated with weaker relations between exposure to violence in the fall and aggression in the winter among male adolescents. High adult support was related to weaker relations between victimization in the fall and aggression in the winter among female adolescents. Strategies promoting supportive adult relationships may benefit male adolescents by buffering the adverse impact of community violence exposure.

No abstract