Children's Exposure to Violence Over Space and Time

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The proposed study is designed to advance knowledge about the causes and consequences of exposure to violence (ETV) by focusing on temporal and spatial variation among children in witnessing and experiencing violence, and on the implications of childhood ETV over the life course. It will use three waves of data covering a 6-year period from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) (Wave I: 1995-1996, Wave II: 1998-1999, Wave III: 2002-2002). The PHDCN is a multilevel study in which 7 age cohorts of children and youth were selected from 80 Chicago neighborhoods stratified by race/ethnicity (including homogeneous and heterogeneous compositions) and SES (low, medium and high). The cohorts selected for our study were 6, 9, 12, and 15 at Wave I (N=3,323). Four types of ETV are measured: parent-child physical aggression, inter-spousal violence, violence in the community as rated by both primary caregivers and children, and family and friend suicidality. Focal child and youth outcomes include emotional and behavior problems, academic functioning, and premature transitions to adulthood. Characteristics of the children and their families and neighborhoods will be considered simultaneously. Our analytic plan includes the use of multilevel models, which are ideally suited to the study of children nested in families and neighborhoods, and longitudinal growth-curve and developmental trajectory models, which capitalize on data from multiple time points. The study has four main research aims: 1) to measure ETV in childhood and adolescence at multiple levels of analysis (e.g., neighborhood, family, and individual) and dynamically over time; 2) to examine multilevel correlates and causes of ETV in childhood and adolescence; 3) to examine a range of consequences of ETV in children's and adolescents' lives both concurrently and longitudinally; and 4) to examine multilevel contextually and developmentally sensitive mediators and moderators of ETV effects on child and adolescent outcomes.