Effects children persistent exposure political violence

拟议研究的总体目标是促进我们对持续和极端暴露于政治冲突和暴力如何与认知，情感和自我过程相结合的理解，以影响儿童的心理社会调整和心理健康。在拟议的调查中，我们将在两个相关的样本中研究这些过程：生活在以色列和巴勒斯坦冲突地区的以色列（犹太人和阿拉伯人）和巴勒斯坦儿童。我们建议进行广泛的访谈评估三个队列的儿童和他们的父母从人口的巴勒斯坦阿拉伯和以色列（犹太人和阿拉伯人）的家庭开始时，儿童是8岁，11岁，14岁和14岁时结束，分别为11岁，14岁和17岁。我们将实施队列序贯前瞻性纵向设计。这种设计将使我们能够分析的方式，在生态环境中不断的种族和政治冲突和频繁爆发的政治动机的暴力影响儿童的心理社会调整从童年中期到青春期中期的关键发展时期。拟议项目的设计还使我们能够研究在极端不利的生态条件下有问题和健康的发展途径的背景和个人预测因素和相关因素。因此，我们可以研究持续的政治暴力背景对认知、情绪风格和自我认同过程的出现和维持的影响，这些过程有助于发展持久的行为调整和心理健康模式。此外，我们将探讨家庭和同伴关系的方式，以缓和和调解暴露于政治暴力和儿童调整之间的关联，并检查父母和他们的孩子在政治暴力条件下的行为之间的交易关系。我们的调查有五个主要目标：1）我们将调查暴露于持续和极端政治暴力对不同年龄、性别和不同社会文化背景下儿童正常发育的心理社会和心理健康后果;（二）我们将研究暴露于持续的政治暴力和三组可能调解或调节那些关系：认知信念（例如，关于一般攻击和针对外群成员的攻击的规范信念），情绪调节风格（例如，愤怒控制），和自我认同过程（例如，自我价值）;（3）我们将调查样本中儿童在极端政治暴力暴露方面的个体差异是否与其他形式的暴力暴露有关，包括社区非政治暴力、家庭暴力和学校暴力;（4）我们将研究亲子关系对政治暴力暴露和儿童适应之间关系的潜在中介和调节作用;（5）考察同伴关系对政治暴力暴露与儿童适应之间关系的潜在中介和调节作用。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): The overarching goal of the proposed research is to advance our understanding of how persistent and extreme exposure to political conflict and violence combines with cognitive, emotional, and self processes to influence the psychosocial adjustment and mental health of children. In the proposed investigation, we will study those processes in two linked samples: Israeli (Jewish and Arab) and Palestinian children living in the conflicted areas of Israel and Palestine. We propose to conduct extensive interview assessments on three cohorts of children and their parents drawn from populations of both Palestinian-Arab and Israeli (Jewish and Arab) families beginning when the children are 8, 11, and 14 years old and concluding when the children are, respectively, 11, 14, and 17 years old. We will implement a cohort-sequential prospective longitudinal design. This design will permit us to analyze the ways in which ecological contexts marred by constant ethnic and political conflicts and frequent eruptions of politically motivated violence affect children's psychosocial adjustment from the critical developmental period of middle childhood through middle adolescence. The design of the proposed project also permits us to study the contextual and individual predictors and correlates of problematic and healthy developmental pathways under extremely adverse ecological conditions. Thus, we can examine the influence of an ongoing politically violent context on the emergence and maintenance of cognitions, emotional styles, and self-identity processes that contribute to the development of enduring patterns of behavioral adjustment and mental health. Additionally, we will explore the ways in which family and peer relationships serve to moderate and mediate associations between exposure to political violence and child adjustment, and examine transactional relations between the behavior of parents and their children under politically violent conditions. Our investigation is guided by five principal aims: 1) We will investigate the psychosocial and mental health consequences of exposure to persistent and extreme political violence to the normal development of children, at different ages, by gender, and across different socio-cultural contexts; 2) We will examine the relations between exposure to persistent political violence and three sets of individual factors that potentially could mediate or moderate those relations: cognitive beliefs (e.g., normative beliefs about general aggression and aggression targeted at outgroup members), emotion regulation styles (e.g., anger control), and self-identity processes (e.g., self worth); 3) We will investigate whether individual differences among children in our sample in exposure to extreme political violence are associated with exposure to other forms of violence, including non-political violence in the community, domestic violence, and school violence; 4) We will examine the potential mediating and moderating effects of parent-child relationships on the relation between exposure to political violence and child adjustment; and 5) We will examine the potential mediating and moderating effects of peer relationships on the association between exposure to political violence and child adjustment.