Identifying Protective Factors That Reduce Violence Among Maltreated Youth

描述（由申请人提供）：本调查旨在找出预防和/或缓冲青少年侵犯、犯罪和暴力行为的保护因素。数据将来自儿童虐待和忽视的纵向研究（LONGSCAN）。LONGSCAN是对1354名遭受虐待或被认为有遭受虐待风险的儿童进行的最大的前瞻性研究。这个队列中的儿童从4岁开始被仔细跟踪，每两年收集一次广泛的数据，直到18岁。攻击性行为和犯罪行为已经从多个线人那里反复仔细地测量过。该数据集对于检查可能与儿童虐待史和目睹暴力有关的犯罪途径以及检查抵消这些途径的保护性因素是理想的。从4岁到16岁的数据将作为这些拟议分析的研究样本。截至14岁的数据收集已经完成，并将于2009年初完成16岁的访谈。目前，1135名参与者已经完成了一次或多次目标访谈（12,14和16），占基线样本的84%。基线样本和相应的分析样本的性别分布大致相等。超过一半的基线样本是非裔美国人（55.2%），其次是高加索人（25.0%），混血儿（11.2%），拉丁裔/黑人（7.2%）和其他（1.4%）。本研究的目的是：(1)在青少年时期测量的三个时间点上确定风险和保护因素的稳定性以及因素抵消风险的能力，以减少青少年暴力的发生；(2)在每个保护因素的增加下检验累积缓冲效应；(3)对于已经从事暴力和侵略的青少年，确定哪些因素增加了14岁和16岁时持续的可能性。建议的保护因素包括成人的支持性、强制性替代护理、社会技能、学业承诺、邻里社会联系和非正式社会控制、父母监督和亲子关系质量。风险因素包括儿童虐待、接触暴力、早期攻击和犯罪。利用LONGSCAN数据来检查受虐待青年的风险和保护因素，为在青春期的多个时间点探索社会生态模型内部和跨层面的这些因素提供了独特而有力的机会。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This investigation proposes to identify protective factors to prevent and/or buffer youth perpetration of aggression, delinquency, and violent behaviors. Data will be drawn from the Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN). LONGSCAN is the largest prospective study of 1,354 children who have been maltreated or who were thought to be at risk for maltreatment. Children in this cohort have been carefully followed since age 4 with extensive data collected every two years until age 18. Aggressive behavior and delinquency have been carefully measured repeatedly from multiple informants. This dataset is ideal for examining the pathways to delinquency that may be linked to a history of child maltreatment and witnessed violence and for examining protective factors that offset those pathways. Data from ages 4 through 16 will serve as the study sample for these proposed analyses. Data collection has been completed through age 14, and will be completed for the age 16 interviews by the beginning of 2009. Currently, 1,135 participants have completed one or more of the targeted interviews (12, 14, and 16), comprising 84% of the baseline sample. The gender distribution for the baseline sample, and for the corresponding analysis sample, is approximately equally distributed. Slightly over half of the baseline sample is African American (55.2%), followed by Caucasian (25.0%), mixed race (11.2%), Latino/a (7.2%), and other (1.4%). Study aims for this proposal are (1) determine the stability of risk and protective factors and the ability of factors to offset risks in reducing the perpetration of youth violence at three time points measured during the adolescent period, (2) examine the cumulative buffering effect given the addition of each protective factor, and (3) for those youth already engaging in violence and aggression, determine which factors increase the likelihood of desistence at ages 14 and 16. Proposed protective factors include supportive adult, mandated substitute care, social skills, academic commitment, neighborhood social bonding and informal social control, parental monitoring, and parent-child relationship quality. Risk factors include child maltreatment, exposure to violence, early aggression and delinquency. The utilization of the LONGSCAN data to examine risk and protective factors of maltreated youth affords and unique and powerful opportunity to explore these factors within and across levels of the socio-ecological model at multiple time points during adolescence. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Violence is a serious public health problem facing every sector of American society, disproportionately affecting children, adolescents and young adults. We propose to analyze data already collected from the Longitudinal Studies of Child Abuse and Neglect (LONGSCAN) to identify factors that compensate and/or modify the effects of risk on adolescent perpetration of violence and aggression in a high risk sample of youth. This dataset is ideal for examining the pathways to delinquency that may be linked to a history of child maltreatment and witnessed violence and for examining protective factors that offset those pathways.