TITLE:
Fear of Violence, Family Support, and Well-Being among Urban Adolescents
AUTHORS:
Allyson M. Drinkard, Christopher G. Schell, Richard Adams
KEYWORDS:
Violence, Family Support, Adolescent, Well-Being, Gender
JOURNAL NAME:
Open Journal of Social Sciences,
Vol.7 No.9,
September
16,
2019
ABSTRACT: Our
study examines how the fear of violence and family support influence adolescent
social, psychological, and physical well-being, after controlling for exposure
to violence and a range of demographic factors. We conduct a secondary analysis
of the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) data (N =
1337) using mixed-effect, multi-level regression models for the total sample
and for males only and females only samples. We find that family support is the
most robust, main effects predictor in all three models and across all outcomes.
Our analyses show that the fear of violence is associated with increases in
social problems (especially for boys) and with decreases in self-rated health.
We discuss the results and implications in light of sociological theories on
the health and well-being of adolescents.