Season of Year and Adolescents' Risky Behaviors As Predictors of Exposure to Community Violence

Introduction: Adolescents are exposed to community violence at disproportionately high rates. Both witnessing community violence and direct victimization in the community are associated with a variety of negative outcomes, including internalizing problems, externalizing behaviors, and poor school adjustment. However, little is known about the factors that place adolescents at risk for exposure to community violence. We hypothesized that rates of exposure to community violence would vary by season of the year and would be related to adolescents' risk behaviors, including delinquency, substance use, and deviant peer associations. We further hypothesized that the influence of adolescents' risk behaviors would vary across seasons.

Method: Participants were 881 students enrolled in three urban, high-risk, low socioeconomic status middle schools in the southeastern United States. The sample was predominantly African American and 53% female. Data were collected every three months between the winter of 2011 and the spring of 2012 using computer-administered surveys of random samples of students at each school as part of a larger project. Students completed measures of their frequency of witnessing or experiencing victimization in the community over the past year; their frequency of substance use and nonviolent delinquent behaviors in the past 30 days; and their friends’ involvement in deviant behaviors within the past three months.

Results: Analyses controlling for school and intervention condition indicated that both witnessing violence and violence victimization were directly related to season of the year, peer deviance, and delinquency. Contrary to expectations, exposure to community violence was lower in the summer compared to fall, winter, and spring. Male gender was associated with higher frequencies of violence victimization but not witnessing violence. Season moderated the relations of exposure to violence with drug use and delinquency. Drug use and delinquency were more strongly associated with both witnessing violence and violence victimization in the fall, winter, and spring than in the summer.

Discussion: This study adds to the literature by indicating that season of the year and adolescents’ risky behaviors are linked to rates of violence exposure. These findings suggest that reducing adolescents’ engagement in drug use and delinquency, and deviant peer associations, may have not only direct benefits, but indirect benefits by reducing their exposure to violence as both witnesses and victims. Future research is needed to identify the mechanisms that lead to lower rates of exposure in the summer, and how summer buffers the effects of risky adolescent behavior.