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The present study of 6- to 13-year-old children in the United States examined bullying victimization's relationships with social disorganization, social structural factors, social relationships, mental health, access to health insurance, and caregiver types. A sample of 12,966 children aged 6 to 13 years was extracted from the 2018 National Survey of Children's Health for secondary data analysis. Logistic regression results indicated that these children's likelihood of being bullied was positively associated with racial discrimination, family violence, child mental health problems (depression, anxiety, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and behavioral/conduct problems), girls, children aged 6 to 10 years, caregiver education level, and nonrelative caregivers; such likelihood also had negative associations with Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, other ethnic minorities, family cohesiveness, caregiver mental health, and caregiver age. Implications included interventions for family support and bullied children's mental health problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Summary: Published literature has demonstrated that strong case manager–client working alliances foster improvement among clients. Reflecting a case-management context, this study explored how working alliances, as perceived by clients, are related to interpersonal capacities (or social support); intrapersonal dynamics; severity of problems facing client; and other client and case manager characteristics. The study included 101 clients and their 26 case managers at four nonprofit social-service agencies. Findings: Working alliances, as perceived by clients, were observed to be associated positively with 3 variables: working alliance as viewed by case manager, length of time client worked with case manager, and client female gender. In turn, client mental-health or substance-use problem was linked to client unfavorable perception of working alliance. No link was observed between client perception of alliance and 6 variables: client social support, goal achievement, problem severity, client–case manager shared ethnicity, case manager work experience, and client age. Applications: The findings suggest that working alliance is collaborative and interactive throughout the helping process. This impacts social work training protocols. Case managers who must establish working alliances with clients need the relevant collaboration skills, which may need to be introduced and practiced at in-service meetings or workshops. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study looked at 991 women surviving intimate partner violence (IPV), exploring several factors in their receipt of IPV services through the child welfare system. A secondary data analysis, the research used longitudinal data from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being II, was conducted to evaluate the relationship between receiving IPV services and child welfare intervention and between such receipt and demographic characteristics. Women in the sample had been substantiated for maltreatment and had lifetime experience of IPV; 15% of these women had received IPV services. Generalized estimation equation results showed likelihood of receiving services increased when the case plan specified needed IPV services. Biological/adoptive mothers retaining custody of children were relatively unlikely to receive IPV services, as were lower income women. Receipt of services was relatively unlikely at the third-wave interview compared with the first-wave interview, but no difference in likelihood of receiving services was found between first- and second-wave interviews. In addition, likelihood of receiving services was not associated here with the number of recent IPV episodes, IPV maltreatment, mother's perceived engagement with caseworker, and mother's race/ethnicity, employment, and education. Some implications for practice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This secondary study examined bullying perpetration’s relationships with social disorganization, social structural factors, social relationships, mental health, and access to health insurance and care. A sample of 30,173 children age 6 to 17 years was extracted from the 2021 National Survey of Children’s Health for secondary data analysis. Logistic regression results demonstrated that these children’s likelihood of bullying perpetration was positively associated with racial discrimination, child age 6 to 10 years, child age 11 to 13 years, parent education level, employed parent, neighbor support, family violence, difficulty parenting the child, child difficulty with peers, child behavioral/conduct problems, family substance use problem, and child receipt of mental health services; such likelihood also had negative associations with safe neighborhood, Black, Asian, other non-Hispanic ethnic minority, parent age, and family cohesiveness. Implications included interventions to promote awareness of racial discrimination for families as well as bully prevention programs in schools and communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This secondary analysis of data describing 3,035 parents, drawn from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being II, identified factors fostering the collaborative alliance of parents and caseworkers within the child welfare system. We used generalized least squares random effects modeling for panel data. We sought associations between caseworker engagement as perceived by parent and parent's interpersonal capacities, intrapersonal dynamics, problem severity, and racial/ethnic background, and between that perception and caseworker turnover. Parents in our sample had been substantiated for maltreatment of their children. Results showed that parent's perceived caseworker engagement was associated positively with seven factors: parent's social support, parent's mental health, kinship care, out-of-home placement, parent's African American ethnicity, parent's Hispanic ethnicity, parent/caseworker shared ethnicity, and family income. Perceived engagement was associated negatively with caseworker turnover (i.e., number of caseworkers assigned, by turns, to parent's case). Implications for practicing social work within the child welfare system are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This longitudinal study applied general strain theory to elaborate specific stressful events' lagged effects on risk of illicit substance use among non-Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black, and Hispanic adolescents, and relatedly evaluated the moderating role of race/ethnicity in explaining illicit use. Data were drawn from five waves representing 9 years (2002–2010) of the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), totaling 16,868 person-waves, and we engaged temporal ordering and generalized estimating equations (GEE) for panel data in STATA for data analysis. Results showed specific events affected risk of illicit substance use differentially across racial/ethnic groups. Strains commonly encountered in disorganized spaces affected non-Hispanic White's risk. Measured strains did not affect non-Hispanic Black respondents and findings for Hispanic respondents point to the family as a possible strain. Results indicated legal drug use and depression increased risk of illicit use greatly. Race/ethnicity's role in illicit use's associations with several variables illustrates differential implications for racial/ethnic groups in policy and preventive interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated factors in women's disclosure of intimate partner violence (IPV) to medical professionals. Its sample of 3,226 women surviving IPV was extracted from the National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey public-use dataset, dated 2010. The dichotomous outcome variable was told medical professional about IPV. Explanatory variables were physical violence experienced in the past year, need for medical services for IPV, injury, fear, poor physical health, number of health problems, poor mental health, African American, Latina, other ethnic minority, education, family income, inability to afford seeing doctor, age, and being married. Logistic regression results showed likelihood of IPV disclosure increased with 31 or more physical IPV episodes in preceding year, needed medical services for IPV, IPV-related injury, 2 or more health problems, fear of partner, poor mental health, inability to afford seeing doctor, and age 55 and over. Disclosure likelihood was decreased by other ethnic minority and absence of high school graduation. Our findings support standardized protocols identifying recent IPV, IPV injury, and multiple health problems, along with corresponding response training for medical professionals. Our findings also support making victim advocates and behavioral health specialists available in medical facilities to address patients' fears and mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This examination of minor and serious delinquency among eighth graders in a large southern Chinese city, Guangzhou, also compared groups of these students, observing differences between the delinquency of migrants and that of urban natives. Data used were originally collected for the study "Stuck in the City: Migration and Delinquency Among Migrant Adolescents in Guangzhou." The present study asked whether and how various sources of strain and social control factors explained students' delinquency, questioning how meaningfully migration status moderated several of the observed delinquency relationships. Of students in the sample, 741 reported being natives of Guangzhou, and 497 reported migrating to Guangzhou from a rural area. The study conceptualized internal migration as a strain factor leading to delinquency, but the analyses did not suggest direct association between internal migration and delinquency. Results generally supported Agnew's theory, and, what's more, they tended to confirm that migration status moderated juvenile delinquency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: While the literature confirms the applicability of routine activity/lifestyle theory in studying individual crime victimization, this study asks whether neighborhood disorganization as well as—on the level of the nation—income inequality, attitudes about gender equality, and the meeting of citizens’ basic human needs are associated with opportunity for crime and so might contribute to the explanation of victimization. The study measures demographic variables that could indicate the presence of motivated offenders and likely crime targets, as well as the absence of effective guardians. Methods: The data come from the sixth wave of the World Values Survey (collected 2010–2014), from the Social Progress Index Report, and from information compiled by the World Bank. The present sample numbers 64,861 respondents, representing 46 countries. Results: The data analysis suggests that risk of victimization increases in the presence of income inequality and gender equality, and decreases where people’s basic human needs are met. The relationship between neighborhood disorganization and one employed victimization measure was found to be moderated by attitudes about gender equality. Conclusions: Further investigation of the role of opportunity and routine activity/lifestyle factors (macro- and individual-level) could improve understanding of victimization, particularly related to the complex interplay between structural and cultural predictors of victimization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study investigates how adolescents’ experiences of violent victimization exert short- and mid-term effects on their involvement in delinquency. The study compares and contrasts delinquency trajectories of youths whose experiences of violent victimization differ. A multilevel growth-curve modeling approach is applied to analyze data from five waves of the National Youth Survey. The results show that, although delinquency involvement increases as youths experience violent victimization, delinquency trajectories differ with the type of violent victimization, specifically, parental versus non-parental victimization. Violent victimization by parents produced a sharp initial decline in delinquency (short-term effect) followed by a rapid acceleration (mid-term effect). In turn, non-parental violence showed a stable trend over time. The findings have important implications for prevention and treatment services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This temporal-ordered causal analysis of secondary data examined impacts of collaborative engagement, chronic health conditions, health and medical services, maltreatment types, and out-of-home placements on health of young children from families participating in the child welfare system. A national sample of 1,087 abused or neglected children (under age 5) was employed. Results suggested that a child's chronic health condition, receiving health and medical services, and receiving emergency medical services lowered the child's health level measured at subsequent interview, but collaborative engagement raised the child's health level measured at subsequent interview. Results identified, moreover, lower next-wave health levels among Hispanic and/or younger children, children cared for by nonbiological parents, and children who lived in lower income families. Implications for policy and intervention are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research adopted the perspective of the multiple disadvantage model to explore racial disparities in intimate partner violence (IPV) against women and IPV’s links to social structural factors, social relationships, substance use, and health/mental health and access to related services. The study used data from 6,588 women who completed the National Violence Against Women Survey; linear regression was conducted separately for four ethnic groups. Results consistently showed physical assaults to increase with posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms. For African Americans, increases in assaults were linked to injury, disclosing IPV to friends/family as well as medical professionals, Medicaid use, and drug use; decreases, in turn, were linked to past assault by ex-partners. For Latinas, increases in assaults were associated with eight factors: being married, number of ex-partners, depression, disclosing IPV to friends/family and disclosing to mental-health professionals, drug use, alcohol abstinence, and partner’s frequent alcohol use. For European Americans, increases in assaults were linked to number of ex-partners, injury, low income, Medicaid use, disclosing IPV to friends/family as well as mental-health professionals, and alcohol abstinence; decreases were associated with age and with other health insurance coverages. For women of other ethnicity, increases were linked to number of ex-partners, disclosing IPV to mental-health professionals, Medicaid use, drug use, and woman’s own as well as partner’s alcohol abstinence; decreases in this ethnicity category were linked to past assault by ex-partners. Intervention and policy implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Applying Aday and Andersen’s health services utilization model, this examination of racial disparities in women’s experience of intimate partner violence also looked at racial disparities in mental disorders and in use of mental health professionals’ help. We conducted a secondary data analysis of 6,589 women completing the National Violence Against Women Survey. Per our linear regression results, minority women, versus White, tended proportionally to seek less help from mental health professionals. Help seeking by African American women was less likely if they were using illegal drugs; among Hispanic women, additional threats from partner curtailed help seeking from mental health professionals. “Other ethnic minority” women’s help seeking decreased with their use of stimulants. Implications for intervention are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a temporal-ordering causal analysis, we explored impacts of parent’s receipt of services and caseworker–parent collaborative engagement on substantiated child maltreatment re-report. Our sample of 2,368 parents came from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being. Using generalized estimating equations, we found likelihood of substantiated re-report to drop significantly in association with collaborative engagement, length of current in-home spell, and family income. In turn, parental alcohol dependence, initial substantiated sexual maltreatment, and prior in-home spells were linked to increased likelihood. Practice implications are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examined risk and protective factors at work when adolescents change from a non-drinking alcohol-use pattern to either non-heavy drinking or heavy drinking. Using a sample of 1,725 non-drinkers extracted from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health, we conducted multinomial logistic regression and found that likelihood of change from non-drinking to non-heavy drinking was associated positively with safe neighborhood, female, peers’ drinking, emotional maltreatment, and delinquent behaviors. We found a negative association between such likelihood and being African American. We found that likelihood of change from non-drinking to heavy drinking was associated positively with peers’ drinking, depressive feelings, drug use, and repeating a grade(s) at school. We found a negative association between such likelihood and having a married mother, being African American or some other non-Hispanic minority ethnicity, and maternal supervision. Implications for intervention and future research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study of Turkish adolescents and cigarette smoking, we applied general strain theory, conceptualizing smoking as a coping strategy for various types of strain and negative emotions associated with strain. Our secondary data were collected via a survey prepared (in English, by the Icelandic Center for Social Research and Analysis, later translated into Turkish) for the Youth in Europe Project fighting drug use by urban European students. The present data came from students in the populous Bagcilar district of Istanbul, Turkey, where in 2008, 10th-grade students completed the questionnaire. Our final sample included 1,949 students. Logistic regression showed cigarette smoking (both lifetime and 30-day) to be associated with strain arising from school, from negative life events, and from violent victimization. Smoking also appeared linked to negative affect, specifically anger and depression. Gender was observed to moderate a link between lifetime cigarette smoking and anger. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A study with 591 low-income women examined domestic violence's role in treatment seeking for mental health or substance abuse problems. (The women resided in one of two California counties.) Following Aday's behavioral model of health services utilization, the secondary data analysis considered the women's need, enabling, and predisposing factors. Generalized estimating equations analyzed the women's longitudinal records of treatment seeking. Results showed that those in the sample who were likely to seek treatment had experienced three or more controlling behaviors and only one abusive behavior. Multivariate data analysis showed treatment-seeking women were likely to be white and older; responsible for few dependent children; not graduates of high school; employed; not participating in Medicaid; diagnosed; and perceiving a need for treatment. The implications of these results for services and policies are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Guided by Anderson’s theory of the code of the street, this study explored social mechanisms linking individual-level disadvantage factors with the adoption of beliefs grounded in the code of the street and with drug trafficking and gun carrying—the co-occurring behavior shaping violence among young men in urban areas. Secondary data were employed from a sample of male inmates and a sample of male high school students. Data analysis indicated that the social disadvantage factor absent father significantly predicted this co-occurring behavior in the inmate sample, whereas the social disadvantage factor history of expulsion did so in the student sample. In both samples, race and adopting beliefs about gun carrying from the code of the street were significant predictors of drug trafficking and gun carrying. The results do not suggest that such code-based beliefs’ impact on drug trafficking and gun carrying differs by race. Implications for social policy are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Effects on delinquency made by grade level, school type (based on grade levels accommodated), and prosocial school climate were assessed, controlling for individual-level risk and protective factors. Data were obtained from the Substance Abuse Services Division of Alabama’s state mental health agency and analyzed via hierarchical linear modeling, yielding three major findings. First, grade level’s effects on delinquency varied strongly by school type, although in the multivariate context the interaction effects of grade level and school type were not significant. Second, prosocial school climate significantly explained differential delinquency rates. Third, the requirement that students change schools upon reaching a certain grade level does, as the literature notes, appear to lead to a poor environmental fit for students’ developmental needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data from the 2005 Monitoring the Future survey were used to examine relationships between school-related factors and high school seniors' lifetime methamphetamine use. The study applied logistic regression techniques to evaluate effects of social bonding variables and social learning variables on likelihood of lifetime methamphetamine use. The results confirmed that likelihood of such use was higher when social bonding factors were weak and social learning factors were strong. Results also showed the social bonds' impact to be mediated by social learning factors. Policy implications are discussed briefly. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The data set employed in the present study came from interviews with arrestees conducted between 1999 and 2001 as well as from their official arrest records obtained from jail administrators. A total of 238 arrestees ages 18 to 25 constituted the final sample. Event history analysis examined each arrestee's movement from periods of no arrests to periods including arrests for any of four types of offense; background variables were controlled, and relevant time-varying factors became the explanatory factors. The results show a tendency among these arrestees to specialize, to varying degrees, in violent offenses, drug offenses, miscellaneous offenses, and property offenses. Evidence of versatility is presented. Anticrime measures are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research examines both risk and protective factors in the frequency of drug and alcohol use by Alabama public school students in grades six through 12. Factors are measured at the individual and county level. The data on both levels were obtained by the Substance Abuse Services Division of the Alabama Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation. The results of data analysis--comprising hierarchical linear modeling techniques (HLM)--show that, overall, the individual protective factors do reduce student use of alcohol and drugs, controlling for certain risk factors. The county-level structural-disadvantage factor, however, operates in direction opposite to expectations. According to the results, structural disadvantage reduces rather than increases student use of all drugs. The implications of the important role structural variables play in individual drug use are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study used data from the 1991 and 1992 Drug Use Forecasting projects and the 1990 census data to test the hypothesis that certain "structural disadvantage factors" identified by social conflict theory (Goode. 1997, 1999) contribute to explaining arrestees' use of cocaine and/or opiates. Using hierarchical nonlinear modeling techniques, this study explored whether social-control factors and demographic factors were effective predictors of arrestees' drug use. It also questioned whether the effects of such factors on drug use varied with the degree of structural disadvantage of the arrestees' residential districts. Overall, the study resulted in support for a link between a group of hard-drug users and contextual factors of structural disadvantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our initial study compared drinking patterns among high-school students from three cultural groups (Chinese adolescents in Hong Kong, adolescents of Chinese origin living in Chicago, American adolescents in the United States). While the present study focuses on one group, Chinese- Americans, it devotes some effort to comparing this group's drinking patterns to those of Chinese adolescents in Hong Kong, and those of adolescents generally in the United States. We hypothesize that the acculturation status of Chinese-American students (indicated by an index developed in the study and by other acculturation factors defined later) is related to their drinking status. We also hypothesize that, in addition to its role in whether or not these adolescents drink, acculturation helps determine how much they drink. Specifically, the study sought to evaluate whether data support one of three acculturation hypotheses (simple acculturation, damaging culture, and acculturation stress hypotheses). An acculturation index was constructed based on the variables residence, place of birth, language used at home, language used with friends, friends' nationality, and movie preferences. Other relevant acculturation factors included the number of years that respondents lived in the United States, the number of years that their friends lived in the United States, and the number of movies rented in a month in Chinatown. The results did not support any one of the three acculturation hypotheses. Adolescents of Chinese origin living in the United States were less likely to be drinkers than adolescents from the other two cultures (Chinese adolescents in Hong Kong and American adolescents in the United States), and they tended to conform to drinking practices found in Hong Kong. Mixed results were found between acculturation factors and drinking levels. Modification of existing acculturation ideas were needed to explain drinking patterns among Chinese-American adolescents. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A trend study was undertaken to evaluate the relationship between onset age of drinking and the use of drugs. Despite the fact that drinking is illegal for teenagers, general acceptance of alcohol use in mid-adolescence prompts many underage individuals to drink. However, an early start in drinking not only suggests a general tolerance for deviance, it also indicates a violation of role definitions. As explained by problem behavior theory, individuals' tolerance of drug use--or the lack it--may exert an impact on lifetime and on current drug-using behavior. It was hypothesized that the younger individuals are when they start to drink, the more frequently they will engage in drinking and also in illegal drug use. Using the repeat survey data collected in the "Monitoring the Future" project, the present study offered a new method of partially evaluating the generality of the deviance hypothesis. By comparing 21 years of trends seen in the effects of onset age of drinking on the use of different drugs, this study derived some support for the generality of deviance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Semi-structured interviews were conducted among approximately 100 high school students each in Hong Kong and one small mid-western town in the United States. We intended 1) to examine differences between the two cultures in sociocultural factors affecting the students' first drinking experience, their drinking levels, and definitions of alcohol use; and 2) to see whether gender, differences in addition to cultural differences, influence the above variables and associations among these variables. As expected, American adolescents are more likely than Hong Kong adolescents to drink, to drink more frequently, and to drink higher quantities. Hong Kong adolescents tended to take their first drink earlier than U.S. adolescents. However, an association between early and later drinking present in the U.S. sample, was not found in the Hong Kong one. Definitions of alcohol use were influential in determining drinking levels. The data also show that gender differences in drinking levels and the social processes leading to alcohol use are more pronounced in the U.S. than in Hong Kong. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Examines how selected internal and external control variables influence lifetime use, frequency of use and cessation of use of marijuana. Analysis of relationships among variables; Explaining frequency of marijuana use; Explaining lifetime marijuana use.

Using a survey of 808 male and female college students at a medium-sized state university in the Deep South, this study compared the drinking behavior of and the social mechanisms leading to alcohol use, in the two gender groups. The results show that males are more likely than females to drink to intoxication. Three main factors can account for this difference. First, males are more likely than females to be associated with others who present prodrinking norms and drinking models. Second, females are more likely to be affected by their parents, and association with parents' more restrictive norms results in less favorable alcohol-use definitions among females, and, in turn, a lower level of alcohol use. Third, peer drinking norms, which are more permissive, exert a stronger impact on male definitions of alcohol use and level of intoxication than on female definitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A total of 493 college students from a medium-sized state university and a small, predominantly black university in Alabama were involved in an alcohol-use survey in the spring of 1991. The respondents were all nondrinkers in their senior year of high school. The aim was to determine whether the social factors of institutional type, Greek affiliation, student living arrangements, and parental, peer, and religious attitudes toward alcohol use would influence drinking behavior during the college years. In other words, this study was designed to partial out some of the campus factors that may influence a nondrinker to begin using alcohol. Among the respondents, 46.5% started to drink in college. When the above factors were simultaneously estimated within a logistic regression context, only friends' negative attitude toward alcohol use and Greek affiliation significantly predicted students' drinking habits. If students did not have friends who discouraged them from using alcohol, and if they were affiliated with a fraternity or sorority, they were three times more likely to become drinkers in college as were students to whom the two conditions did not apply. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With data from the 2004 General Social Survey, the study examined effects of religiosity and spirituality on substance abuse. Also explored was whether and how social bonding mediates religiosity's effects on substance abuse. The results show that religiosity was negatively associated with substance abuse and, further, that social bonding variables did somewhat mediate this negative relationship between the two. Additionally, and as expected, with religiosity controlled, the likelihood of substance abuse increased along with increasing spirituality, in the models. Policy implications and further research needs are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]