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We describe the development and validation of a new instrument to measure the non-academic impact of education abroad, the Global Engagement Measurement Scale (GEMS). Based on a review of the extant literature, we developed a 37-item instrument containing scales for four specific constructs of interest: a) cultural engagement; b) ambiguity tolerance; c) knowledge of the host site; and d) diversity openness. The measure was piloted with 263 education abroad students before and after a 5- week education abroad program. We examined the scales’ underlying factor structure, reliability, and sensitivity to education abroad program effects. Results indicate strong reliability and statistically significant increases across all scales following education abroad experiences. The GEMS instrument is brief and easy to administer, publically available, and includes important constructs for assessing the impact of education abroad. Additionally, the GEMS could be used to assess campus internationalization efforts with domestic and international students.

Firearm-related homicides, suicides, and unintentional injuries continue to undermine the wellbeing and safety of children and adolescents. According to 2010 statistics, homicide and suicide are the second and third leading causes of death, respectively, among youth ages 10 to 19 years. Firearms are involved in a substantial proportion of youth homicides and suicides. Despite the protective benefits of storing guns and ammunition safely, few gun-owning families do so. Health and mental health care providers in pediatric settings can play an important role in educating families about gun safety and in preventing youth involvement in gun violence. This article reviews developmental risk factors for involvement in youth gun violence, as well as evidencebased community programs to prevent gun violence. We then discuss ways in which health and mental health care providers can prevent youth gun violence and promote safety.

This paper reports on the development and piloting of the Madres a Madres (Mothers to Mothers) program, a new, community-based parent training program designed for immigrant Latina mothers and their children. Promotoras, or female community health workers of Latina background, delivered the program in a home visitation format. A total of 194 mothers and 194 focal children (87 male, 107 female) ages 7-12 were randomized to the intervention (113 mother-child dyads) or wait-list control condition (81 mother-child dyads) over the study period. Outcomes of interest were mother-reported parenting skills, broad family functioning, and child externalizing and internalizing behaviors. Data collection occurred at pretest, 3-month posttest, and 9-month follow-up periods. Multilevel growth models revealed increases in intervention mothers' reported parenting skills, family support, and family organization, and reductions in child internalizing behavior from pretest to follow-up, relative to the control condition. Outcomes did not vary by focal child age, gender, nativity status, or mother acculturative status (years in the United States). Findings are discussed in the context of future directions for research on the Madres a Madres program and on the implementation and dissemination of empirically-supported parent training practices to culturally diverse families.

The current study examined the relations among self-esteem, approving normative beliefs about bullying, school climate, and bullying perpetration using a large, longitudinal sample of children from elementary, middle, and high school. Self-report surveys were collected at two points in time over the course of 1 year from 7,299 ethnically diverse students (47.8% males, 52.2% females) in 5th, 8th, and 11th grades in 78 schools or community centers across Colorado. Results of ordinary least squares regression analyses indicated that self-esteem, school climate, and normative approval measured at Time 1 significantly predicted self-reported bullying perpetration 1 year later at Time 2, controlling for Time 1 bullying. Further, the effect of self-esteem on bullying perpetration was moderated by perceptions of school climate. When perceptions of school climate were negative (indicating poor school climate), high self-esteem predicted higher levels of bullying perpetration. In contrast, when perceptions of schoo...

IntroductionTHERE IS GLOBAL INTEREST in promoting healthy youth development and preventing antisocial and problem behaviour during adolescence.1 Not only is positive development an important goal in its own right, linked to academic achievement and socioeconomic success,2 but many social and emotional competencies also decrease risk for antisocial behaviours that compromise individual health and development and exact costs for society.3 Among adolescent problem behaviours, rising rates of youth violence worldwide have been a particular cause for concern and are considered a major public health problem. Nowhere is this problem more severe than in the Caribbean region, where homicide rates for this age group are among the highest in the world.4 Within the Caribbean, the highest documented homicide rates are in Jamaica, at approximately 60 per 100,000 islandwide, rising to 140 per 100,000 in inner-city communities of Kingston, the capital city.5Focusing on Jamaica, these high rates of violence, particularly among youth, have been accompanied by repeated calls to develop and implement effective programmes. International donors, governmental ministries, health systems, and non-profit agencies have pushed for the development of empirically supported programmes and policies to prevent and mitigate aggression and violence from the early years through adolescence and beyond. There is a clear need for greater monitoring and evaluation of programmes which target youth, and a policy mandate to this effect might be useful. However, to date, the majority of available programmes have not been carefully evaluated, making it difficult to differentiate programmes that are popular and/or garner media attention from those that demonstrate evidence of effectiveness. In Jamaica and elsewhere in the Caribbean, there has been relatively little progress in developing coordinated responses to youth violence prevention and conducting rigorous scientific studies of programme outcomes.An important first step in building capacity for this type of evaluation is to develop a reliable and valid youth self-report assessment tool to measure risk and to establish programme impact. This includes long-term impact on aggressive and violent behaviours as well as short-term effects on proposed mediators of change, that is, those attitudes, skills and beliefs that are targeted directly by the intervention because of their association with aggression and violence. Further, given that many youth violence prevention programmes emphasise positive youth development, these mediators should reflect core competencies for positive development that are protective against youth violence and also lead to productive engagement in society, greater health, and enhanced well-being.There is debate regarding the relevant contributions of various factors within youth development, especially as regards antisocial behaviour, and about interventions which can improve outcomes.6 We do not review that literature here, rather we underscore the need to have in place an instrument which has been shown to be valid and reliable within the cultural context in order to properly assess both contributing factors and interventions in a systematic and repeatable way. The present study reports on the development and validation of the Jamaica Youth Survey. This survey was developed as part of a project funded by the World Bank to evaluate individual-level programmes for promoting well-being and preventing violence among teenage boys and girls (ages 12-18 years) in Jamaica. Short-term outcomes included five core competencies for healthy development that have been linked empirically with aggression and violence (described below) and that typically are targeted by community-based positive youth development and prevention programmes. Long-term outcomes emphasised distinct types of aggressive and violent behaviour and aggressive propensity (intent to behave aggressively). All items and scales were modified from previously validated instruments. …

Bullying is an important social problem that occurs within a bounded social setting. As such, it is best understood by analyzing the social dynamics that produce and sustain it. However, previous research has tended to view bullying as a manifestation of personal pathology or amorphous characteristics of contexts. The present study addresses this gap in the literature by applying the construct of collective efficacy to account for variations in the frequency of bullying perpetration within schools. Just as collective efficacy provides a theoretical foundation for understanding the dynamics of bullying in schools, these settings also provide an ideal social context for testing collective efficacy theory. The reason is that schools are clearly defined contexts with regular, ongoing social interactions among students, teachers, school staff, and administrators. In the present study, both lagged cross-sectional (LCS) models and fall-to-spring change (FSC) models were estimated to determine the empirical relations between student perceptions of collective efficacy and bullying perpetration, using data collected from 7,299 youth in fifth, eighth, and eleventh grades in 78 schools. Two key results were found: (1) perceptions of collective efficacy were negatively, significantly, and substantially associated with the frequency of bullying perpetration within schools over time, and (2) of the three components of collective efficacy (cohesion and trust, informal social control by adults, informal social control by peers) identified in a principal components factor analysis, cohesion and trust had the strongest estimated effects in all models estimated. Findings suggest that collective efficacy theory can provide a useful framework for capturing important dynamics of bullying in schools with important implications for prevention and intervention.

Child development research has a rich history of informing practices in families, schools, communities, and other contexts that shape children’s development and enhance their health and well being (Huston, 2008; Senn, 1975). Understanding developmental processes in typically and atypically developing children provides guidance on how to optimize positive development as well as how to prevent or minimize problematic outcomes. One of the most visible and well-known examples over the last few decades is the early childhood movement, including Head Start and related efforts to enhance early child development and school readiness (Shonkoff, 2010). Based on a convergence of solid evidence on diverse but related topics including normative cognitive, social, and emotional development, early brain plasticity, the short- and long-term impacts of early intervention, and cost–benefit analyses, early childhood programs have attained status as valued investments, both in the United States and internationally (Fox & Rutter, 2010; Heckman, 2006). The importance of grounding policy and practice in the scientific study of children’s development is consistent with the relatively new and rapidly evolving domain of translational research. Initially, this orientation emerged to increase the connection between the study of basic processes and their applications to health improvement and treatment in the field of medicine, characterized as connecting ‘‘bench to bedside’’ (Insel, 2005). This critical shift emphasizing the end usability of research on basic processes for health improvement became influential in other areas such as social psychology (Tashiro & Mortensen, 2006) and developmental psychopathology (Cicchetti & Toth, 2006). Within developmental studies, there has been increased focus on the connection between normative development, atypical development, and intervention, including the importance of understanding atypical development through a normative lens that can guide interventions (Cicchetti & Gunnar, 2009).

In the present study, quantitative and qualitative data are presented to examine individual and contextual predictors of bullying and victimization and how they vary by age and gender. Two waves of survey data were collected from 2,678 elementary, middle, and high school youth attending 59 schools. In addition, 14 focus groups were conducted with 115 youth who did not participate in the survey. Changes in both bullying and victimization were predicted across gender and age by low self-esteem and negative school climate, with normative beliefs supporting bullying predicting increases in bullying only. Focus group comments provided insights into the dynamics of bullying, highlighting its connection to emergent sexuality and social identity during adolescence. Findings are discussed in terms of their implications for preventive antibullying interventions in schools.

At present, there is limited evidence supporting the effectiveness of family-based intervention programs to prevent violence or related behavior problems with Latino youth and families. Although progress has been made, a number of important issues remain. In this article, the authors review several of the more prominent interventions for Latino youth and families, highlighting how they were adapted to or developed for Latino culture. They begin by discussing cultural sensitivity and how it affects the design, implementation, and adaptation of youth violence prevention programs. Following this, the authors review and discuss programs adapted for Latino families followed by programs developed specifically for Latino families. They highlight four primary components of family-based programs that have been linked most frequently to prevention outcomes: (a) improving parental monitoring, (b) increasing family cohesion, (c) increasing networking across families, and (d) empowering families to access resources more effectively.

The authors of this article consider how education researchers can improve school violence and school safety research by (a) examining gaps in theoretical, conceptual, and basic research on the phenomena of school violence; (b) reviewing key issues in the design and evaluation of evidence-based practices to prevent school violence; and (c) suggesting new directions for a translational science agenda that can inform policy and practice. The authors describe international empirical approaches that help match annual school safety monitoring data with specific evidence-based practices for each school site, school district, or region. The systemic exploration of successful large-scale applications of evidence-based programs at the district, regional, and state levels could inform theoretical paradigms, empirical databases, and practice.

In this chapter, we present a brief review of the developmental literature linking healthy adjustment to five core competencies: (1) positive sense of self, (2) selfcontrol, (3) decision-making skills, (4) a moral system of belief, and (5) prosocial connectedness. A central premise of this chapter and the rest of the volume is that promoting mastery of social and emotional core competencies provides a connection between positive youth development and risk prevention programming. In subsequent chapters, empirical evidence linking these core competencies with prevention of specific risk behaviors is reviewed, and examples of integrated promotion and prevention efforts in the United States and internationally are discussed. © Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

We consider how culture impacts the translation of research into practice, focusing on the culture of the client and the culture of the agency implementing selected pro- grams. We build on lessons learned from a pilot study of an evidence-based family-school partnership, Families and Schools Together (FAST), to prevent youth violence with low-income, immigrant Latino families in Southern Califor- nia. We examine the impact of cultural characteristics on the translation of this innovation into practice at the community level, relying on an interactive systems framework developed recently by Wandersman and colleagues (2008, American Journal of Community Psychology, 41(3-4), in press) dis- cussed in this issue. As we point out, the culture of the client and the culture of the agency can facilitate or impede con- nections within and across these interactive systems.

Purpose With the Internet quickly becoming a new arena for social interaction, it has also become a growing venue for bullying among youth. The purpose of the present study was to contrast the prevalence of Internet bullying with physical and verbal bullying among elementary, middle, and high school boys and girls, and to examine whether key predictors of physical and verbal bullying also predicted Internet bullying. Methods As part of an ongoing, statewide bullying prevention initiative in Colorado, 3,339 youth in Grades 5, 8, and 11 completed questionnaires in 78 school sites during the fall of 2005, and another 2,293 youth in that original sample participated in a follow-up survey in 65 school sites in the spring of 2006. Questionnaires included measures of bullying perpetration and victimization, normative beliefs about bullying, perceptions of peer social support, and perceptions of school climate. Results The highest prevalence rates were found for verbal, followed by physical, and then by Internet bullying. Physical and Internet bullying peaked in middle school and declined in high school. Verbal bullying peaked in middle school and remained relatively high during high school. Males were more likely to report physical bullying than females, but no gender differences were found for Internet and verbal bullying. All three types of bullying were significantly related to normative beliefs approving of bullying, negative school climate, and negative peer support. Conclusions Preventive interventions that target school bullying by changing norms about bullying and school context may also impact Internet bullying, given the shared predictors.

This chapter conceptualizes school-based, peer-to-peer bullying as a coercive relational process, in which bullies instrumentally use aggressive interpersonal tactics to influence, change, or dominate others in order to attain desired outcomes. We explain how this coercive process occurs on multiple levels, both within the bully-victim dyad and within the peer group context. We then discuss how the nature and desired outcomes of bullying change according to school setting and developmental period, drawing on empirical research that highlights the increasingly sexualized nature of bullying during early adolescence. Finally, we link sexual harassment and bullying behaviors during adolescence to risk for involvement in coercive relationships and processes in adulthood, and review the implications of this work for evidence-based bullying prevention programs.

Using longitudinal data collected over 2 years on a sample of 2,745 urban elementary school children (1st–6th graders, ages 6–11 years) from economically disadvantaged communities, effects of stressful experiences within 3 contexts (school, family, neighborhood), cumulative stress, and multiple context stress on 3 indices of children’s adjustment (achievement, depression, and aggression) were examined. All 3 stressor contexts were related contemporaneously and longitudinally to negative outcomes across adjustment measures, with differential paths in each predictive model. Cumulative stress was linearly related to increases in adjustment problems but multiple context stress was not related to problematic adjustment beyond effects of cumulative stress alone. The important influence of life events stress on children’s adjustment in disadvantaged communities is discussed. In the present study, we build on and expand previous research examining the stress–adjustment relation among elementary school children growing up in disadvantaged urban communities (Brooks-Gunn, Duncan, & Aber, 1997; Evans & English, 2002; Guerra & Williams, 2005; Roosa et al., 2005; Taylor, Seaton, & Rodriguez, 2002; Yates, Egeland, & Sroufe, 2003). We focus on the role of stress in children’s school achievement, depression, and aggression. These three outcomes represent important components of adjustment (or maladjustment) during the elementary school years. Using longitudinal data from a large developmental study of urban elementary school children, we consider different mechanisms by which stress in three specific contexts (school, family, and neighborhood) can influence these outcomes. We are particularly interested in whether the impact of contextual stress varies as a function of the particular type of stress experienced in a given context, the cumulative amount of stress experienced, or the experience of stress across more than one or multiple contexts.

Over the past decades, public concern over youth violence has led to a proliferation of prevention programs as well as a corresponding push to identify programs that "work". A more accurate understanding of effectiveness as well as failure can be found by reframing the questions to ask what works, for whom, and under what conditions.

Recent advances in understanding the learning, maintenance, prevention, and treatment of problematic social behaviors in childhood and adolescence have emphasized the central role of the child's developing cognitions (Beck, 1999; Boxer & Dubow, 2002; Compton et al., 2004; Crick & Dodge, 1994; Durlak, Rubin, & Kahng, 2001; Eron, 1994; Guerra & Huesmann, 2004; Huesmann, 1998; Lochman & Lenhart, 1995). The developing individual is seen as an active participant in a learning process linking individual (e.g., irritability, impulsivity) and environmental (e.g., community violence, poverty) risk factors to social behavior through cognitive structures, such as beliefs, rules, and schemas, and skills, such as attention, attribution, and problem solving. This cognitive-ecological view posits that problem behaviors emerge through interactions between individual predisposition and contextual socialization and are maintained over time and across situations by cognitive "styles" that are shaped by direct and observational learning experiences. Cognitive styles are learned across multiple contexts and, in turn, influence responding across these contexts. The term "ecological" refers to the nested contexts of child development, providing a stage for social interactions, opportunities for social engagement, and a normative or regulatory structure that includes costs and benefits of distinct courses of action (Guerra & Huesmann).Consider a boy who grows up in an environment laced with harsh and hostile encounters with parents, teachers, and peers. Over time, it is likely that these negative experiences will influence, at least to some degree, his self-perception ("nobody likes me"), perceptions of others ("they have it in for me"), and beliefs about aggression ("it's OK to hit and be mean-everybody does it"). Under these conditions, it is also likely that he will develop characteristic biases in social information processing that are based on the presumption that others act with hostile intent, leading to increased perceptions of vulnerability and anger, and a greater likelihood of aggressive retaliation. For example, Dodge and col leagues (Dodge, Pettit, & Bates, 1997; Dodge, Pettit, Bates, & Valente, 1995) have shown that children who experience harsh parental discipline or are physically abused during their early childhood years are more likely to attribute hostile intent to peers in ambiguous situations and behave more aggressively than their nonexposed peers.If cognitive patterns linked to emotional reactions, such as anger, and behaviors, such as aggression, are learned over time, then it is also the case that they can be "unlearned." In essence, this is a fundamental premise of cognitive-behavioral interventions; that is, modifying dysfunctional cognition will, in turn, lead to positive effects on emotional and behavioral adjustment. However, because the primary emphasis is on the individual's cognitive deficits and distortions and how these can be modified, less attention has focused on the contribution of the child's total developmental ecology to the emergence and maintenance of targeted cognitions (Boxer & Butkus, in press; Durlak et al., 2001).Both clinical and psycho-educational interventions typically are designed to change how children think in response to problematic social situations, with less attention focused on modifying contextual influences on these emerging cognitions. The assumption is that once children correct errors in thinking or reduce deficits in social information-processing skills, they will be better equipped to navigate their social and emotional worlds, resulting in corresponding gains in adjustment. Although cognitive-behavioral interventions also address situational factors that have established or are maintaining specific symptoms or behaviors (e.g., functional analysis; Haynes & O'Brien, 1990), they focus primarily on immediate situational contingencies rather than overarching developmental contexts. …

We evaluated the extent to which aggressive victims show unique developmental pathways that are different from those of passive victims, bullies, and uninvolved children. A total of 1,722 children were followed from 4th grade to 6th grade, and the prevalence and stability of each group were assessed. Aggressive victims became less prevalent and passive victims and bullies became more prevalent with age. Although it was common for aggressive victims and bullies to move from one group to the other across time, there was little overlap with the passive victim group. Stability estimates were higher for the bully and aggressive victim groups than for the passive victim group, and patterns of stability were influenced by peer rejection and exposure to violence.

The effects of witnessing community violence on aggressive cognitions and behavior were investigated in an ethnically diverse sample of 4,458 children living in urban neighborhoods. Prior violence exposure had a significant effect in increasing aggression, normative beliefs about aggression, and aggressive fantasy. Although exposure to violence predicted aggressive behavior both in Grades 1 through 3 (ages 5–8) and Grades 4 through 6 (ages 9–12), the effects on social cognition were only evident in the later grades. Furthermore, the effect of violence exposure on aggression in the later grades was partially mediated by its effect on social cognition. These findings suggest that witnessing community violence has an effect on children’s aggressive behavior through both imitation of violence and the development of associated cognitions as children get older. One of the most robust findings in the literature on the etiology of aggression is the statistical continuity of aggression from early childhood into adulthood (Huesmann, Eron, Lefkowitz, & Walder, 1984; Olweus, 1979). Several researchers have argued that one of the mediating factors in maintaining this continuity is the pattern of social cognition the child develops supporting aggression. In other words, aggressive behavior is seen as being increasingly controlled by internal self-regulating processes that become more stable over time (Huesmann & Guerra, 1997). Huesmann (1988, 1998) has emphasized the importance of cognitive schemas used as models of the world, cognitive scripts stored in memory and used as guides for social behavior, and normative beliefs used to evaluate the appropriateness of scripts. The more aggressive child is presumed to have acquired cognitive schemas depicting the world as a more hostile place, to endorse normative beliefs that aggression is more acceptable, and to have encoded in memory more extensive, wellconnected networks of social scripts emphasizing aggressive responses.

This article describes the planning, implementation, and evaluation of school-based Wellness Centers operated by the Riverside Unified School District in Riverside, CA, as part of the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). We describe the program as planned in terms of the theoretical model for the intervention and the evaluation design, and discuss the actual implementation including accomplishments and challenges. The program was designed to promote positive development and wellness for individual students via self- and teacher-referrals for personal and mental health problems handled through a case management and referral process, support groups, and other activities such as after-school programs, mentoring, tutoring, and parent training. An effort was also made to promote wellness at the school level by providing wellness campaigns, information, and compatible policies and procedures designed to enhance healthy development. Our observations are based on a qualitative assessment that was a component of the evaluation. A more detailed evaluation examining the impact of school-wide and student-focused activities on academic and behavioral outcomes is currently underway. However, we do include comments from students suggesting that the Wellness Center concept holds much promise for school-based mental health and violence prevention services. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Psychol Schs 40: 473–487, 2003.

This paper presents a framework for school-based health promotion and prevention programming that can serve to guide planning and action. Rather than separating specific prevention programs (such as violence prevention, substance abuse prevention, etc.) from more broad-based youth development efforts, this approach provides an integrated framework that: (a) identifies benchmarks of healthy development and strategies to support this development across contexts; (b) specifies additional factors that contribute to identified problems that are not directly linked to healthy development; and (c) provides for matching services to individual needs. Suggestions for application of this framework are discussed, with a particular focus on its application to the development of school-based Wellness Centers.

This study examined the effects of being victimized by peers on children's behavioral, social, emotional, and academic functioning. We assessed an ethnically diverse sample of 2,064 first, second, and fourth graders and followed them over 2 years, locating 1,469 of the participants at the follow-up. Correlation and partial correlation analyses revealed that prior victimization predicted externalizing, internalizing, and social problems 2 years later for the sample as a whole. However, not all victimized children experienced the same types of outcomes; instead, there was heterogeneity in children's responses to victimization. Using cluster analysis, we identified eight outcome patterns that represented different patterns of functioning. These were labeled as externalizing, internalizing, symptomatic, popular, disliked, absent, low achieving, and high achieving. Discriminant function analyses revealed that the symptomatic, externalizing, and disliked patterns were systematically related to victimization. Moreover, significant gender and age differences in the severity of effects were obtained. The discussion highlights the complexity of victimization effects.

Although there is a general agreement in the literature of the importance of social-emotional skills for labor market success, there is little consensus on the specific skills that should be acquired or how and when to teach them. The psychology, economics, policy research, and program implementation literatures all touch on these issues, but they are not sufficiently integrated to provide policy direction. The objective of this paper is to provide a coherent framework and related policies and programs that bridge the psychology, economics, and education literature, specifically that related to skills employers value, non-cognitive skills that predict positive labor market outcomes, and skills targeted by psycho-educational prevention and intervention programs. The paper uses as its base a list of social-emotional skills that employers value, classifies these into eight subgroups (summarized by PRACTICE), then uses the psychology literature -- drawing from the concepts of psycho-social and neuro-biological readiness and age-appropriate contexts -- to map the age and context in which each skill subset is developed. The paper uses examples of successful interventions to illustrate the pedagogical process. The paper concludes that the social-emotional skills employers value can be effectively taught when aligned with the optimal stage for each skill development, middle childhood is the optimal stage for development of PRACTICE skills, and a broad international evidence base on effective program interventions at the right stage can guide policy makers to incorporate social-emotional learning into their school curriculum.

This study examined aggression and withdrawal as predictors of peer victimization. In addition, peer rejection was evaluated as both a moderator and mediator of these relations. The sample consisted of 1956 African-American, Hispanic, and White elementary school-aged boys and girls attending urban and inner-city schools that were classified as high or moderate disadvantage. Correlation and regression analyses revealed that aggression predicted both contemporaneous and longitudinal victimization by peers. This relation maintained across school disadvantage, ethnicity, age, and sex, andwas mediated by rejection. Withdrawal, mediated by rejection, predicted victimization for fourth graders only; withdrawal also reduced risk for victimization for low rejected children. The implications for understanding the dynamics of childhood victimization and intervention are discussed.

This study examines the prevalence, stability, and contextual correlates of peer victimization in a sample of African-American, Hispanic, and non-Hispanic White urban elementary school-age children. A total of 1956 children (40% African-American, 42% Hispanic, and 18% White) attending any 1 of 14 public elementary schools located in one large and one mid-sized Midwestern city participated in this study. Peer ratings of victimization were obtained at two points in time, separated by a 2-year period. Findings revealed that risk for being victimized by peers varied by ethnicity and by school context. Hispanic children had lower victimization scores than did either African-American or White children. These findings, however, were moderated by school context, such that attending ethnically integrated schools was associated with a significantly higher risk of victimization for White children and a slightly lower risk of victimization for African-American children and did not affect the risk of victimization for Hispanic children. In addition, African-American children were less likely than Hispanic and White children to be repeatedly victimized by peers over time. The importance of considering ethnicity and context in explaining peer victimization is discussed and suggestions for preventive interventions and future research are provided.

Viewpoints: A Guide to Conflict Resolution and Decision Making for Adolescents is about understanding yourself, others and their points of view; confronting common problems; and solving them effectively. Problems within one's control can be solved and the manual can be of assistance in this process if used on one's own or in small groups. Lessons include: Thinking About Our Problems, Is There a Problem? Why Is There a Conflict? and What Do I Want?

Normative beliefs have been defined as self-regulating beliefs about the appropriateness of social behaviors. In 2 studies the authors revised their scale for assessing normative beliefs about aggression, found that it is reliable and valid for use with elementary school children, and investigated the longitudinal relation between normative beliefs about aggression and aggressive behavior in a large sample of elementary school children living in poor urban neighborhoods. Using data obtained in 2 waves of observations 1 year apart, the authors found that children tended to approve more of aggression as they grew older and that this increase appeared to be correlated with increases in aggressive behavior. More important, although individual differences in aggressive behavior predicted subsequent differences in normative beliefs in younger children, individual differences in aggressive behavior were predicted by preceding differences in normative beliefs in older children.

Bullying involvement in any form can have lasting physical and emotional consequences for adolescents. For programs and policies to best safeguard youth, it is important to understand prevalence of bullying across cyber and traditional contexts. We conducted a thorough review of the literature and identified 80 studies that reported corresponding prevalence rates for cyber and traditional bullying and/or aggression in adolescents. Weighted mean effect sizes were calculated, and measurement features were entered as moderators to explain variation in prevalence rates and in traditional-cyber correlations within the sample of studies. Prevalence rates for cyber bullying were lower than for traditional bullying, and cyber and traditional bullying were highly correlated. A number of measurement features moderated variability in bullying prevalence; whereas a focus on traditional relational aggression increased correlations between cyber and traditional aggressions. In our meta-analytic review, traditional bullying was twice as common as cyber bullying. Cyber and traditional bullying were also highly correlated, suggesting that polyaggression involvement should be a primary target for interventions and policy. Results of moderation analyses highlight the need for greater consensus in measurement approaches for both cyber and traditional bullying.

The Metropolitan Area Child Study (MACS) is a multifaceted school- and family-based intervention and evaluation study designed to prevent and understand the development of aggressive behavior. The multifaceted interventions are grounded in combined social-cognitive and ecologic theories. Social-cognitive theories contend that cognitive scripts, attributions, and beliefs acquired early in life mediate the effects of ecological factors that influence the development of antisocial behavior. Prevention programs aimed at these cognitions must address multiple dimensions of the child's environment including family, peer, school, and community. The program has three levels of intervention delivered in two-year segments: (1) Level 1: a general enhancement classroom intervention that stresses culturally sensitive student and teacher interaction involving instructional and classroom management strategies and a social-cognitive curriculum that mitigates aggressive development; (2) Level 2: intensive small-group sessions designed to change children's cognitions and enhance peer relationship skills for at-risk children added to the general classroom enhancement program; and (3) Level 3: a one-year family relationship intervention that stresses parenting skill building and emotional responsiveness in family interactions added to the general enhancement and small-group training conditions. Sixteen Chicago-area schools are randomly assigned (four each) to a control group or one of the three intervention levels. Individual child assessment, peer assessments, classroom behavioral observations, and archival data are collected before the interventions begin, during the interventions, at the end of each intervention, and at a follow-up point. The pretests indicate that the children on average have higher levels of aggression than found nationally and elevated clinical levels of other psychopathologies. Across the four intervention levels there are no significant differences in ethnic composition, socio-economic status (SES), aggressive behavior, and normative beliefs about aggression.

This chapter describes a public health approach to preventing youth violence in high-risk populations. The discussion uses two case studies to illustrate the potential impact of public health interventions on reducing delinquency among a population of youth in Southern California. It reviews evaluation data from two community-based studies conducted by the Southern California Academic Center of Excellence on Youth Violence Prevention at the University of California at Riverside, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The first study is an implementation of the Families and Schools Together intervention in Santa Ana, California, and the second is the Arlanza Neighborhood Initiative in Riverside, California. In addition to highlighting evaluation results, the chapter reviews the need for public health intervention across the life course, including long term assessment, the importance of family, school, and community outcomes, tailoring interventions to specific individuals and communities, and assessing effectiveness among subgroups.

The purpose of this study was to pilot the Positive Life Changes (PLC) program, a comprehensive cognitive-behavioral intervention for at-risk adolescents that aims to promote social competencies and to prevent aggression. The program was piloted in 4 intervention groups with a sample of 31 self-referred adolescents (M age 15.64) attending an alternative high school. Questionnaires at pretest and 6-week posttest included five social competencies that represent an expansion of social information-processing (SIP) skills, a measure of aggressive behavior, and a new measure of aggression propensity. Three-level hierarchical linear models showed increases in three social competencies and reductions in physical and verbal aggression propensity from pretest to posttest. Number of program sessions attended did not moderate pretest–posttest change. Findings are discussed in the context of program implementation and future research in school and community settings.

Peer nominations have been used very successfully to assess aggressive dispositions in children but are costly to administer in situations in which a subject population is scattered among many classrooms. In the present study, the authors evaluated an alternative measure, the Teacher Prediction of Peer-Nominated Aggression. This measure proved to be highly reliable and valid—a better predictor of peer nominations of aggression than teacher checklist ratings of aggression. The teachers' predictions of peer-nominated aggression also displayed the same pattern of interrelations and gender differences as actual peer nominations of aggression. Finally, the teachers' predictions of aggression were more accurate than their predictions of other behaviors. One problem that has beset research on personality is the difficulty of directly observing and accurately measuring personality traits as they are manifest outside the laboratory in real life. Traits cannot be directly observed; they can only be inferred from observed behavioral dispositions. In fact, traits are best viewed simply as behavioral dispositions. To measure a behavioral disposition, the researcher must develop an operational definition of the construct of interest in terms of observable behaviors. The researcher must observe these behaviors directly or obtain judgments from individuals who have had the opportunity to observe them in the past. These observations must then be counted, rated, subjected to arithmetic operations, and perhaps processed by computer programs designed to detect underlying latent structure. The results of such analyses must then be interpreted to yield a plausible measurement scale for the underlying disposition. There are many potential pitfalls on this path from behavioral observations to trait inference. Generally, researchers are on firmer ground if a particular trait of interest can be connected very closely with observable behaviors. One of the most widely researched personality traits, at least since the late 1930s, has been aggression. Although individuals vary widely in their characteristic levels of aggressiveness, ex

In the present review, we summarize the extant literature in the field of delinquency prevention. We do not provide a recounting of whether specific programs have or have not been effective but, rather, attempt to judge the overall utility of programs to prevent delinquency in its various forms and among various definable groups. Specifically, we organize our review of programs according to the characteristics of the targeted population, differentiating programs for universal, selected, or indicated populations. Within each population type, we further distinguish programs according to designated intervention context, relying on a biopsychosocial model that specifies four levels of influence on risk for delinquency: individual, close interpersonal relationships, proximal social settings, and societal macrosystems. At each level, we identify a number of effective intervention strategies and highlight those that are based on relevant risk factor research. As we note, the effectiveness of some approaches depends on the specific population, although, in general, multicomponent, multilevel programs appear to have the most substantial effects.

In the present study, quantitative and qualitative data are presented to examine individual and contextual predictors of bullying and victimization and how they vary by age and gender. Two waves of survey data were collected from 2,678 elementary, middle, and high school youth attending 59 schools. In addition, 14 focus groups were conducted with 115 youth who did not participate in the survey. Changes in both bullying and victimization were predicted across gender and age by low self-esteem and negative school climate, with normative beliefs supporting bullying predicting increases in bullying only. Focus group comments provided insights into the dynamics of bullying, highlighting its connection to emergent sexuality and social identity during adolescence. Findings are discussed in terms of their implications for preventive antibullying interventions in schools.

The effectiveness of the evidence based program, Families and Schools Together (FAST), was examined in two inter-related studies with immigrant Latino (Mexican) families in the U.S. In Study 1, we reported findings from pre-test, 3-month post-test, and 12-month follow-up surveys of parents and children participating in the FAST program. Families were selected from communities that were randomly assigned to either intervention or control groups. A total of 282 parents (263 mothers and 19 fathers) participated in either the intervention (140 parents) or control (142 parents) condition over the course of 3 years. Each of the parents had a participating focal child; thus, 282 children (144 females and 138 males; average age = 9.5 years) participated in the study. A primary focus of the research was to determine whether participation in FAST led to reductions in children's aggression. Using linear growth models, no differences were noted on aggression between intervention and control groups, although intervention children did show significant improvements in social problem-solving skills and perceptions of collective efficacy. In Study 2, we conducted two focus groups with ten FAST participants to explore whether other unmeasured outcomes were noted and to understand better the mechanisms and impact of FAST. All of the parents in the focus groups reported that FAST had helped them better relate to and communicate with their children, and that the greatest effect was on the behavior of their older children. Results are discussed in terms of cultural fit of the FAST program for immigrant Latino families and future directions.

Community mobilization can increase the effective implementation of evidence-based practices (EBPs) in youth violence prevention. These strategies bring together people and organizations in a community to try to solve or reduce a problem. They help communities address the challenges of identifying EBPs, disseminating them to local decision-makers, and then implementing and sustaining them if they are successful. Science-based systems for implementing EBPs such as PROSPER and Communities That Care can help to integrate this complex work in communities. Further insight about implementing EBPs in youth violence prevention is being developed through the CDC-funded Academic Centers for Excellence in Youth Violence Prevention. Community mobilization approaches for seven of these programs are discussed, highlighting successful approaches and challenges encountered.

VioLit summary: OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study by Guerra et al. was to explore how attributions about the causes of social failure might influence affective reactions and increase aggressive behavior. METHODOLOGY: This study was quasi-experimental. The authors compared a sample of nondelinquent high school boys of similar age with delinquent boys. In the initial sample of delinquent subjects there were 79 males incarcerated in a state correctional facility ranging in age from 15 to 19 years. About 67% of the subjects were of African-American or Hispanic origin. Approximately 88% of the boys incarcerated in this facility were from lower or lower-middle class backgrounds. Within the nondelinquent group, there were 119 males ranging in age from 15 to 19 from a large urban high school in an ethnically diverse lower-middle class neighborhood. Approximately 57% of the nondelinquent subjects were of African-American or Hispanic origin. The nondelinquent subjects were recruited from several physical education classes in the high school. While some boys in the nondelinquent sample may in fact have engaged in delinquent behaviors, the authors defined the sample as nondelinquent by the fact that the boys were attending regular classes in a regular high school and were not institutionalized in a facility for delinquent youth. The authors operationally defined the delinquent youths as those boys who were incarcerated in a facility for seriously delinquent youth. In order to assess levels of aggression, subjects were administered the Physical Aggression Scale, which was a 13-item self-report measure which included a 3-item self-report of general aggressive behavior. The subjects rated their aggressive behavior based on a Likert scale, ranging from 0 (never having committed aggressive acts) to 4 (committing an aggressive act four or more times). The authors also developed the Assessment for Social Failure (ASF) questionnaire. This measure assessed three dimensions of causal attributions (locus of causality, stability, and controllability) using the questions from the Causal Dimension Scales. However, the stimulus stories were constructed to portray social failure instead of academic failure. The subject was asked to answer several questions about each of four stimulus stories involving social situations in which another person frustrates the subject. In two of the situations, subjects were exposed to failure involving peer-group entry with either a same gender or opposite gender peer. The other two situations involved blocked attainment of an instrumental goal by either a same gender or opposite gender peer. Testing of all the subjects was conducted in small groups by two female graduate students during the regular school day. There was no concern raised about the gender nor race of the experimenters nor the confidentiality of the subject's responses nor their difficulty understanding the items. The same procedures were followed for both the delinquent and the high school samples. FINDINGS/DISCUSSION: A multivariate analysis of variance enabled the authors to reject the null hypothesis that the two populations' mean scores were the same on attributions for social failure. However, the means on the three individual attribution scores were very similar for the two samples and did not contribute to the overall significant differences. Therefore, the results suggested that there were both similarities and differences in cognitive processing following social failure for delinquent and nondelinquent adolescent boys of the same age. Looking at the similarities, delinquent boys were no more likely than the nondelinquent boys to attribute social failure to controllable, external, and stable causes, even though they were substantially more aggressive and endorsed more verbally and physically aggressive responses. Rather, their findings suggested that studying the relations between attributions about failure, hostile affective reactions, subsequent behavioral choices, and actual aggressive behavior in delinquent and nondelinquent populations could detect differences in the cognition (attribution)oaffectobehavior linkages in these two populations. In particular, among delinquent but not among nondelinquent boys, the tendency to attribute ones social failures to stable and controllable causes predicted stronger hostile emotional responses to failure and a tendency to endorse physically aggressive responses following such failure. These hostile emotional responses to failure and this preference for a physically aggressive response, in turn, predicted greater actual aggression within the population of delinquent boys. AUTHORS' RECOMMENDATIONS: The authors contended that the next step for further investigation included whether aggressive behavior was related to a tendency to attribute negative social outcomes to: 1) the event being caused by either an external force or the adolescent themselves; 2) the child's perception of the intentionality of the others act; 3) whether or not who caused the negative event was perceived by the child as controlling the child or not; 4) to what extent did the child perceive the negative event to be due to anothers hostility towards the child. (CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado) Aggression Causes Offender Nonoffender Comparison Male Aggression Male Inmate Male Delinquency Male Offender Juvenile Aggression Juvenile Offender Juvenile Male Juvenile Inmate Juvenile Delinquency Interpersonal Relations Relationships Skills Physical Aggression 02-05

The relation between positive parenting, family cohesion, and child social competence was examined among Latino families (predominantly from Mexico) who were recent immigrants to the United States. A mixed method study was conducted, including both pre- and post-test self-reported surveys (9-month interval) and qualitative data from focus groups. A total of 282 parents and 282 children (ages 9-12) participated in the survey study. Results at post-test follow-up indicated that family cohesion predicted improvements in child social problem-solving skills and social self-efficacy, and positive parenting predicted improvements in child social self-efficacy. A total of 12 mothers participated in the focus group study that was designed to explore barriers to positive parenting and family cohesion in this population. Results from focus groups revealed four major themes impacting parenting and family cohesion: (a) acculturation differences between parents and children and the resulting power imbalance; (b) difficulty getting involved in their child's education; (c) loss of extended family; and (d) discrimination against immigrants and legal status. The implications for family support programs for immigrant Latino families and their children are discussed.

Bullying is not an isolated problem, occurring only in a particular country or social setting. Rather, it is a pervasive behavioral problem crossing national boundaries and penetrating virtually every social setting in which people have ongoing relationships with repeated interactions over time. Schools represent a social setting common to nearly every country throughout the world. As a result, researchers worldwide have devoted considerable attention to studying bullying in schools (Espelage & Swearer, 2004; Smith et al., 1999; Olweus, 1993; Rigby, 2002), as evident in the survey of bullying conducted by Smith and others (1999) involving 21 countries in America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia.