NCJ Number
238175
Journal
Aggression and Violent Behavior Volume: 17 Issue: 1 Dated: January/February 2012 Pages: 83-88
Date Published
February 2012
Length
6 pages
Annotation
This review examines the relationship between first-time gun carrying and high crime rates in high poverty settings, especially how it relates to at risk African-American youth.
Abstract
First time gun carrying is specified as a logical starting point for the primary prevention of youth gun violence, which is also consistent with the public health approach to the prevention of firearm injuries for at risk African-American youth. However, it is difficult to disentangle youth gun violence from other aspects of violence that are concentrated in high poverty settings. Insights from developmental life-course criminology (DLC) are used to: (1) categorize first time gun carrying as a critical inflection point in the development of youth violence; and (2) categorize exposure to violence in the community as a developmental pathway for first time gun carrying for youth attempting to prevent and/or deter future violent victimization. The ecological-transactional model of community violence provides a more nuanced breakdown of the impact of exposure to violence in the community on first time gun carrying given the embeddedness of contexts that shape child and adolescent development in high poverty settings. Finally, several areas for future research are outlined that include a need to better integrate gun carrying into existing theories as well as future longitudinal studies of high risk African-American youth. (Published Abstract)