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Abstract
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Mounting evidence of serious adverse consequences of childhood physical and sexual abuse has important implications for public health officials and care providers. Given the potential impact on social policy of this area of inquiry, programmatic research is needed for the validation of theoretical models across populations and over time. This study, based on a sample of high-risk youths, replicates a structural model that specified the influence of child physical and sexual abuse on self-derogation and drug use. Results suggest that for male and female youths, physical abuse and sexual victimization had a direct effect on self-derogation and illicit drug use, and an indirect effect on drug use that was mediated by self-derogation. Moreover, structural coefficients for the model were found to be identical across gender. Subsequent analyses demonstrated the equivalence of the structural model of child physical and sexual abuse on drug use across two study cohorts. Implications for the identification and treatment of youths in high-risk groups are discussed.
VioLit summary
OBJECTIVE:
The purpose of this study by Dembo et al. was to replicate a structural model (Dembo et al., 1987) showing the influence of childhood physical and sexual abuse on later self-derogation and illicit drug use.
METHODOLOGY:
The design of this study is quasi-experimental, using interviews. The cohort used in this study (1986-87) consisted of voluntary, confidential, paid interviewees who were new resident detainees in a Florida juvenile detention center. All female residents who met the criteria (111) were interviewed, and a half-random sample of the male residents (288) was used. The mean age of the females was 15.12 years, while that of males was 15.46, but no racial differences were noted between genders. Socioeconomic status was indexed from questions about the family's occupation or source of income, and a referral history was taken. The six items used to determine physical abuse were based on the work of Straus and his associates, 1979-1983. Items used to determine sexual victimization were based on the work of Finkelhor (1979), and the ten items determining self-derogation were based on the work of Kaplan (1980) and Kaplan and Pokorny (1969), who based their items on work by Rosenberg (1965). A factor analysis was done on the intercorrelations of the items and a principle factor identified.
Nine categories of illicit drug use were based on items adapted from a national survey done by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (1985), and the responses to these items was compared with responses to the national household survey done in 1985. A principal factor analysis was used and indicated only one reliable factor, with others loading on it. A regression factor score was calculated and used for further analyses. The results of this study were then compared with that of the 1984 cohort, consisting of 76 boys and 69 girls from a detention center. The model formulated from this earlier cohort, reported by Dembo et al. (1987), was tested for equivalence with the new cohort.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
Sexual victimization of girls was significantly greater (p<.001), as was self-derogation (p<.01). This is also consistent with the findings from the earlier cohort of 1984. When the magnitude of intercorrelations was compared across gender (using Fisher's r to z transformation), girls showed a significantly greater association between self-derogation and sexual victimization than did boys (z=4.71; p<.001), and boys showed a significantly higher correlation between lifetime drug use and self-derogation (z=2.88; p<.001). The structural model of the 1984 and the 1986-87 cohorts fit across gender groups. The data were then pooled across gender for each cohort and a test of equivalence of the model across the two cohorts was done. There were significant relationships between pairs of variables for the 1986-87 cohort, and for the 1984 cohort, there were significant relationships between each of the variables and lifetime illicit drug use. There also was a significant association between self-derogation and physical abuse. The equivalence of the structural model for lifetime illicit drug use was tested and supported for both study cohorts. And when controlled for race, the structural paths remained statistically significant.
AUTHORS' RECOMMENDATIONS:
In future analyses, the significantly higher lifetime frequency of illicit drug use by whites over blacks will be studied. Also, the significantly higher reported levels of physical abuse and self-derogation of whites will be studied. Follow-up study of the interviewees in the 1986-87 cohort will be conducted to determine to what extent their reported sexual victimization, physical abuse and self-derogation relate to their long-term drug use. Longitudinal studies need to be done on other samples of high-risk youth, as well as on the general population of adolescents. This will help to develop models which are explanatory and more comprehensive, of other adverse developmental outcomes of abused children. Early interventions are needed for youths (and families) who have been abused as children, to avert such negative outcomes as this study has explored. Prevention of physical and sexual harm to our vulnerable youth, as much as possible, should be exercised. And care for those who have had damaging experiences needs to be high-quality and humane, in seeking reconstructions of their lives.
EVALUATION:
Since this study was conducted with a restricted population, that of a juvenile detention institute, the results cannot be generalized to the general population, but only applied to other restricted populations of detained juveniles. However, the comparisons of this study with the earlier cohort of 1984 show a significant similarity in construction of the model. (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)
N1 - Call Number: F-47, AB-47
KW - Child Abuse Effects
KW - Child Abuse-Substance Use Link
KW - Child Abuse Victim
KW - Child Physical Abuse Effects
KW - Child Physical Abuse Victim
KW - Child Sexual Abuse Effects
KW - Child Sexual Abuse Victim
KW - Child Victim
KW - Childhood Victimization
KW - Childhood Experience
KW - Domestic Violence Effects
KW - Domestic Violence Victim
KW - Sexual Assault Effects
KW - Sexual Assault Victim
KW - Juvenile Substance Use
KW - Substance Use Causes
KW - Late Adolescence
KW - Early Adolescence
KW - Drug Use Causes
KW - Juvenile Inmate
KW - Inmate Studies
KW - Incarcerated
Language: en |