TY - JOUR
PY - 2017//
TI - Community Violence Exposure and Conduct Problems in Children and Adolescents with Conduct Disorder and Healthy Controls
JO - Frontiers in behavioral neuroscience
A1 - Kersten, Linda
A1 - Vriends, Noortje
A1 - Steppan, Martin
A1 - Raschle, Nora M.
A1 - Praetzlich, Martin
A1 - Oldenhof, Helena
A1 - Vermeiren, Robert
A1 - Jansen, Lucres
A1 - Ackermann, Katharina
A1 - Bernhard, Anka
A1 - Martinelli, Anne
A1 - González-Madruga, Karen
A1 - Puzzo, Ignazio
A1 - Wells, Amy
A1 - Rogers, Jack C.
A1 - Clanton, Roberta
A1 - Baker, Rosalind H.
A1 - Grisley, Liam
A1 - Baumann, Sarah
A1 - Gundlach, Malou
A1 - Kohls, Gregor
A1 - Gonzalez-Torres, Miguel A.
A1 - Sesma-Pardo, Eva
A1 - Dochnal, Roberta
A1 - Lazaratou, Helen
A1 - Kalogerakis, Zacharias
A1 - Bigorra Gualba, Aitana
A1 - Smaragdi, Areti
A1 - Siklósi, Réka
A1 - Dikeos, Dimitris
A1 - Hervás, Amaia
A1 - Fernández-Rivas, Aranzazu
A1 - De Brito, Stephane A.
A1 - Konrad, Kerstin
A1 - Herpertz-Dahlmann, Beate
A1 - Fairchild, Graeme
A1 - Freitag, Christine M.
A1 - Popma, Arne
A1 - Kieser, Meinhard
A1 - Stadler, Christina
SP - e219
EP - e219
VL - 11
IS -
N2 - Exposure to community violence through witnessing or being directly victimized has been associated with conduct problems in a range of studies. However, the relationship between community violence exposure (CVE) and conduct problems has never been studied separately in healthy individuals and individuals with conduct disorder (CD). Therefore, it is not clear whether the association between CVE and conduct problems is due to confounding factors, because those with high conduct problems also tend to live in more violent neighborhoods, i.e., an ecological fallacy. Hence, the aim of the present study was: (1) to investigate whether the association between recent CVE and current conduct problems holds true for healthy controls as well as adolescents with a diagnosis of CD; (2) to examine whether the association is stable in both groups when including effects of aggression subtypes (proactive/reactive aggression), age, gender, site and socioeconomic status (SES); and (3) to test whether proactive or reactive aggression mediate the link between CVE and conduct problems. Data from 1178 children and adolescents (62% female; 44% CD) aged between 9 years and 18 years from seven European countries were analyzed. Conduct problems were assessed using the Kiddie-Schedule of Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia diagnostic interview. Information about CVE and aggression subtypes was obtained using self-report questionnaires (Social and Health Assessment and Reactive-Proactive aggression Questionnaire (RPQ), respectively). The association between witnessing community violence and conduct problems was significant in both groups (adolescents with CD and healthy controls). The association was also stable after examining the mediating effects of aggression subtypes while including moderating effects of age, gender and SES and controlling for effects of site in both groups. There were no clear differences between the groups in the strength of the association between witnessing violence and conduct problems. However, we found evidence for a ceiling effect, i.e., individuals with very high levels of conduct problems could not show a further increase if exposed to CVE and vice versa.
RESULTS indicate that there was no evidence for an ecological fallacy being the primary cause of the association, i.e., CVE must be considered a valid risk factor in the etiology of CD.
Language: en
LA - en SN - 1662-5153 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fnbeh.2017.00219 ID - ref1 ER -