Children's Perceptions of Their Neighborhoods
Section snippets
Participants
The participants were 223 children (97 girls; 126 boys) 7 to 11 years old who were recruited from several after-school programs in and around Los Angeles, California. The sample was heterogeneous and reflected the ethnic diversity of the wider urban area from which the children were drawn. Fifty-two children were African American, 101 were Latino, and 70 were European American.
One hundred nine children came from high violence neighborhoods (27 were African American, 52 were
Community Violence Rates and Perceptions of Neighborhood Safety
To examine how children's perceptions correspond to actual neighborhood violence rates and to parent ratings of neighborhood safety, we conducted chi-square analyses. In the high violence neighborhoods, 60% of the children and their mothers agreed on the safety of their neighborhoods and 40% disagreed; , p = .05. Whereas in the low violence neighborhood, 92% of the children and their mothers agreed on the safety of their neighborhood, and 8% disagreed .
To examine parents'
Discussion
The results support our first hypothesis that children's perceptions of violence and safety would be related to their neighborhood violence rates. Although there were no significant differences between the neighborhoods in children's perceptions of safety at home, in school, and walking to school, children in the high violence neighborhoods reported feeling less safe playing in their neighborhoods than children from the low violence neighborhoods. A study on children's perceptions of
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to the participating families and their children. We also extend a special thanks to the research team: Roxana Alvarez, Daniel Bolton, Michael Flannery, Stephanie Gates, Adriana Lozano, Kimberly Morris, Sonia Narang, Cathy Thielen, Lisa Sokol, Angela Thomas, and Gwen Velasco. This study was supported by a Faculty Grant for Research on Southern California awarded to the first author from the USC Southern California Studies Center.
References (68)
- et al.
Children's drawingsSpecial issue clinical recognition of sexually abused children
Child Abuse and Neglect
(1993) - et al.
Emotional impact of children's exposure to community violenceA preliminary
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(1995) - et al.
The effects of community violence on inner city preschoolers and their families
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology
(1999) - et al.
The prevalence and consequences of exposure to violence among African-American youth
Journal of the American Academy of Child Psychiatry
(1993) - et al.
Violent events reported by normal urban school-aged childrenCharacteristics and depression correlates
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(1993) - et al.
The effects of chronic violence on preschool children living in South African townships
Child Abuse and Neglect
(1993) - et al.
Two approaches to the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder in infancy and early childhood
Journal of American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(1995) - et al.
No safe havenA study of violence exposure in an urban community
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
(1995) Violence and youthPsychology's response: Vol. 1. Summary of the American Psychological Association Commission on Violence and Youth
(1993)- et al.
Neighborhood disadvantage, stressful life events, and adjustment in urban elementary school children
Journal of Clinical and Child Psychology
(1994)
Boys and girlsThe development of gender roles
The ecology of human development
Families and communities
The neighborhood walkSources of support in middle childhood
Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development
Children's conceptions of poverty
Assessing community violenceThe children's report of exposure to violence
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Geographic concentration of poverty and risk to children in urban neighborhoods
American Behavioral Scientist
Post traumatic stress disorder
Living in a war zoneMothers and young children in a public housing development
Child Welfare
Consequences of growing up poor
The effects of family violence on children's academic performance and behavior
Journal of the American Medical Association
L. A. storiesAggression in preschoolers' spontaneous narratives after the riots of 1992
Child Development
Exposure to violence and the presence of depression among low-income African-American youth
Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology
Children's responses to warWhat do we know?
Infant Mental Health Journal
Children in dangerCoping with the consequences of community violence
No place to be a childGrowing up in a war zone
Aggression and violence—the enemies of precision learning in children
American Journal of Psychiatry
Stress resilient childrenThe search for protective factors
In J. E. Stevenson (Ed.)
Chronic exposure to violence and povertyInterventions that work for youth
Crime and Delinquency
The clinical application of projective drawings
Children's perceived competence scale
Child Development
Cited by (38)
Mapping future directions to test biopsychosocial pathways to health and well-being
2020, Social Science and MedicineNaive conceptions of pollution by children aged 7 to 12 years: A study of their drawings
2020, Psychologie FrancaiseChildren and young people's views on institutional safety: It's not just because we're little
2017, Child Abuse and NeglectCitation Excerpt :The embrace of child-centred perspectives is predicated on the view that children and young people experience the world in ways different to adults and that better outcomes can be achieved when children and young people are able to express their needs and wishes (Moore, Saunders, & McArthur, 2011). Existing studies have examined how children consider risks in their families and at home (Kelley, Mayall, & Hood, 1997), at school (Leonard, 2006; Miller, 2011; Wiebe et al., 2013) and within their neighbourhoods and communities (Farver, Ghosh, & Garcia, 2000; Milne, 2009; Nayak, 2003; Negreinos, 2010). Within this literature there has been an increasing focus on children’s experiences of safety and their concerns about their lack of safety.
The association of unemployment from age 21 to 33 with substance use disorder symptoms at age 39: The role of childhood neighborhood characteristics
2017, Drug and Alcohol DependenceCitation Excerpt :Relatedly, childhood neighborhood characteristics were based on self-report measures, rather than objective measures. However, prior studies have pointed out that subjective measures might carry a unique strength by directly tapping into children’s experienced reality, rather than projected reality from objective measures (Farver et al., 2000; Tucker et al., 2013). Second, effects of the most recent recession in 2008 might have conditioned the influence of unemployment on substance use or dependence disorder symptoms.
Preschoolers' perceptions of neighborhood environment, safety, and help-seeking
2017, Children and Youth Services ReviewCitation Excerpt :Childhood researchers have argued that children can be valuable informants about their lives and that it is important for adults to listen to children's voices (Clark, 2005; Conroy & Harcourt, 2009; Elden, 2012; Farrell, 2005; MacNaughton et al., 2003; Roberts, 2000; Torstenson-Ed, 2007). In the context of the neighborhood environment, studies with school-aged children and adolescents have explored the themes of neighborhood safety (Farver, Ghosh, & Garcia, 2000), resource availability (Anthony & Nicotera, 2008), neighborhood boundaries (Aitken, 1994; Bass & Lambert, 2004; Spilsbury, 2005a; Spilsbury, Korbin, & Coulton, 2009), and positive and negative aspects of physical and social characteristics of the neighborhood (Francis & Lorenzo, 2002; MacDougall, Schiller, & Darbyshire, 2009; Morrow, 2001; Spilsbury, 2005b; Tisdale & Pitt-Catsuphes, 2012; van Vliet, 1981). Relevant studies with children under the age of 5 are rare, but two studies in particular have shown that children as young as 3 can participate meaningfully in research about their communities.
Outside the Clinic Door: How Neighborhood Sociodemographic Disadvantage is Associated with Community Therapist Secondary Traumatic Stress and Emotional Exhaustion
2024, Evidence-Based Practice in Child and Adolescent Mental Health