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Development of a Screening Instrument for Exposure to Violence in Children: The KID-SAVE

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Abstract

The present study provided psychometric data on the KID-SAVE, an empirically based measure of children's exposure to community violence. The KID-SAVE was administered to 470 inner-city children in the third through seventh grades and demonstrated excellent reliability. Factor analysis yielded three subscales: Traumatic Violence, Indirect Violence, and Physical/Verbal Abuse. Initial investigation of construct validity suggested that the KID-SAVE successfully discriminated between groups of children reporting high and low levels of traumatic symptoms. The KID-SAVE appears to be a promising assessment tool and allows for quantification of the severity of violence exposure.

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Flowers, A.L., Hastings, T.L. & Kelley, M.L. Development of a Screening Instrument for Exposure to Violence in Children: The KID-SAVE. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment 22, 91–104 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1007580616096

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