Date of Award
2016
Degree Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
Psychology
Abstract
The current study explored the moderating roles of support coping and support
quality in the predictive relationship between community violence exposure (ECV) and a
variety of psychosocial outcomes. Participants were 119 African American males (9 th –
12 th grade; mean age at baseline = 15.33). Participants completed measures of exposure to
violence, support-seeking coping, quality of support from friends and family, and a range
of psychosocial outcomes, and completed these same measures approximately one year
after baseline. Regression analyses were conducted to examine the relationships between
ECV and psychosocial outcomes, as well as the relationships between support coping and
outcomes. Results showed that ECV predicted increased internalizing, externalizing, and
trauma symptoms after one year. No differences in the predictive power of witnessing
and victimization were reported. A moderated moderation analysis was conducted to
examine whether perceived support quality moderated the buffering effect of support-
seeking coping in the prediction of ECV and outcomes. Results did not support the
overall moderated moderation model across all outcomes, but an interaction between
ECV and support-seeking coping was detected at high levels of perceived friend support
in the prediction of social skills development. Implications for future research are
discussed.
Recommended Citation
Pierre, Cynthia L., "Community Violence Exposure Among Urban African American Males: Understanding the “Buffering Effect” of Adaptive Social Support Coping on Psychosocial Outcomes" (2016). Dissertations. 2143.
https://ecommons.luc.edu/luc_diss/2143
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Copyright Statement
Copyright © 2016 Cynthia L Pierre
