Juvenile Justice Bulletin Banner 2003
   J. Robert Flores, Administrator
 November 2003  
How Families and Communities Influence Youth Victimization

Janet L. Lauritsen

Introduction

Past Approaches To Studying Youth Victimization

Using NCVS To Study Youth Victimization

Findings

Conclusion

References

Endnotes

NCJ 201629
The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention is a component of the Office of Justice Programs, which also includes the Bureau of Justice Assistance, the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the National Institute of Justice, and the Office for Victims of Crime.
This Bulletin was prepared under grant number 1999JN–FK–K002 from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, U.S. Department of Justice.

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A Message From OJJDP

When youth are victimized, they suffer physical, psychological, and emotional injuries that may take considerable time to heal. The repercussions of youth victimization also affect their families and communities. Each victimization represents a tear in the social fabric that is supposed to protect children.

With limited data, past research focused on violent offenders rather than their victims. As a result of recently available data from the National Crime Victimization Survey, however, researchers can explore violent victimization in a new light.

Drawing on that data, this Bulletin explores how individual, family, and community factors influence the risk for nonlethal violence among U.S. youth ages 12–17. By examining the connection between such factors and the risk for violent victimization, the Bulletin shows that disadvantaged communities with high proportions of young people and single-parent families experience the greatest difficulty in protecting youth from victimization.

Understanding how individual, family, and community factors influence violent victimization is the first step toward preventing it. With this knowledge, community leaders and policymakers can make sound decisions and implement effective programs that prevent youth from becoming victims.

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Acknowledgments

This Bulletin was prepared by Janet L. Lauritsen, Ph.D., Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice, University of Missouri-St. Louis, and Visiting Research Fellow at the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Support for this research was provided by OJJDP and the American Statistical Association Committee on Law and Justice Statistics. Data for the analyses were made available through the National Consortium on Violence Research (National Science Foundation #SBR 9513040) under the supervision of the U.S. Census Bureau and in cooperation with the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

The author thanks Alfred Blumstein, Ph.D., Dave Merrell, Ph.D., and Renee Fields, Ph.D., for their assistance in accessing the data. The author also thanks Brian Wiersema for sharing his NCVS expertise and Howard N. Snyder, Ph.D., for his helpful comments on this report. None of the above agencies or persons bears any responsibility for the findings presented here.
  


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