Violence in Schools: Repeat Victimization, Low Self-Control, and the Mitigating Influence of School Efficacy

Objectives: Examine the distribution of various forms of violent victimization among adolescents in school and the main and interactive effects of low self-control and school efficacy on repeat assault victimization. Methods: This study used data collected from students and teachers as part of the Rural Substance abuse and Violence Project. We calculated a simple Poisson model of the expected frequencies of adolescents to experience each number of assault, robbery, and weapons victimizations given the total number of each type of victimization reported by the sample. We then tested whether the observed frequencies differed significantly from the expected. Finally, we estimated a series of hierarchical nonlinear models to assess the main and interactive effects of low self-control and school efficacy on repeat assault victimization. Results: All three forms of violent victimization were non-randomly distributed across students. Low self-control was associated with repeat victimization among assault victims, though this effect was weakened significantly by school efficacy. Conclusions: Violence in schools is highly concentrated among repeat victims. Efforts to reduce violence in schools should be focused on those who have already been victimized. Schools may be able to limit the effects of low self-control on repeat assault victimization by strengthening school efficacy.