TY - JOUR
T1 - Why Are Crime Victims at Risk of Being Victimized Again? Substance Use, Depression, and Offending as Mediators of the Victimization-Revictimization Link
AU - Ruback, R. Barry
AU - Clark, Valerie A.
AU - Warner, Cody
N1 - Funding Information:
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research is based on data from the Add Health project, a program project designed by J. Richard Udry (PI) and Peter Bearman and funded by Grant P01-HD31921 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to the Carolina Population Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, with cooperative funding participation by the National Cancer Institute; the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism; the National Institute of General Medical Sciences; the National Institute of Mental Health; the National Institute of Nursing Research; the Office of AIDS Research, NIH; the Office of Behavior and Social Science Research, NIH; the Office of the Director, NIH; the Office of Research on Women’s Health, NIH; the Office of Population Affairs, HHS; the National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, HHS; the Office of Minority Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, HHS; the Office of Minority Health, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health, HHS; the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, HHS; and the National Science Foundation.
PY - 2014/1
Y1 - 2014/1
N2 - Using three waves of data from 5,165 male and 5,924 female teenagers surveyed in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, this study tested whether drug use, alcohol use, depression, and offending mediate the link between a serious violent criminal victimization and a subsequent serious violent revictimization. Results indicated that victimization at Wave 1 significantly predicted changes in violent offending, delinquency, and drug use at Wave 2, even controlling for all other lagged mediators. Violent offending emerged as a robust and consistent mediator of the victimization-revictimization link for males. For females, all the mediators together produced a significant and large indirect effect that reduced the direct effect of prior victimization to nonsignificance, but no one single mediator was significant. This study demonstrates that revictimization is partially the result of behavioral changes following victimization. The fact that mediation between victimization and revictimization occurred through a cluster of changed behaviors and moods suggests that the impact of victimization is greater for females than males. This evidence that victimization changes behavior and increases risks and that these risks differ by gender has implications for both mental health care and law enforcement.
AB - Using three waves of data from 5,165 male and 5,924 female teenagers surveyed in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, this study tested whether drug use, alcohol use, depression, and offending mediate the link between a serious violent criminal victimization and a subsequent serious violent revictimization. Results indicated that victimization at Wave 1 significantly predicted changes in violent offending, delinquency, and drug use at Wave 2, even controlling for all other lagged mediators. Violent offending emerged as a robust and consistent mediator of the victimization-revictimization link for males. For females, all the mediators together produced a significant and large indirect effect that reduced the direct effect of prior victimization to nonsignificance, but no one single mediator was significant. This study demonstrates that revictimization is partially the result of behavioral changes following victimization. The fact that mediation between victimization and revictimization occurred through a cluster of changed behaviors and moods suggests that the impact of victimization is greater for females than males. This evidence that victimization changes behavior and increases risks and that these risks differ by gender has implications for both mental health care and law enforcement.
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U2 - 10.1177/0886260513504626
DO - 10.1177/0886260513504626
M3 - Article
C2 - 24097905
AN - SCOPUS:84888985523
SN - 0886-2605
VL - 29
SP - 157
EP - 185
JO - Journal of Interpersonal Violence
JF - Journal of Interpersonal Violence
IS - 1
ER -
