Peer victimization in schools most often occurs in the presence of bystanders. When bystanders intervene on behalf of the victims, they are often successful in stopping the victimization. Defender self-efficacy (i.e., the belief in one's ability to successfully defend victims) has consistently been associated with greater defending and less…

This study examined beliefs about aggression and self-efficacy for nonviolent responses as mediators of longitudinal relations between exposure to violence and physical aggression. Participants were a predominantly African American (79%) sample of 2705 early adolescents from three middle schools within urban neighborhoods with high rates of…

Urban adolescents experience high rates of exposure to community violence, which is associated with sleep problems. However, less is known about the prospective relationships between community violence exposure and sleep problems across adolescence. This study investigated reciprocal relationships between community violence exposure and sleep…

Research finds that vicarious strain significantly predicts juvenile delinquency. However, no studies have examined the influence of vicarious health strain on youth behavior despite the fact that when individuals directly experience poor health, there is a greater likelihood of crime and delinquency. Using a sample of youth from the Project on…

Although dating violence poses a serious threat to adolescents' health and well-being around the globe, little evidence is available for Europe in general and Switzerland in particular. Also, evidence on the role of cognitive predictors related to a more general justification of aggressive behavior and gender-based violence is lacking. Therefore,…

Objective: This study examined if empathy was a significant moderator of several empirically established risk factors for sexual violence perpetration among college men. Participants: Data are from 544 college men who participated in a longitudinal study from 2008 to 2011 at a large, public university. Methods: Participants completed a self-report…

The practice of temporarily removing students from school as a form of punishment (i.e., suspensions) remains quite common. This study uses longitudinal data from a large, urban school district in California to assess whether the use of suspensions improves school safety in the following school year. Additional analyses by student race and…

Social network analysis (SNA) consists of a broad set of frameworks and methods to assess how direct and indirect relationships influence individual functioning. Although interest in SNA has steadily increased in the psychological sciences, school psychology has not kept pace. This article provides a general overview of core SNA concepts,…

In Vietnam, school violence is a serious problem; yet, little is known about the factors explaining this phenomenon. The current study looked at the role of normative beliefs approving aggression in the development of overt aggressive behavior. Using a short-term longitudinal design with three waves (4-month interval), this study examined the…

Growing evidence of the prevalence of school-related gender-based violence (SRGBV) has raised concerns about negative effects on education. Previous quantitative research on this topic has been limited by descriptive and cross-sectional data. Using longitudinal data from the Malawi Schooling and Adolescent Study, we investigate associations…

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) have been identified as a key risk factor for a variety of negative health, psychiatric, and behavioral outcomes across the life course. Although recent research has begun to consider the role of ACEs in criminogenic behaviors among youth, few studies to date have assessed the association between early exposure…

Early life adversity influences the diurnal cortisol rhythm, yet the relative influence of different characteristics of adversity remains unknown. In this study, we examine how developmental timing (childhood vs. adolescence), severity (major vs. minor), and domain of early life adversity relate to diurnal cortisol rhythms in late adolescence. We…

The aims of the current study were to provide the first Australian prevalence estimates of sexual harassment in adolescents, explore gender differences in form and frequency of harassment, and investigate demographic and weight status correlates. A total of 4098 adolescents (47.3% boys), aged 11 to 19 years from government and non-government…

Exposure to intimate partner violence (IPV) is associated with children's internalizing and externalizing problems. IPV is thought to impair mothers' ability to scaffold young children's emotion regulation through coregulated interactions. Mother-child language style matching (LSM) is an index of coregulation that has yet to be examined in…

A growing body of empirical research on teacher victimization indicates that it is widespread and yields negative consequences. However, limited research has investigated the relationship between teacher victimization and turnover. In this study, using longitudinal data from approximately 1,300 teachers in a metropolitan area in Texas, USA, we…