Violence is a serious problem on college campuses. The literature on primary prevention of violence does not call for the adoption of specific programs or policies but rather suggests a paradigm shift in the way practitioners approach violence. Primary prevention means asking the question, "Why is violence happening in the first place?" in order to identify and change the underlying conditions that lead to violence. A number of factors contribute to violent incidents at the peer, institutional, community, and policy levels, in addition to individual factors. According to the WHO, these factors can then be addressed with targeted interventions across these levels simultaneously. Understanding local factors that contribute to violent incidents is critical to inform program development, because the specific factors that lead to violence may differ by type of violence and context. While much of the dialogue about primary violence prevention has occurred in the research on community violence prevention efforts, those who focus on campus violence prevention can benefit from this work. This primary violence prevention concept already has begun to make its way into campus prevention. One example is the American College Health Association's 2008 publication "Shifting the Paradigm: Primary Prevention of Sexual Violence," a toolkit that encourages the adoption of comprehensive primary prevention efforts that employ a combination of strategies to address multiple contributing factors. These factors include knowledge and attitudes that support violence, skills to intervene in violence and its precursors, norms, and policy and enforcement approaches to convey community standards. (Contains 1 resource.)