Associate Professor and Advisee Add to List of Publications

Associate Professor Joseph Mahoney and Ph.D. student Maria Parente have published in the Journal of Community Psychology: "Residential Mobility and Exposure to Neighborhood Crime: Risks for Young Children’s Aggression."

The study that provided research for this publication was supported by grants from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (R01 HD MH39909) and the Smith Richardson Foundation.

Dr. Mahoney's research interests include child/adolescent social development, out-of-school time, and social/educational intervention and policy. Ms Parente's research interests include youth out-of-school activities, self-care, and neighborhood structural characteristics.

Abstract

This three-year longitudinal study investigated associations between residential mobility, neighborhood crime, and aggression during middle childhood. Participants were 460 children (M age = 6.9 years, SD = 1.1) residing in a disadvantaged city in the Northeastern United States. Residential mobility was determined from school records, teachers provided ratings of aggression, and city police reports of call complaints provided information on neighborhood crime. Neighborhoods were classified as average or high crime. Results showed that mobility and neighborhood crime were significantly (p < .05) related to boys’ (but not girls’) aggression. Boys’ aggression was relatively high if they: (1) moved; (2) had stable residence in a high crime neighborhood, and (3) both moved and lived in high crime. Net of demographic characteristics and baseline adjustment, boys who moved from an average to high crime neighborhood showed particularly high aggression.