Examining Patterns of School-Based Polyvictimization and Repeat Victimization: A Latent Class Analysis Approach

ABSTRACT

This study uncovers nuances in the range and frequency of adolescent school-based victimization experiences, focusing on the gendered nature of these experiences. A concentration on indicators of criminal opportunity reveals unique predictors of pathways to single-time, poly, and repeat victimization within the school domain. Results from Latent Class Analysis and multinomial logistic regression models indicate that the standard dichotomy of victimization masks the possibility that there are more than two substantively unique classes of school victimization experiences and that many common risk factors may be important for membership in one class but may not matter for membership in other classes.

KEYWORDS:

• Latent class analysis
• polyvictimization
• repeat victimization
• opportunity theory
• school-based victimization
• gender

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The victimization measures include items that do not specify whether the victimization occurred in school. However, the prompt references the current school year, and that section of the questionnaire is labeled “School Experiences and Activities,” making it likely that students considered these items to be school based. Also, the original responses were set up so that “Once or twice” were combined into a single response category. As such, we were not able to concisely separate out single from multiple victimizations.