Adult Family Adversities and Bullying among Urban African American Adolescents

ABSTRACT

The current study examined how adverse family events (i.e., adult family incarceration, adult family substance use, and adult family mental illness) were associated with adolescent bullying perpetration. More specifically, this study examined whether levels of future orientation mediated the link between adult family incarceration, substance use, and mental illness and bullying perpetration. A sample of 637 African American adolescents from the Southside of Chicago was used for this study. Adult family incarceration, substance use, and mental illness were all found to be positively associated with bullying perpetration. Also, adult family substance use and mental illness were positively associated with low levels of future orientation, which was significantly related to bullying perpetration. These findings demonstrate the importance of understanding how adverse family events are related to adolescent bullying. Implications for future research are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• African American
• bullying
• incarceration
• mental health
• substance use
• urban

Disclosure statement

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest. There were no ethical issues with regard to human participants/animals in the study. Informed consent was obtained prior to the data collection.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by the Center for Health Administration Studies and the STI/HIV Intervention Network at the University of Chicago, which were awarded to Dr. Dexter R. Voisin. The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the last author’s previous institution. The last author collected the data for the study and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data. All authors assume responsibility for the accuracy of the data analysis