Poster #121 - Desensitization to community violence and moral disengagement in adolescent offenders

• In Event: 3-206 - Poster Session 13
  In Poster Session: PS 13 Section - Moral Development

Integrative Statement

Background: Exposure to community violence (ECV) refers to experiencing or witnessing violent acts in the community (e.g., fights, shootings, stabbings; Krug et al., 2002). ECV is disproportionately higher among youth between the ages 12 to 24 (Finkelhor et al., 2009) and males adolescents (Zimmerman & Messner, 2013). Further, adolescent offenders are at an elevated risk for ECV, with many being exposed to multiple traumatic stressors including victimization, witnessing violence, or interpersonal loss. Although research has consistently observed a strong relation between ECV and externalizing behaviors, such as participation in delinquent behaviors, the association between ECV and internalizing symptoms has been inconsistent, with some scholars suggesting that the inconsistent associations are due to desensitization to violence (Gaylord-Harden et al., 2011). One construct that has been proposed to explain desensitization to violence is moral disengagement, which involves cognitive processes such as moral justification, displacement and diffusion of responsibility, distortion of consequences, attributions of blame and dehumanization (Bandura et al., 1996). However, very little research examines moral disengagement as a mechanism of the association between ECV and internalizing symptoms. The current study examines moral disengagement as both a mediator and a moderator in the association between ECV and internalizing symptoms (anxiety and depression) in a sample of adolescent offenders.

Methods: Participants were 1170 male adolescent offenders, ages 14-19 years old (M=16.05, SD=1.159) enrolled in the Pathways to Desistance study. Baseline, 6-month and 12-month time periods were utilized in the current analyses to focus the study on adolescence. Participants completed the Exposure to Violence Inventory (ETV; Selner-O'Hagan et al., 1998), the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI; Derogatis & Melisara, 1983), the Mechanisms of Moral Disengagement scale (Bandura et al., 1996) and several demographic questions.

Results: Hierarchical linear regression analysis was used to examine moderation effects. Moral disengagement at Time 2 did not moderate the association between ECV and internalizing symptoms (anxiety: B=-.018; p=.570; depression: B=.010, p=.740). However, the results showed a significant main effect for Time 2 moral disengagement in the prediction of Time 3 anxiety (B=.066, p=.031) and depression (B=.082, p=.008), controlling for baseline anxiety and depression. The results also showed a significant main effect for Time 1 ECV in the prediction of Time 3 anxiety symptoms (B=.102, p=.001) and depression symptoms (B=.123, p<.001), controlling for baseline anxiety and depression. Mediation analyses using the PROCESS macro (Hayes & Rockwood, 2017) revealed that moral disengagement did not significantly mediate the relation between ECV and anxiety (CI=-.0003-.0055). However, there was a significant indirect effect for depression (CI=.0003-.0071). Specifically, higher ECV at Time 1 significantly predicted increases in Time 3 depressive symptoms through its effects on increased moral disengagement at Time 2.

Conclusions: Moral disengagement may help explain the process by which ECV is related to depressive symptoms in adolescent offenders, which may help to understand the inconsistent findings for ECV and depression in prior research. Future studies should also examine moral disengagement within community samples to better understand whether these processes may help to explain or protect against desensitization to violence in adolescents.

Authors

• Jenny Phan, Loyola University Chicago
  Presenting Author

• Elizabeth Sargent, Loyola University Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author

• Noni K. Gaylord-Harden, Loyola University Chicago
  Non-Presenting Author