Parents should help children determine how to cope with violence

By Sathya Achia Abraham

When it comes to coping with violence that hits close to home, parents can play a key role by providing guidance and encouraging a child to discuss ways to solve a problem, according to a new study by Virginia Commonwealth University researchers.

“Children living in environments where they are exposed to high levels of community violence face unique coping challenges. Witnessing or experiencing violence is linked with a range of problems in youth, including symptoms of depression and anxiety, aggressive and unlawful behavior, and starting to use drugs or increasing drug use,” said Wendy Kliewer, Ph.D., an associate professor in VCU’s Department of Psychology and lead author on the study.

“What children or youth do to cope with the violence they witness or experience predicts whether they fare well or poorly. Parents or caregivers can help children in developing strategies to cope with these stressors,” she said.

In the May-June issue of the journal Child Development, Kliewer and colleagues evaluated the coping strategies of approximately 100, 9– to 13-year-old youth and their female caregivers living in high violence areas in Richmond, Va. Researchers conducted two interviews, six months apart, of both parent and child. They reported that children who took an active approach in response to violence showed improvements in grades, self-esteem, post-traumatic stress symptoms, depression and anxiety across the two times they were interviewed.

Caregivers who participated in the study also were asked to discuss family life, how they coped with violence and how they discussed violence with their children.

As part of the interview, a video clip depicting a fight between an older boy and a younger boy was shown to the parent and child. Following the review of the video they discussed what the child could do in that situation, and how the parent could help the child cope.

Kliewer said that parents suggested a variety of coping strategies to help their children cope with violence in their community. Some of these strategies included active coping, proactive coping, resignation, seeking emotional support, thinking about their coping decisions and aggression.

She said that youth who coped most adaptively had parents who suggested active and proactive coping strategies to them, modeled active coping themselves, and had a good relationship with their children. An active approach involved making efforts to solve a problem directly, seeking help from others - typically adults - to solve a problem, or leaving the situation. Proactive coping is when a child takes action in advance to avoid a potential problem.

To further develop adaptive coping strategies, Kliewer said that programs such as home-health visits, outreach through churches and neighborhood centers, or public health campaigns, similar to those used to encourage parents to talk with youth about drugs, may be employed to teach parents effective ways to talk with their children about coping with violence.

Witnessing or experiencing drug deals, hitting, slapping or punching, attacks with knives or guns, threats and hearing gunfire are considered forms of community violence.

This work was supported in part by grants from the Centers for Disease Control and VCU. Kliewer collaborated with VCU students and colleagues Katie Adams Parrish, B.A., Kelli W. Taylor, M.S., Kate Jackson, B.S., Jean M. Walker, B.S., and Victoria A. Shivy, Ph.D.