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Adverse Life Events, Coping and Internalizing and Externalizing Behaviors in Urban African American Youth

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Abstract

African American youth residing in low income urban neighborhoods are at increased risk of experiencing negative life events in multiple domains, increasing their risk for internalizing and externalizing behaviors. However, little is known about youth’s differential responses to life event stress, or protective processes and coping strategies for urban African American youth exposed to adverse life events. Thus, the present study examined whether variability in predominantly low income, urban African American youth’s responses to life event stress are accounted for by the type of life event experienced or the type of coping strategies used. Participants were a community sample of 353 urban African American youth (52.8 % girls; age range 8–12 years) who participated in the Multiple Opportunities to Reach Excellence (MORE) Project. Youth reported about their experiences with adverse life events, coping strategies, and internalizing and externalizing symptoms. Results indicated that violent life events were uniquely associated with externalizing behavior, while discrimination and economic stress were uniquely associated with internalizing behavior. The utility of coping strategies varied by gender, such that avoiding problems was protective for girls who experienced violent life events, but not for boys. For boys, exposure to violence was significantly positively associated with externalizing symptoms regardless of the amount of avoiding problems coping used. Findings suggest that interventions to develop coping strategies may need to be gender-specific as well as tailored for the types of stressors common for low income urban youth.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to express our gratitude to the Baltimore City Public School System and students who participated in the MORE Program, as well as Robert Griffin and the MORE research Team. This work was funded by support to the third author from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (PI: Cooley; 1 R01 DA018318).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, The George Washington University, Washington, DC, 20052, USA

    Yadira M. Sanchez & Sharon F. Lambert

  2. NPI, Semel Institute, Center for Culture and Health, University of California, Los Angeles, CA, 90024, USA

    Michele Cooley-Strickland

  3. Department of Mental Health, Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, 21205, USA

    Michele Cooley-Strickland

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  1. Yadira M. Sanchez
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  2. Sharon F. Lambert
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  3. Michele Cooley-Strickland
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Correspondence to Yadira M. Sanchez.

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Sanchez, Y.M., Lambert, S.F. & Cooley-Strickland, M. Adverse Life Events, Coping and Internalizing and Externalizing Behaviors in Urban African American Youth. J Child Fam Stud 22, 38–47 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-012-9590-4

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