Pathways from Childhood Adversity to Problem Behaviors in Young Adulthood: The Mediating Role of Adolescents' Future Expectations.
Adverse childhood experiences and pessimistic future expectations about college attendance or mortality are established risk factors for problem behaviors among youth. Data were from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (N = 14,800; 49 % female). Participants were 11-17-years-old at baseline and 24-32-years-old at outcome. Adolescents' college expectations and fatalistic expectations mediated the effect of childhood adversity on violent behavior in young adulthood. Neither college nor fatalistic expectations were significant mediators in models predicting substance use and nonviolent antisocial behaviors. Although observed mediational effect sizes were small, they survived models that included multiple controls designed to rule-out alternative explanations. Intervening on adversity-exposed adolescents' college and fatalistic expectations may reduce risk for violent behaviors.
Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 425 S. University Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA.
Lauren D
LD
Brumley
Department of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania, 425 S. University Avenue, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA. srjaffee@psych.upenn.edu.
Sara R
SR
Jaffee
Graduate School of Education, University of Pennsylvania, 3700 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA.
Benjamin P
BP
Brumley
D000293:Adolescent; D000294:Adolescent Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D000328:Adult; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D005544:Forecasting; D006801:Humans; D008016:Life Change Events; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D008297:Male; D000066553:Problem Behavior / Q000523:psychology*; D000297:Psychology, Adolescent; D055815:Young Adult
Adolescence; Adverse childhood experiences; College expectations; Fatalistic expectations; Mediation; Problem behavior; Young adulthood