Drawing on structural racism and urban disadvantage approaches, this article posits a broad influence of citywide racial residential segregation on levels of violent crime across all urban neighborhoods regardless of their racial/ethnic composition. Multilevel models based on data from the National Neighborhood Crime Study for 7,622 neighborhoods in 79 cities throughout the United States reveal that segregation is positively associated with violent crime for white and various types of nonwhite neighborhoods. Nonetheless, there is a lack of parity in violence across these types of communities reflecting the larger racialized social system in which whites are able to use their privileged position to reside in the most advantaged neighborhoods, while African-Americans and Latinos live in the most disadvantaged urban communities and therefore bear the brunt of urban criminal violence.
Although the suicide rate among U.S. youth between the ages of 10 to 24 dramatically increased during the past 50 years, little research has examined this outcome within larger social contexts of the adolescent environment. Relying on Durkheim's theory of social integration, we examine the effect of individual- and structural-level social integration on adolescents' suicidality. Using a sample of 6,369 respondents within 314 neighborhoods, we examine the assumptions that high levels of religious, familial, neighborhood, and school integration are associated with fewer suicide attempts among youths. We find support for the traditional Durkheimian assumptions; specifically, the proportion of religiously conservative residents in a neighborhood reduces youths' risk of attempting suicide, as do individual-level controls of school and parental attachment. Moreover, we find evidence for a cross-level interaction between depression and neighborhood level of religiosity. Depression increases youths' risk of attempting suicide, but in places where religion is very important, this positive effect of depression is diminished.
Aims One-eighth of young adults in the United States report that their biological father has ever been incarcerated (FEI). This study is the first to examine associations between FEI and trajectories of substance use during the transition from adolescence into young adulthood for the US population. Design Using multi-level modeling techniques, trajectories of marijuana and other illegal drug use are examined, with FEI as the primary independent variable. Setting Data are from the first three waves of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, a nationally representative sample of US adolescents beginning in 1995. Participants Panels of 7157 males and 7997 females followed from adolescence (7th–12th grades) into early adulthood (ages 18–27 years). Measurements Dependent variables included an ordinal measure of marijuana frequency of use in last thirty days, and a dichotomous measure for whether respondent had any use in the last thirty days of illegal drugs such crystal meth, cocaine, heroin, hallucinogens, PCP, LSD, speed, and ecstasy. Findings Among males and females, respectively, FEI is associated with an increased frequency of marijuana use, and increased odds of any other illegal drug use. Interactions between FEI and age further reveal that FEI is associated with an accentuated trajectory (i.e. a steeper slope) of marijuana use, and an elevated risk (i.e. higher mean level) of other illegal drug use. Conclusions Analysis provides some of the first evidence that paternal incarceration is significantly associated with drug use among U.S. males and females, even after controlling for a number of family background, parental, and individual characteristics.
This paper examines racial and ethnic differences in locational attainments in the transition to adulthood, using longitudinal data about neighborhoods of youth in the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. It examines place stratification and life course models of locational attainment during the 1990s, a period during which neighborhood poverty rates were declining for many groups. The analysis reveals durable inequalities in neighborhood poverty from adolescence to young adulthood, particularly for blacks and Hispanic origin subgroups. Family socioeconomic status and emerging educational attainments are associated with decreases in neighborhood poverty, with blacks receiving a stronger return from educational attainments than whites. Despite the benefits of education, racial and ethnic minorities remain more likely to live in considerably more disadvantaged neighborhoods in young adulthood than whites.
Using data from the Los Angeles Family and Neighborhood Survey and its companion datasets, we examined how neighborhood disorder, perceived danger and both individually perceived and contextually measured neighborhood social cohesion are associated with self-rated health. Results indicate that neighborhood disorder is negatively associated with health and the relationship is explained by perceived cohesion and danger, which are both also significant predictors of health. Further, individually perceived cohesion emerges as a more important explanation of self-rated health than neighborhood-level social cohesion. Finally, neighborhood disorder and perceived cohesion interact to influence health, such that cohesion is especially beneficial when residents live in neighborhoods characterized by low to moderate disorder; once disorder is at high levels, cohesion no longer offers protection against poor health. We interpret our findings as they relate to prior research on neighborhoods, psychosocial processes, and health, and discuss their implications for intervention efforts that address disorder in urban communities.
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