Understanding and Using Informants’ Reporting Discrepancies of Youth Victimization: A Conceptual Model and Recommendations for Research

Abstract

Discrepancies often occur among informants' reports of various domains of child and family functioning and are particularly common between parent and child reports of youth violence exposure. However, recent work suggests that discrepancies between parent and child reports predict subsequent poorer child outcomes. We propose a preliminary conceptual model (Discrepancies in Victimization Implicate Developmental Effects [DiVIDE]) that considers how and why discrepancies between parents' and youths' ratings of child victimization may be related to poor adjustment outcomes. The model addresses how dyadic processes, such as the parent-youth relationship and youths' information management, might contribute to discrepancies. We also consider coping processes that explain why discrepancies may predict increases in youth maladjustment. Based on this preliminary conceptual framework, we offer suggestions and future directions for researchers who encounter conflicting reports of community violence exposure and discuss why the proposed model is relevant to interventions for victimized youths.

Introduction to the Special Issue: Discrepancies in Adolescent–Parent Perceptions of the Family and Adolescent Adjustment

“…This research supports the idea that convergence between adolescent and parent reports reflects their consonance in understanding of family dynamics or their relationship (De Los Reyes et al 2013c;Goodman et al 2010). In support of this interpretation, consider that low adolescent-parent discrepant views about the family relate to high performance on objective indices of emotion recognition (De Los Reyes et al 2013c).…”

“…To begin, consider that when adolescents and parents provide researchers with reports about family functioning domains (e.g., conflict, parenting, relationship quality), they are providing their impressions of features of their lives that may matter a great deal to them (see also De Los Reyes 2011;De Los Reyes and Kazdin 2006a). Thus, patterns of convergence and divergence between adolescents' and parents' reports of such functioning may reflect important aspects of their interactions and how they relate to one another (De Los Reyes et al 2013c;Goodman et al 2010). In line with this view, recent work indicates that both the convergence between adolescents' and parents' reports, as well as the divergence between these reports, longitudinally predicts psychosocial outcomes among adolescents (e.g., De Los Reyes 2011; Laird and De Los Reyes 2013;Lippold et al 2013;Ohannessian and De Los Reyes 2014).…”

“…That is, a few theoretical models exist that seek to explain or improve interpretability of informant discrepancies (e.g., Kazdin 2005, 2006b;Goodman et al 2010;Kraemer et al 2003). However, these models focus on domains other than family functioning, such as mental health, treatment outcome, and youth victimization.…”

Examining Bidirectional Pathways Between Exposure to Political Violence and Adolescent Adjustment in Northern Ireland

“…This scale was specifically developed in this context to assess the degree to which young people were exposed to sectarianism (Goeke-Morey et al, 2009), or antisocial behaviors between the Catholics and Protestants (Taylor et al, 2011). Although parents and youth may provide discrepant reports on the youth's report of exposure to community violence (Goodman, De Los Reyes, & Bradshaw, 2010), mother and adolescent report on the SAB have been found to be moderately correlated (r=.46, Cummings et al, 2010).…”

Parent, Child, and Teacher Reports of School Climate as Predictors of Peer Victimization, Internalizing and Externalizing in Elementary School

“…The Ecology of School Climate As Kohl, Recchia, & Steffgen (2013) note in their review of school climate scales, ''A child is rooted within a family, just as a school is rooted within a community, therefore the home and the community are also part of the subjective experiences of school and therefore by definition of school climate'' (p. 412). Research demonstrates that different informants have different opportunities to monitor or witness children's victimization or emotional or behavioral problems (Goodman, De Los Reyes, & Bradshaw, 2010;De Los Reyes, Thomas, Goodman & Kundey, 2013), and it is likely that different informants have different access to information about school climate. One approach to examining how school climate operates across different but interacting ecologies that affect children's lives has been to use multilevel analyses that use individual child ratings to compute average classroom or average school-level ratings that can be compared across classes or schools.…”