U.S. Department of Justice

Office of Justice Programs

Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention 

A Message From OJJDP

Children are exposed to violence 

every day in their homes, schools, and 

communities. Such exposure can cause 

them significant physical, mental, and 

emotional harm with long-term effects 

that can last well into adulthood.

The Attorney General launched 

Defending Childhood in September 2010 

to unify the Department of Justice’s 

efforts to address children’s exposure to 

violence under one initiative. Through 

Defending Childhood, the Department 

is raising public awareness about the 

issue and supporting practitioners, 

researchers, and policymakers as 

they seek solutions to address it. A 

component of Defending Childhood, 

OJJDP’s Safe Start Initiative continues 

efforts begun in 1999 to enhance 

practice, research, training and technical 

assistance, and public education about 

children and violence. 

Under Safe Start, OJJDP conducted the 

National Survey of Children’s Exposure 

to Violence, the most comprehensive 

effort to date to measure the extent 

and nature of the violence that children 

endure and its consequences on their 

lives. This is the first study to ask 

children and caregivers about exposure 

to a range of violence, crime, and abuse 

in children’s lives.

As amply evidenced in this bulletin 

series, children’s exposure to violence 

is pervasive and affects all ages. The 

research findings reported here and 

in the other bulletins in this series are 

critical to informing our efforts to protect 

children from its damaging effects.

Access OJJDP publications online at ojjdp.gov. 

Learn more about the Attorney General’s Defending Childhood 

Initiative at justice.gov/ag/defendingchildhood. 

Find out more about OJJDP’s Safe Start Initiative on 

the Safe Start program summary page at ojjdp.gov. 

Children’s Exposure to Violence

N A TIONAL SURVEY OF

Children’s Exposure to 

Office of Justice Programs Innovation • Partnerships • Safer Neighborhoods www.ojp.usdoj.gov

Robert L. Listenbee, Administrator September 2015 

Children’s Exposure to 

Violence, Crime, and Abuse: 

An Update 

David Finkelhor, Heather Turner, Anne Shattuck, 

Sherry Hamby, and Kristen Kracke 

This bulletin discusses the second 

National Survey of Children’s Exposure 

to Violence (NatSCEV II), which was 

conducted in 2011 as a followup to 

the original NatSCEV I survey. The 

U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and 

the Centers for Disease Control and 

Prevention (CDC) sponsored both 

surveys. The Crimes against Children 

Research Center of the University of 

New Hampshire conducted the NatSCEV 

I survey between January and May 

2008. NatSCEV I represented the first 

comprehensive national survey of 

children’s past-year and lifetime exposure 

to violence, crime, and abuse in the home, 

school, and community across children 

and youth from ages 1 month to 17 years. 

(For more information on NatSCEV I, 

see “History of the National Survey of 

Children’s Exposure to Violence”). 

As in the first NatSCEV survey, NatSCEV 

II researchers interviewed a nationally 

representative sample of children and 

their caregivers regarding the children’s 

exposure to violence, crime, and 

abuse across several major categories: 

conventional crime, child maltreatment, 

victimization by peers and siblings, sexual 

victimization, witnessing and indirect 

victimization (including exposure to 

community violence, family violence, 

and school violence and threats), and 

Internet victimization. (For more detailed 

information on the types of violence 

that children were questioned about in 

NatSCEV I, see Finkelhor, Turner, Ormrod, 

Hamby, and Kracke, 2009). In addition 

to the types of exposure to violence, 

crime, and abuse covered in the original 

survey, NatSCEV II asked participants 

about several new types of exposure in 

the categories of conventional crime, 

child maltreatment, peer and sibling 

victimization, and Internet victimization 

(see “Methodology”). 

In general, NatSCEV II confirms the earlier 

survey’s findings regarding the extent of 

children’s past-year and lifetime exposure 

to violence, crime, and abuse, with few 

significant changes in reported exposures 

between the two surveys. In the NatSCEV 

II sample, approximately three in five 

children (57.7 percent) experienced 
at least one exposure to five aggregate 

types of violence in the past year 

(physical assault, sexual victimization, 

maltreatment, property victimization, 

and witnessing violence). Among the 

individual categories of exposure, declines 

somewhat outnumbered increases; 

however, NatSCEV II recorded significant 

changes from 2008 (all declines) in 

exposure to only 6 of 54 types of exposure 

to violence covered in the survey (see 

“Methodology”): property victimization 

and robbery (past year), being flashed by 

a peer (past year and lifetime), statutory 

sex offenses (past year and lifetime), 

school bomb threats (past year and 

lifetime), and assault by juvenile siblings 

(lifetime). 

NatSCEV II recorded high levels of pastyear exposure to various individual 

categories of direct victimization. In 2011, 

approximately 2 in 5 children and youth 

surveyed (41.2 percent) were victims of 

at least one assault in the past year, and 

approximately 1 in 10 (10.1 percent) were 

injured in an assault. Approximately 1 

in 20 children and youth (5.6 percent) 

were sexually victimized in the past 

year. Approximately one in four children 

and youth (24.1 percent) were victims 

of property crimes (including robbery, 

vandalism, and theft) in the past year. 

The reported rate of child maltreatment 

(including physical, sexual, and emotional 

abuse; neglect; and custodial interference 

or family abduction) in the past year was 

13.8 percent. 

Approximately 1 in 4 study participants 

witnessed a violent act in the past year 

(22.4 percent), and approximately 1 

in 12 witnessed family violence in the 

past year (8.2 percent). Approximately 

1 in 30 children and youth (3.7 percent) 

experienced bomb or attack threats 

against their schools. The rate of indirect 

exposure to household theft was 7.9 

percent in the past year. 

Multiple exposures to violence among 

children and youth continued to be 

a concern, with nearly one-half (48.4 

percent) of NatSCEV II participants 

reporting more than one type of direct 

or witnessed victimization in the past 

year—nearly 1 in 6 (15.1 percent) reported 

6 or more types of direct or witnessed 

victimization and 1 in 20 (4.9 percent) 

reported 10 or more types of direct or 

witnessed victimization over the same 

period. 

In 2011, reported rates of lifetime 

exposure to violence continued to be 

high, especially for the oldest youth 

(ages 14–17), showing how exposure 

to violence accumulates as a child 

grows. For example, approximately 7 

in 10 of these youth (69.7 percent) had 

been assaulted during their lifetimes, 

and a similar proportion (71.5 percent) 

witnessed violence during their lifetimes. 

In addition, more than half of these youth 

(56.6 percent) were victims of property 

crimes during their lifetimes. Lifetime 

exposure to major categories of violence 

for all youth surveyed in 2011 ranged 

from approximately 1 in 10 (9.5 percent) 

for sexual victimization to more than half 

(54.5 percent) for any assault. During their 

lifetimes, one in four (25.6 percent) were 

victims of maltreatment, two in five (40.2 

percent) were victims of property crimes, 

and two in five (39.2 percent) witnessed 

violence. 

Background 

Childhood exposure to violence, 

crime, and abuse can lead to serious 

consequences for the health and wellbeing of those exposed, both during 

childhood and throughout adulthood 

(Shonkoff, Boyce, and McEwen, 2009; 

Fang et al., 2012). Child maltreatment, 

peer victimization, and exposure to 

family and community violence have 

all been shown to be connected to 

developmental difficulties, problem 

behavior, and physical and mental 

health effects extending throughout 

the lifespan (Danese et al., 2009; SachsEricsson et al., 2005; Widom, DuMont, 

and Czaja, 2007; Bensley, Van Eenwyk, 

and Wynkoop Simmons, 2003). Children 

exposed to violence, crime, and abuse are 

more likely to abuse drugs and alcohol; 

suffer from depression, anxiety, and 

posttraumatic stress disorder; fail or 

have difficulties in school; and become 

delinquent and engage in criminal 

behavior. (For a more detailed discussion 

of the problem of child victimization, 

see Finkelhor, Turner, Ormrod, Hamby, 

and Kracke, 2009, and the sources cited 

therein.) Measuring child victimization 

accurately and comprehensively is 

crucial to reducing child victimization 

because those assessments help child 

welfare professionals identify and provide 

services to child victims of violence and 

their families and provide programs to 

educate children, their families, and those 

who work with children at risk for violence 

(including educators, social workers, 

medical professionals, and juvenile justice 

professionals). Unfortunately, earlier 

studies that measured children’s exposure 

to violence often were limited in the age 

ranges and types of exposure to violence 

studied as well as where the exposure 

to violence took place (i.e., they were 

limited to violent incidents in the home, 

the school, or the community instead of 

studying incidents in all of these locations) 

(Shonkoff, Boyce, and McEwen, 2009; 

Finkelhor, 2008; Nansel et al., 2003). Most 

of these studies tended to concentrate 

on specific forms of violence, such as 

child maltreatment, domestic violence, 

bullying, or community violence. This 

meant that data could not be combined 

to provide an accurate assessment of 

the total level of violence, crime, and 

abuse in a child’s environment. These 

studies also tended to look at specific 

characteristics of violent events (e.g., 

location, victim, or perpetrator) rather 

than viewing them from the perspective 

of the totality of the child’s experience. As 

a result, controversies persist about the 

most common forms of victimization, the 

age of greatest exposure to various types 

of victimization, and trends across time 

as children grow (Almeida et al., 2008; 

Mulford and Giordano, 2008; Pepler et 

al., 2008). In addition, few earlier studies 

analyzed the effect of polyvictimization— 

the cumulative effect over time of 

repeated exposures to multiple forms 

of violence, including a greater risk of 

exposure to other forms of violence and 

accumulation of multiple adversities and 

trauma symptoms (Dong et al., 2004; 

Finkelhor, Ormrod, and Turner, 2007). 

To support a more regular and systematic 

nationwide assessment of children’s 

exposure to violence, crime, and abuse, 

DOJ supported the collection of critical 

nationwide data to assess the full range 

and scope of children’s exposure to 

violence (both direct and indirect) in 

the home, school, and community. CDC 

joined with DOJ to support the collection 

of data on variables for safe, stable, and 

nurturing relationships as protective 

factors for vulnerable youth. NatSCEV 

I, conducted in 2008, was the first such 

assessment (Finkelhor, Turner, Ormrod, 

and Hamby, 2009); the bulletin presenting 

survey findings was published in 2009 

(Finkelhor, Turner, Ormrod, Hamby, and 

Kracke, 2009). NatSCEV I represented 

the first nationwide attempt to measure 

children’s past-year and lifetime exposure 

to violence across a number of categories, 

from relatively minor and common forms 

2 
History of the National Survey of Children’s Exposure to 

Violence 

Under the leadership of then-Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder in June 1999, 

the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) created the 

Safe Start Initiative to prevent and reduce the impact of children’s exposure to 

violence. As a part of this initiative and with a growing need to document the full 

extent of children’s exposure to violence, OJJDP launched the National Survey 

of Children’s Exposure to Violence (NatSCEV) with the support of the Centers for 

Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). CDC partnered with OJJDP to support 

the assessment of safe, stable, and nurturing relationships and environments as 

protective factors for vulnerable youth. 

NatSCEV I was the first national incidence and prevalence study to comprehensively 

examine the extent and nature of children’s exposure to violence across all 

ages, settings, and timeframes. Conducted between January and May 2008, it 

measured the past-year and lifetime exposure to violence for children age 17 and 

younger across several major categories: conventional crime, child maltreatment, 

victimization by peers and siblings, sexual victimization, witnessing and indirect 

victimization (including exposure to community violence and family violence), school 

violence and threats, and Internet victimization. This survey marked the first attempt 

to measure children’s exposure to violence in the home, school, and community 

across all age groups from 1 month to age 17, and the first attempt to measure the 

cumulative exposure to violence over the child’s lifetime. 

The survey asked children and their adult caregivers about the incidents of violence 

that children suffered and witnessed themselves and also about other related crime 

and threat exposures, such as theft or burglary from a child’s household, being in 

a school that was the target of a credible bomb threat, and being in a war zone or 

an area where ethnic violence occurred. OJJDP directed the development of the 

study, and the Crimes against Children Research Center at the University of New 

Hampshire designed and conducted the research. It provided data on the full extent 

of violence in the daily lives of children. NatSCEV documented the incidence and 

prevalence of children’s exposure to a broad array of violent experiences across a 

wide developmental spectrum. The research team asked followup questions about 

specific events, including where the exposure to violence occurred, whether injury 

resulted, how often the child was exposed to a specific type of violence, and the 

child’s relationship to the perpetrator and (when the child witnessed violence) the 

victim. 

In addition, the survey documented differences in exposure to violence across 

gender, race, socioeconomic status, family structure, region, urban/rural residence, 

and developmental stage of the child; specified how different forms of violent 

victimization “cluster” or co-occur; identified individual-, family-, and community-level 

predictors of violence exposure among children; examined associations between 

levels/types of exposure to violence and children’s mental and emotional health; 

and assessed the extent to which children disclose incidents of violence to various 

individuals and the nature and source of assistance or treatment provided (if any). 

of violence (such as siblings hitting 

one another) to more serious forms of 

violence (such as sexual victimization, 

including attempted and completed rape 

and statutory sex offenses, assaults with 

a weapon, and assaults that resulted 

in injury). It also represented the first 

comprehensive attempt to capture the 

full range of childhood exposure to 

violence, crime, and abuse in the home, 

school, and community in a single survey, 

collecting data on 48 types of exposure 

across 7 domains: conventional crime, 

child maltreatment, peer and sibling 

victimization, sexual victimization, 

witnessing and indirect victimization, 

school violence and threats, and Internet 

violence and victimization (Finkelhor, 

Turner, Ormrod, Hamby, and Kracke, 

2009). It further represented the first 

attempt to systematically measure 

witnessing violence and indirect violence 

in the home, school, and community, 

including children’s witnessing of intimate 

partner violence and other violence 

within the family, and witnessing and 

other exposure to shootings, assaults, and 

murder in the community. The NatSCEV 

I survey was the most detailed survey 

to that date and the first national survey 

to examine children’s witnessing and 

exposure to intimate partner violence 

and other family violence (Hamby et al., 

2011). The rates of exposure to intimate 

partner violence and other family 

violence were considerably higher than 

in previous surveys that captured more 

limited data on these exposures. NatSCEV 

II confirms these magnitudes, indicating 

that exposure to violence within the family 

remains a matter of grave concern for 

those who work with our nation’s youth 

(see “History of the National Survey of 

Children’s Exposure to Violence”). 

The second survey in this assessment, 

NatSCEV II (conducted in 2011), gathered 

information about the past-year and 

lifetime exposure to violence among a 

new group of 4,503 children ages 1 month 

to 17 years. The updated survey asked 

participants about children’s exposure to 

the same general categories of violence, 

crime, and abuse as in NatSCEV I. To 

monitor this nationwide problem over 

time, NatSCEV II generally replicated 

the first survey in terms of sample size, 

sampling procedures, and the questions 

asked of participants, although it asked 

some new questions that went into greater 

depth about exposure to assaults by 

adults, child maltreatment and neglect, 

peer and sibling victimization, and cell 

phone harassment (see “Methodology” 

for more information on the NatSCEV II 

survey procedures and the new screening 

questions). Beyond the measures of 

violence exposure, the survey also has 

information about mental health status, 

delinquency, family environment, and 

other childhood adversities. 

The addition of questions about cell 

phone harassment helps to increase 

understanding of whether the greater use 

of electronic communication media by 

youth increases or moderates violence 

between peers. As youth socialize and 

communicate electronically, they may be 

spending less time in face-to-face contact 

situations where assaults and physical 

violence can occur (Common Sense 

Media, 2012; Vahlberg, 2010). They may 

also be doing more of their risk taking 

and independence testing online, which 

may provide some safeguards against 

immediate physical exposure to violence. 

The engrossing quality of the Internet may 

also have undercut some of the boredom 

and alienation among youth that has in 

the past been associated with delinquency 

and criminal pursuits (Common Sense 

Media, 2012; Rideout, Foehr, and Roberts, 

2010). At the same time, when children 

3 
Methodology 

The National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence II (NatSCEV II) was designed to obtain up-to-date incidence and 

prevalence estimates of a wide range of childhood victimizations. The sample size, sampling and interview procedures, and 

questions asked generally followed those of the original NatSCEV survey, but some changes were made to account for 

households’ greater cell phone use and to provide more details on certain types of victimization. 

Telephone interviews were conducted with a nationwide sample of 4,503 children and youth ages 1 month to 17 years (or their 

caregivers for children younger than age 10) in 2011 (as compared with 4,549 interviewees in 2008). The sample of telephone 

households was determined by random-digit dialing. In addition, to represent the growing number of households that rely entirely 

or mostly on cell phones, the researchers contacted a national sample of 31 cell phone numbers and an address-based sample 

of 750 households that responded to a one-page mail questionnaire. Approximately one-half of the households in the addressbased sample used cell phones only. The average cooperation rate was 60 percent and the average response rate was 40 percent 

across all means of collection. 

As in 2008, a short interview was conducted with an adult caregiver (usually a parent) to obtain family demographic information. 

The child with the most recent birthday was then selected from all eligible children living in a household. If the selected child was 

10 to 17 years old, the main telephone interview was conducted with the child. If the child was younger than age 10, the interview 

was conducted with the caregiver who “is most familiar with the child’s daily routine and experiences.” 

Respondents were promised complete confidentiality and were paid $20 for their participation. The interviews, averaging 55 

minutes in length, were conducted in either English or Spanish. Respondents who disclosed a situation of serious threat or ongoing 

victimization were contacted again by a clinical member of the research team, trained in telephone crisis counseling, whose 

responsibility was to stay in contact with the respondent until the situation was appropriately addressed locally. All procedures were 

authorized by the Institutional Review Board of the University of New Hampshire. 

To correct for study design and demographic variations in nonresponse, weights were applied to adjust for (1) differing probabilities 

of household selection based on sampling frames; (2) variations in within-household selection resulting from different numbers of 

eligible children across households; and (3) differences in sample proportions according to gender, age, race/ethnicity, income, 

census region, number of adults and children in the household, and phone status (cell only, mostly cell, other) relative to the 2010 

American Community Survey Public Use Microdata Sample. 

Types of Victimization Surveyed 

This survey used an enhanced version of the Juvenile Victimization Questionnaire (JVQ), an inventory of childhood victimization 

(Finkelhor, Hamby et al., 2005; Finkelhor, Ormrod et al., 2005; Hamby et al., 2004). The test–retest reliability and construct validity 

of the JVQ were established in a previous national sample that used the JVQ, the Developmental Victimization Survey, conducted 

in 2002 and 2003 (Finkelhor, Hamby et al., 2005; Hamby, Finkelhor, and Turner, 2012). 

This enhanced version of the JVQ obtained reports on 54 forms of offenses against youth that cover the following general areas 

of concern: conventional crime, child maltreatment, peer and sibling victimization, sexual assault, exposure to family violence and 

abuse, witnessing and indirect victimization, Internet and cell phone victimization, and school violence and bomb threats. The 

NatSCEV II survey instrument included several new questions that were not included in NatSCEV I in 2008: conventional crime, 

child maltreatment and neglect, peer and sibling victimization, and Internet/cell phone victimization, as described below: 

•	 Conventional crime: Hitting or an attack on a child by any adult, and hitting or an attack that resulted in injury. 

•	 Child maltreatment/neglect: A parent’s inability to look after a child because of drug or alcohol abuse or psychological 

problems, parent abandonment of a child, the presence in the home of persons who made the child fearful, unsafe or unsanitary 

conditions in the home, and failure to attend to the child’s cleanliness or grooming. 

and youth get into threatening situations, 

cell phone technology now affords them 

a way of summoning help or recording 

misbehavior, which may act as a deterrent 

(Crime in America.net, 2011; Klick, 

MacDonald, and Stratmann, 2012). 

The new questions in NatSCEV II 

regarding child maltreatment, neglect, 

or abandonment solicited additional 

details about conditions in the child’s 

household related to that maltreatment 

and neglect and gathered information 

about possible unsanitary, unsafe, or 

threatening conditions that the child 

might be subjected to that would require 

immediate intervention. Similarly, the 

additional questions about peer and 

sibling victimization solicited additional 

information about the types of relational 

aggression that a child or youth might 

be subjected to from classmates or 

acquaintances, including ostracism and 

the spreading of hurtful lies and rumors, 

and made it clear that those behaviors are 

components of relational aggression. In 

addition, the new questions about assaults 

by adults captured general information 

relating to assaults by adults against 

children that NatSCEV I did not capture, 

allowing more exact measurement of 

all forms of violence by adults against 

children. 

4 
Methodology (continued) 

•	 Peer and sibling victimization: Types of emotional bullying or relational aggression, including peers spreading lies or rumors 

about a child or otherwise trying to make a child be disliked; and peers excluding, ostracizing, or ignoring a child. 

•	 Internet/cell phone victimization: Use of cell phone/texting to harass a child or spread harmful words and pictures about or of 

the child. 

Followup questions for each screener item gathered additional information, including perpetrator characteristics, the use of a 

weapon, whether injury resulted, and whether the event occurred in conjunction with another screener event. Because different 

types of victimizations can occur together and can overlap by definition (e.g., physical abuse by a caretaker can also be an assault 

with or without injury), the rates reported for victimizations reflect considerable rescoring of the data provided by the screener items 

and their followup questions. Rates shown for NatSCEV II reflect the incorporation of the new information; however, statistical 

comparisons of rates with 2008 were based on data only from screeners that were used in both surveys. The rates determined 

reflect 44 types of victimization in the following categories: 

•	 Assaults and bullying: Any physical assault (excludes threats, bullying, and teasing/emotional bullying), assault with a weapon, 

assault with injury, assault without a weapon or injury, attempted assault, attempted or completed kidnapping, assault by an adult, 

assault by a juvenile sibling, assault by a nonsibling peer, assault by a gang or group, nonsexual genital assault, dating violence, 

bias attack, credible threat of attack, physical intimidation (formerly physical bullying), relational aggression (formerly emotional 

bullying), or Internet/cell phone harassment. 

•	 Sexual victimization: Any sexual victimization (includes statutory sex offenses), sexual assault, completed rape, attempted or 

completed rape, sexual assault by a known adult, sexual assault by an adult stranger, sexual assault by a peer, flashing or sexual 

exposure by a peer, flashing or sexual exposure by an adult, sexual harassment, or Internet sex talk. 

•	 Child maltreatment: Any maltreatment, physical abuse, psychological or emotional abuse, neglect, custodial interference, or 

family abduction. 

•	 Property victimization: Any property victimization, including robbery, vandalism, or theft by a nonsibling. 

•	 Witnessed and indirect victimization: Any witnessed violence (if the child saw or heard the assault); witnessed family assault; 

witnessed partner assault; witnessed physical abuse; witnessed other family assault; witnessed assault in the community; or 

exposure to shooting, bombs, or riots. 

Limitations 

The study has a variety of limitations that make it difficult to capture the full extent of children’s exposure to violence. The families 

that could not be found at home or that refused to cooperate for themselves or their children may be the families where children 

have discrepant levels of exposure compared to the cooperating families. For many reasons, children may fail to disclose all their 

exposures, and parents may not know about all of a child’s exposure to violence or may underreport or minimize certain types of 

victimizations. The screening questions for exposures needed to be brief and may not have included enough examples and details 

to trigger the memory of qualifying experiences. Some exposures, especially over a long timespan, may be forgotten or may have 

occurred before the memory capacity of some victims was well formed. Some important types of victimization, such as witnessing 

parental homicide, occur too infrequently in the population to be adequately counted in a survey methodology of this sort. In spite of 

these limitations, the approach taken by NatSCEV II is more detailed and comprehensive than previous violence exposure studies. 

Major Findings From 

the NatSCEV II Survey 

Like NatSCEV I, NatSCEV II estimates 

both past-year and lifetime exposure to 

violence across a number of categories, 

including physical assault, bullying, 

sexual victimization, child maltreatment 

and neglect, property victimization, and 

witnessed and indirect victimization 

(see “Methodology” above for more 

detailed definitions of these terms). 

Exhibit 1 illustrates the past-year and 

lifetime exposure to selected categories of 

violence for all youth studied and for the 

oldest youth surveyed (those ages 14–17). 

Some of the more notable findings are 

outlined below (see Finkelhor et al., 2013, 

for more details). 

The NatSCEV II survey confirmed NatSCEV 

I’s finding that children’s exposure to 

violence is common; nearly 60 percent 

of the sample (57.7 percent) had been 

exposed to violence in the past year, and 

more than 1 in 10 reported 5 or more 

exposures. This exposure occurs across 

all age ranges of childhood and for both 

genders (see exhibit 2 for a comparison 

of past-year and lifetime exposure to 

selected categories of victimization among 

boys and girls). 

Assaults and Bullying 

Two in five children (41.2 percent) were 

physically assaulted during the past year, 

and 1 in 10 (10.1 percent) was injured. 

Siblings and nonsibling peers were both 

common perpetrators, and assaults from 

both groups were most common during 

middle childhood. Assaults by siblings 

were most common among 6- to 9-yearolds, with 28.0 percent being victims in 

the past year, and assaults by nonsibling 

peers were most common among 10- to 

5 
Exhibit 1. Exposure to Selected Categories of Violence for All Youth in 

Sample and for 14- to 17-Year-Olds: NatSCEV II 

All Youth 14- to 17-Year-Olds 

Past Year Lifetime Past Year Lifetime 

Any physical assault 41.2% 54.5% 39.5% 69.7% 

Assault with no weapon or injury 29.8 44.2 23.6 56.2 

Assault with a weapon 6.2 10.3 6.8 16.9 

Assault with injury 10.1 16.6 16.6 31.9 

Assault by juvenile sibling 20.7 28.6 13.6 32.6 

Physical intimidationa 13.7 24.6 9.6 33.7 

Relational aggressiona 36.5 51.8 39.6 72.3 

Dating violence 3.2b 3.4b 4.2 6.3 

Internet/cell phone harassment 6.0c 8.5c 13.9 20.3 

Any sexual victimization 5.6 9.5 16.4 27.4 

Sexual assault 2.2 4.1 6.1 10.6 

Statutory sex offense 0.1 0.2 0.1 0.3 

Peer flashing 1.6 3.1 3.8 8.3 

Any child maltreatment 13.8 25.6 20.6 41.2 

Physical abuse 3.7 9.6 5.5 18.2 

Emotional abuse 8.0d 14.9d 13.9 25.7 

Neglect 6.5 14.6 8.6 22.3 

Any property victimization 24.1 40.2 28.5 56.6 

Robbery 4.3 8.7 3.0 8.9 

Vandalism 6.8 13.4 6.5 17.9 

Theft 6.7 14.8 9.5 26.8 

Witnessing violencee 22.4 39.2 42.6 71.5 

Witnessing partner assault 6.1 17.3 7.6 28.3 

Witnessing family assault 8.2 20.8 10.2 34.5 

Witnessing community assault 16.9 27.5 36.4 58.9 

Indirect exposure to violence 3.4 10.1 6.4 21.8 

Indirect exposure to family assault 1.0 3.0 1.5 6.3 

Indirect exposure to community 2.5 7.9 5.0 17.3 violence
 

Household theft 7.9 20.3
 9.1 32.7 

School bomb or attack threat 3.7 9.6 8.4 21.7 

Note: Values in bold are significantly different from those in the NatSCEV I survey in 2008.
 

a

 Bullying includes both physical intimidation and relational aggression.
 

b For adolescents age 12 and older.
 

c

 For children and youth age 5 and older.
 

d For children and youth age 2 and older.
 

e Excludes indirect exposure to violence.
 

13-year-olds, with 23.5 percent being victims were assaulted by nonsibling peers in the 

in the past year. However, both sibling and past year; among 14- to 17-year-olds, 13.6 

nonsibling peer assaults were common percent were assaulted by siblings and 

throughout childhood and adolescence: 18.4 percent were assaulted by nonsibling 

Among 2- to 5-year-olds, 26.3 percent were peers in the past year. NatSCEV II was 

assaulted by siblings and 16.4 percent the first survey to report in general on 

assaults on children by adults; these 

were less common than assaults by peers 

and siblings, with a past-year rate of 5.0 

percent and a lifetime rate of 10.2 percent 

for all children and youth. Both past-year 

and lifetime rates of assault by adults were 

similar for boys and girls; past-year rates 

of assault by adults were highest for 14- to 

17-year-olds, but the difference across 

the age range from 6 to 17 years was not 

significant. 

Some specific types of assaults occurred 

to smaller groups of youth in the previous 

year: dating violence to 3.2 percent of 

youth who were age 12 or older, bias 

attacks to 1.8 percent, gang or group 

assault to 1.7 percent, and attempted or 

completed kidnapping to 0.6 percent. Boys 

experienced more assaults overall (45.2 

percent vs. 37.1 percent for girls) and had 

particularly disproportionate levels of 

assault with injury (13.0 percent vs. 7.1 

percent), gang/group assault (2.5 percent 

vs. 0.9 percent), and nonsexual assault to 

the genitals (9.3 percent vs. 1.0 percent). 

Girls were targets of more dating violence 

(4.7 percent vs. 1.9 percent). Assault with 

injury, dating violence, and nonsexual 

assault to the genitals were higher among 

the oldest youth. 

Bullying-type victimizations were also 

common, with 13.7 percent of children 

and youth being physically intimidated 

within the past year and 36.5 percent 

being victims of relational aggression 

within the past year. (The terms “physical 

intimidation” and “relational aggression” 

were used instead of the more common 

terms of physical and emotional bullying, 

which in their technical definition require 

a “power imbalance” in the relationship 

between victim and perpetrator.) Pastyear rates of exposure to relational 

aggression and Internet/cell phone 

harassment were higher for girls (NatSCEV 

II, unlike the first survey, asked specifically 

about cell phone harassment). Past-year 

rates of physical intimidation for boys and 

girls were comparable but did differ by 

age, with the highest rate experienced by 

children younger than 10. Among other 

victimization types occurring in the past 

year, relational aggression was highest for 

6- to 9-year-olds, and Internet/cell phone 

harassment was highest for 14- to 17-yearolds. 

The overall estimate for assault in 2011 

was down 2.2 percentage points compared 

to 2008, and most specific forms of assault 

also showed declines. However, except 

for the decline in lifetime exposure to 

6 
Exhibit 2. Exposure to Selected Categories of Violence, Crime, and Abuse by 

Gender: NatSCEV II 

Past Year Lifetime 

Males Females Males Females 

Any physical assault 45.2% 37.1% 58.5% 50.3% 

Assault with no weapon or injury 33.0 26.4 48.0 40.3 

Assault with a weapon 7.4 5.1 12.8 7.7 

Assault with injury 13.0 7.1 21.3 11.6 

Assault by juvenile sibling 22.2 19.2 30.7 26.6 

Physical intimidationa 14.1 13.3 24.3 25.0 

Relational aggressiona 31.9 41.4 48.4 55.5 

Dating violenceb 1.9 4.7 3.4 6.4 

Internet/cell phone harassmentc 3.8 8.3 5.8 11.3 

Any sexual victimization 3.8 7.5 7.8 11.4 

Sexual assault 1.0 3.5 2.5 5.9 

Statutory sex offense 0.1 0.1 0.3 0.3 

Peer flashing 1.8 1.4 3.0 3.2 

Any child maltreatment 13.4 14.2 25.2 26.1 

Physical abuse 4.5 2.9 11.0 8.1 

Emotional abused 6.9 9.2 12.5 17.5 

Neglect 6.9 6.0 15.2 14.0 

Any property victimization 24.9 23.2 42.5 37.8 

Robbery 4.7 3.9 9.1 8.3 

Vandalism 8.7 4.8 16.6 10.1 

Theft 6.4 6.9 15.5 14.1 

Witnessing violencee 24.2 20.5 40.9 37.4 

Witnessing partner assault 6.0 17.6 6.1 17.1 

Witnessing family assault 8.5 7.8 20.9 20.7 

Witnessing community assault 18.5 15.2 30.0 24.9 

Indirect exposure to violence 3.7 3.1 10.1 10.2 

Indirect exposure to family assault 0.9 1.0 2.9 3.1 

Indirect exposure to community 2.9 2.1 7.7 8.2 violence
 

Household theft 9.2 6.6
 22.2 18.3 

School bomb or attack threat 2.3 5.2 7.9 11.5 

Note: Values in bold are significantly different for males and females at p < 05.
 

a

 Bullying includes both physical intimidation and relational aggression.
 

b For adolescents age 12 and older.
 

c

 For children and youth age 5 and older.
 

d For children and youth age 2 and older.
 

e

 Excludes indirect exposure to violence.
 

sibling assault, none of the changes in victimization in the past year, and 2.2 

assault from 2008 to 2011 were statistically percent experienced a sexual assault in 

significant. the past year. (Sexual assault includes 

attempted and completed rape and 

contact sex offenses by adults and peers 

but excludes sexual harassment.) Girls 

Sexual Victimization 

Nearly 6 percent (5.6 percent) of the ages 14–17 represented the highest risk total sample experienced a sexual 

group, with 22.8 percent experiencing 

a sexual victimization and 10.7 percent 

experiencing a sexual assault in the past 

year. Among this group, 8.1 percent 

reported an attempted or completed rape, 

13.6 percent were sexually harassed, and 

12.9 percent were exposed to an unwanted 

Internet sexual solicitation in the past 

year. 

NatSCEV II shows lifetime estimates for 

sexual victimization for 14- to 17-yearolds by gender: during their lifetimes, 

17.4 percent of the older girls and 4.2 

percent of the older boys said they had 

experienced a sexual assault. Completed 

rape occurred for 3.6 percent of girls and 

0.4 percent of boys. Sexual assault by 

a known adult occurred for 5.9 percent 

of girls and 0.3 percent of boys. Sexual 

assault by an unknown adult occurred 

for 3.8 percent of girls and 0.1 percent of 

boys. One category of sexual victimization, 

peer flashing, saw a significant decline 

from 2008 in both past-year and lifetime 

rates. 

Child Maltreatment and 

Neglect 

Child maltreatment includes physical 

abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, sexual 

abuse by a known adult, and custodial 

interference or family abduction (defined 

as one parent taking, keeping, or hiding 

a child to prevent the child from being 

with the other parent; Finkelhor, Turner, 

Ormrod, and Hamby, 2009). Altogether, 

13.8 percent of the sample experienced 

such maltreatment in the past year, 

and 25.6 percent experienced it during 

their lifetimes. The lifetime rate of child 

maltreatment for the oldest subgroup, 

14- to 17-year-olds, was 41.2 percent. 

Emotional abuse by a caregiver was the 

most frequent; the past-year rate was 

8.0 percent for the total sample and the 

lifetime rate was 25.7 percent for 14- to 

17-year-olds. The rate for physical abuse 

by a caregiver was 3.7 percent for the 

full sample in the past year and 18.2 

percent for 14- to 17-year-olds in their 

lifetimes. The rate for neglect was 6.5 

percent for the full sample in the past 

year and 22.3 percent for 14- to 17-yearolds in their lifetimes. Gender differences 

were evident for physical abuse only, 

with boys experiencing somewhat higher 

rates in the past year (4.5 percent vs. 2.9 

percent for girls). Rates of both physical 

and emotional abuse were significantly 

higher for older children. There were no 

significant changes in the rate of child 

maltreatment from 2008 to 2011. 

7 
Property Victimization 

Property victimization, consisting 

of robbery, vandalism, and theft by 

nonsiblings, occurred to 24.1 percent of 

children and youth during the past year. 

Vandalism was more common for boys 

(8.7 percent vs. 4.8 percent for girls), 

and theft was more common among 

older youth. Property victimization as a 

whole and robbery specifically declined 

significantly from 2008. 

Witnessing and Indirect 

Victimization 

Almost a quarter of the sample (22.4 

percent) had witnessed violence in the 

past year, either in the family or in the 

community. In addition, 8.2 percent had 

witnessed a family assault, and 6.1 percent 

had witnessed a parent assault another 

parent (or parental partner) in the past 

year. Over their lifetimes, more than one 

in five children surveyed (20.8 percent) 

witnessed a family assault, and more 

than one in six (17.3 percent) witnessed 

one parent assault another parent or 

a parental partner. Among the oldest 

youth (ages 14–17), the lifetime rate of 

witnessing any family assault was 34.5 

percent, and 28.3 percent of these youth 

had witnessed one parent assaulting 

another. There were few significant gender 

or age differences in the witnessing of 

family assaults. 

In the case of witnessing a community 

assault, the rate for all children and youth 

was 16.9 percent in the past year and 58.9 

percent over the lifetime of the oldest 

youth. The rate for lifetime exposure to 

shootings (including hearing gunshots 

as well as seeing someone shot) was 16.8 

percent for the oldest group of youth 

(ages 14–17), but the rate for exposure to 

warfare was only 2.0 percent. Among all 

children and youth, 7.9 percent had been 

exposed to household theft in the past 

year and 3.7 percent had been exposed 

to a bomb threat or other attack threat 

in their school in the past year. Past-year 

and lifetime exposure to school bomb and 

attack threats significantly declined since 

2008. 

Multiple Exposures 

Altogether, 57.7 percent of the children 

had experienced at least one of five 

aggregate types of direct or witnessed 

victimization in the year prior to 

this survey (physical assault, sexual 

victimization, maltreatment, property 

victimization, or witnessing family/ 

community violence). Exposures to 

multiple types of violence were also 

common. Among all children and youth 

surveyed, nearly half (48.4 percent) had 

experienced more than one specific 

victimization type involving direct or 

witnessed victimization (out of 50 possible 

types), nearly 1 in 6 (15.1 percent) 

experienced 6 or more types, and nearly 

1 in 20 (4.9 percent) had been exposed to 

10 or more different forms of victimization. 

Exposure to one type of violence, crime, 

or abuse increased the likelihood that a 

child had exposures to other types as well. 

Exhibit 3 presents the odds ratios that 

a child or youth who is exposed to one 

type of victimization will be exposed to 

a victimization of another type. An odds 

ratio greater than 1.0 means that a youth 

who suffers one type of victimization 

is at increased risk of exposure to 

another type of victimization. In most 

cases, the risk of an additional type of 

exposure was increased by a factor of 

two or three for a past-year exposure and 

somewhat more for a lifetime exposure. 

For example, having a past-year assault 

was associated with a 2.7 times greater 

likelihood of sexual victimization and a 

2.9 times greater likelihood of caregiver 

maltreatment. This increase in risk of 

exposure to other forms of violence 

occurred for all combinations of exposure. 

Victimization and 

Delinquency 

Among children age 6 and older, violent 

delinquency dropped by 30 percent from 

2008 to 2011, and property delinquency 

decreased by 40 percent. In 2011, 16.5 

percent of the youth engaged in an act 

of violent delinquency, and 12.1 percent 

engaged in an act of property delinquency. 

(For a comprehensive discussion of 

the relationship between victimization 

and delinquency, with reference to the 

NatSCEV I findings, see Cuevas et al., 

2013.) 

Comparison of Selected 

NatSCEV I and NatSCEV II 

Survey Results 

The rates reported here for 2011 have 

been compared to rates from the 2008 

NatSCEV I survey, which was also based 

on a nationally representative sample of 

children and youth ages 1 month to 17 

years (Finkelhor, Turner, Ormrod, and 

Hamby, 2009; Finkelhor, Turner, Ormrod, 

Hamby, and Kracke, 2009). 

Comparing the exposure rates between 

the two surveys suggests a mixture of 

stability and change. The percentage 

experiencing any of the five direct and 

witnessed aggregate types of exposure 

to violence, crime, and abuse (assaults 

and bullying, sexual victimization, child 

maltreatment, property victimization, and 

witnessing and indirect victimization) in 

the past year fell by 2.3 percentage points, 

but that change was not significant. 

Declines outnumbered increases 

somewhat among the specific types of 

exposures, but there were only 6 types 

out of 54 whose changes were significant 

for either the past year or lifetime. Assault 

by juvenile siblings (lifetime) declined, 

being flashed by a peer and statutory sex 

offenses (past year and lifetime) declined, 

property victimization (past year) and 

robbery (past year) declined, and school 

bomb threats (past year and lifetime) 

declined. 

8 
These trends are consistent with other 

evidence: the National Crime Victimization 

Survey showed post-2008 declines 

in violent crime and property crime 

exposure among youth (Finkelhor, 2013; 

Robers et al., 2012; White and Lauritsen, 

2012) and, according to Federal Bureau of 

Investigation statistics, the overall trend in 

crime as tracked by reports to the police 

was down 4, 6, and 5 percent, respectively, 

for each successive year from 2008 to 2011 

(Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2010, 

2011, 2012, 2013). Rates for substantiated 

child maltreatment fell during the period 

2008 to 2011, including declines in sexual 

abuse within the family (Finkelhor, Jones, 

and Shattuck, 2013), and police reports of 

crime and homicide dropped. 

Implications for 

Researchers, 

Practitioners, and 

Policymakers 

This section discusses implications for 

researchers, practitioners, and policymakers 

in a number of areas. This study reinforces 

numerous previous reports showing that 

children and youth are frequently exposed 

to violence, abuse, and crime both annually 

and over the course of their childhoods 

(Baum, 2005; Kilpatrick, Saunders, and 

Smith, 2003; Straus et al., 1998). The 

NatSCEV surveys measure this exposure 

in greater detail than prior research, 

breaking it down by a variety of distinct and 

sometimes related types by age and by both 

past-year and lifetime rates. The NatSCEV I 

and NatSCEV II surveys allow researchers 

and policymakers to track trends over 

time and to monitor the possible effects 

of social changes and public policies. 

The survey findings also enable public 

health officials to educate the public about 

the harms to children from exposure to 

violence, crime, and abuse. Moreover, 

they provide practitioners with risk and 

protective factor data on which to base 

evidence-based approaches to reducing 

children’s exposure to violence, crime, 

and abuse and to craft interventions to 

prevent and treat the harms resulting 

from that exposure. Overall, from 2008 

to 2011 there were more decreases than 

increases in rates of children’s exposure 

to specific types of violence, crime, and 

abuse, but few of the changes were large 

enough to be detectable as significant 

with the sample sizes available. There 

were significant downward trends in both 

past-year and lifetime peer flashing and 

statutory sex crimes. Also significant were 

declines in past-year robbery and property 

victimization, lifetime exposure to juvenile 

sibling assault, and past-year and lifetime 

school bomb threats. 

These surveys are the first to 

comprehensively document children’s 

exposure to incidents of violence, crime, 

and abuse from the child’s perspective 

as both victim and witness. The 

comprehensiveness of these surveys 

documents the degree to which some 

youth experience multiple exposures that 

appear to be highly correlated within 

types. It also provides a perspective 

on the degree to which exposure to 

multiple types of violence across a range 

of domains has an exponential impact 

on both the risk of further victimization 

and the level of trauma and adversity a 

child experiences. Eleven percent of the 

youth in the sample had experienced six 

or more types of direct victimization in a 

single year; this highly vulnerable segment 

of the youth with “polyvictimizations” 

suffers from many adversities at rates 

significantly higher than those youth who 

experience victimizations within single 

categories of violence, crime, and abuse, 

even those who experience serious, 

Exhibit 3. Past-Year and Lifetime Risk of Multiple Exposures, Matching Each Victimization Type With Other 

Victimization Types 

Odds Ratio 

Assaults and Sexual Maltreatment by Property Witnessing Other Indirect 

Victimization Type Bullying Victimization a Caregiver Victimization Violence Exposure 

Past-Year Victimization 

Assaults and Bullying 1.0 2.7 2.9 2.9 2.0 2.5 

Sexual Victimization 1.5 1.0 2.9 2.3 2.1 1.9 

Maltreatment by a Caregiver 1.8 3.6 1.0 2.0 2.3 1.5 

Property Victimization 1.9 3.4 2.3 1.0 1.9 2.2 

Witnessing Violence 1.6 2.7 2.7 2.0 1.0 5.6 

Other Indirect Exposure 2.5 1.8 1.4 1.8 2.9 1.0 

Lifetime Victimization 

Assaults and Bullying 1.0 3.7 3.4 2.7 2.5 2.3 

Sexual Victimization 1.5 1.0 2.6 1.7 1.9 2.3 

Maltreatment by a Caregiver 1.8 4.0 1.0 2.0 2.5 2.4 

Property Victimization 1.8 2.5 2.6 1.0 2.1 2.3 

Witnessing Violence 1.8 3.4 4.1 2.2 1.0 4.5 

Other Indirect Exposure 1.4 2.3 1.9 1.6 2.0 1.0 

N = 4,503 (ages 0–17) 

Odds ratios converted to approximate the risk ratio to adjust for outcome incidence (Zhang and Yu, 1998). 

All odds ratios are statistically significant at p < .05. Analyses control for age. 

Values equal to 1.0 are reference values. 

9 
chronic victimizations, such as repeated 

sexual abuse. The characteristics of these 

polyvictimized youth differ significantly 

from those of other youth in that their 

exposures to violence, crime, and 

abuse are far more serious and chronic, 

accounting for a disproportionate share of 

the most serious victimizations, including 

sexual abuse and child maltreatment, and 

reach across multiple domains. These 

youth have relatively few areas of safety, 

which may explain their added distress 

and vulnerability (Finkelhor et al., 2011; 

Finkelhor, Ormrod, and Turner, 2007; 

Turner, Finkelhor, and Ormrod, 2010). 

The exponential nature of the harms 

caused by polyvictimization has serious 

and far-ranging implications for research, 

policy, and practice. Researchers should 

broaden their focus, away from studying 

individual categories of violence, crime, 

and abuse, and move toward looking 

at the totality of a child’s experience. 

Research that focuses on single types or 

domains of violence, crime, and abuse may 

inaccurately attribute adverse outcomes 

to single types of victimizations without 

investigating whether multiple types 

of victimizations are co-occurring and 

exacerbating those outcomes. In addition, 

as part of the concentration on the child’s 

experience, researchers and practitioners 

need to look at how experiences in the 

home, school, and community reinforce 

each other. Children do not experience 

individual incidents of violence, crime, 

and abuse in isolation from other events. 

Therefore, teachers, school counselors, 

medical and mental health professionals, 

child welfare professionals, domestic 

violence advocates, law enforcement 

officers, juvenile justice system 

professionals, and other practitioners 

who work with children at risk need to 

identify the full range of victimizations a 

child may be experiencing, not limiting 

themselves to the problem or incident 

that was the reason for the initial contact 

with the child. For example, when a child 

is referred to a child welfare agency 

because of violence within the home, 

the caseworker should assess possible 

child maltreatment as well as the child’s 

possible exposure to violent incidents 

in the home, school, and community. 

Expanding the use of screening tools 

and protocols will enable practitioners 

to assess child victims more broadly to 

understand and identify the full scope 

of their risks and adversities as well as 

the resiliency and protective factors that 

mitigate some of the harms that exposure 

to violence, crime, and abuse cause (see 

Turner et al., forthcoming). 

In treating child victims of violence, 

crime, and abuse, medical and mental 

health professionals need to do more to 

identify and treat victims with multiple 

domains of exposure. Treatment needs 

to address all victimizations and the 

resulting adversities that a child may be 

experiencing, not only the presenting 

problem for which a child is referred. 

As part of treating victims of violence, 

crime, and abuse in multiple domains, 

treatment professionals need to provide 

them with support to help them decrease 

their vulnerability to further victimization 

and disrupt the pathways that lead to 

future adversities. For children exposed to 

intimate partner violence and other family 

violence, better screening protocols that 

can be used in many settings are needed. 

These children need more and better 

evidence-based prevention programs and 

interventions to reduce the harms that 

exposure to family violence cause, and 

greater efforts are needed to coordinate 

services for adult and child victims to 

keep both the children and the adults in 

the household safe (Hamby et al., 2011). 

In general, perhaps the most important 

implication of these studies for 

understanding, preventing, and 

responding to children’s exposure to 

violence, crime, and abuse is the need to 

reach across disciplines and coordinate 

across sectors in a way that responds to 

all of a child’s needs. Just as the NatSCEV 

surveys examine children’s total and 

cumulative experience of violence, crime, 

and abuse in the home, school, and 

community, addressing the consequences 

of that exposure will require the efforts 

of researchers, practitioners, educators, 

law enforcement officers, child welfare 

professionals, juvenile justice system 

personnel, medical and mental health 

providers, and parents and families 

working together to protect children and 

help them heal and grow into healthy, 

productive adults. 

Implications of More 

Comprehensive 

Measurement of 

Victimization 

Public health has clearly demonstrated 

the value of comprehensive, frequent, 

and ongoing measurement for the 

management and reduction of a wide 

variety of health problems. Unfortunately, 

systematic measurement has been less 

available outside the public health field. 

The high rate of children’s exposure 

to violence, crime, and abuse and the 

complexity and interrelationships among 

the types of exposure argue for much 

more systematic, frequent, and intensive 

efforts to measure this exposure. Some 

categories of victimization that are 

covered in the NatSCEV survey that 

warrant more comprehensive and regular 

measurement include multiple types of 

sexual victimization (including sexual 

assaults by known adults, adult strangers, 

and peers), bullying, and dating violence. 

Although NatSCEV does not measure 

certain types of exposures to violence, 

crime, and abuse, and the sample size has 

some limitations for detecting changes in 

the rarest exposures to violence among 

children, the NatSCEV surveys point to 

the feasibility of more coordinated and 

frequent measurement of specific types of 

exposures. More work is needed to refine 

10 
measurement and determine how many 

and what proportion of child victims are 

and are not coming to the attention of 

practitioners. In addition, there is a need 

to collect surveillance data at the state 

and local levels from multiple sources 

to better inform prevention programs 

and policies and tailor them to local 

conditions. Coordinating the collection of 

these data would also help standardize 

the definitions of the various types of 

children’s exposure to violence, crime, 

and abuse across the multiple systems— 

including mental and physical health 

care, child welfare, education, and law 

enforcement—that come into contact 

with at-risk children and provide services 

on their behalf (Institute of Medicine and 

National Research Council, 2014). 

Implications for Interventions 

With Children and Families 

One factor that holds promise for 

reducing children’s exposure to violence 

may be the growth and dissemination of 

prevention and intervention strategies 

aimed at reducing youth violence and 

victimization. Anecdotal information 

suggests that a wide variety of programs 

were disseminated prior to and during 

the 2008 to 2011 period. These include 

school-based prevention programs 

targeting bullying, interpersonal conflict, 

sexual violence, and dating violence— 

some of which have been shown to be 

effective in rigorous evaluation studies 

(Foshee et al., 1998, 2004; Grossman et al., 

1997; Ttofi and Farrington, 2011). These 

programs also include family prevention 

and intervention strategies (including 

parenting education programs) that have 

shown effectiveness in reducing child 

maltreatment and delinquent behavior 

(Borduin et al., 1995; Chaffin et al., 2011, 

2012; Eckenrode et al., 2010; Olds et al., 

1998; Prinz et al., 2009). Some programs 

that mobilize law enforcement (including 

school resource officers) to reduce youth 

violence and victimization have also been 

shown to be effective (Braga, 2005; Braga, 

Papachristos, and Hureau, 2012, 2014; 

Johnson, 1999; Na and Gottfredson, 2013). 

Continuing to focus attention on the 

prevalence and incidence of children’s 

exposure to violence may help those who 

work with children and their families 

better understand what may be effective 

in preventing violence and extending 

improvements in safety. Although 

evaluations of specific prevention 

programs are the most conclusive for 

guiding prevention strategies, studies 

comparing local policy environments and 

their association with violence trends 

could be helpful in providing feedback 

about the value of various policy mixes. 

Studies that address specific hypotheses 

may help guide the development of more 

specific violence prevention programs 

that employ these strategies. 

For More Information 

This bulletin was adapted from Finkelhor, 

D., Turner, H.A., Shattuck, A.M., and 

Hamby, S.L. 2013. Violence, crime, and 

abuse exposure in a national sample of 

children and youth: An update. JAMA 

Pediatrics 167(7):614–621. 

To learn more about the Safe Start 

Initiative, visit the Safe Start program 

summary page on OJJDP’s website at 

ojjdp.gov. For more information about the 

National Survey of Children’s Exposure to 

Violence, visit the Crimes against Children 

Research Center website at www.unh.edu/ 

ccrc. 

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13 

Acknowledgments 

This bulletin was written by David Finkelhor, Ph.D., Director, Crimes against Children Research 

Center, University of New Hampshire; Heather Turner, Ph.D., Professor, Department of 

Sociology, University of New Hampshire; Anne Shattuck, Data Analyst, Crimes against Children 

Research Center, University of New Hampshire; Sherry Hamby, Ph.D., Research Associate 

Professor, Department of Psychology, Sewanee The University of the South; and Kristen Kracke, 

M.S.W., Social Science Specialist, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention 

(OJJDP). The authors would like to acknowledge the assistance of the late Brian Higgins of 

Lockheed Martin, who helped in the drafting and editing of this bulletin and numerous others 

emanating from the National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence research. 

OJJDP wishes to acknowledge the contributions to this bulletin of Melissa T. Merrick, Ph.D., 

Behavioral Scientist, Division of Violence Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention 

and Control, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). OJJDP also wishes to 

acknowledge the support of CDC for the National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence and 

its partnership in the Safe Start Initiative to create safe, stable, and nurturing environments for 

children and their families. 

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This bulletin was prepared under grant 

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JW–BX–0018 from the Office of Juvenile 

Justice and Delinquency Prevention, U.S. 

Department of Justice. 

Points of view or opinions expressed in 

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Justice and Delinquency Prevention, the U.S. 

Department of Justice, or the Centers for 

Disease Control and Prevention. 

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