DOI: 10.3886/icpsr36592
title: Effects of Child Maltreatment, Cumulative Victimization Experiences, and Proximal Life Stress on Adult Outcomes of Substance Use, Mental Health Problems, and Antisocial Behavior, 2 Pennsylvania counties, 1976-2010
title: Archival Version

description: The study investigates protective factors for maltreated children and predictors of self-reported crime desistence among maltreated and multiply victimized children. Data are from the Lehigh Longitudinal Study, a prospective investigation of children and families that began in the 1970s. The original sample was comprised of 457 children and their families. Over 80 percent of the children, now adults, were most recently assessed in 2010, at an average of 36 years, using a comprehensive, interviewer-administered survey. Data on child maltreatment and related risk and protective factors were collected much earlier, beginning when participants were preschoolers, 18 months to 6 years of age. Childhood data are from multiple sources, including child welfare case observations of parents and children, school records, and parent and adolescent surveys. Data collected during adolescence and adulthood offer detailed accounts of the psychosocial adjustment and well-being of participants and their families at later life stages, ongoing experiences of abuse and victimization, self-reported crime and antisocial behavior, and protection and resilience.
description: This study sought to replicate and extend research findings on subtypes of child maltreatment, childhood exposure to domestic violence, subsequent forms of victimization, and stress in relation to antisocial behavior, crime, and adulthood IPV perpetration and victimization.
description: A secondary data analysis project that used several waves of data from a larger prospective study focused on the correlates and consequences of child maltreatment. The original study sampled children and families from child welfare caseloads as well as other group settings in a two-county area of Eastern Pennsylvania. A near gender-balanced sample was achieved: 248 (54 percent) males and 209 females. The sample is relatively homogeneous with respect to race and ethnicity but generally consistent with the makeup of the geographic area from which the sample was originally drawn.
description: Not applicable.
description: Response Rates: Approximately 80 percent in the most recent data collection wave in 2008-2010.
description: Presence of Common Scales: 
Child Level of Living Scale, Polansky, Borgman, and De Saix, (1972); Polansky, Cabral, Magura, and Phillips, (1983); Polansky, Chalmers, Buttenwieser, and Williams, (1978)
Self-Reported Delinquency Scale, Elliott, Dunford, and Huizinga (1987)
Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS), Straus (1979)
Women's Experiences with Battering (WEB) Scale, Smith, Earp, and DeVellis (1994; 1999)
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R), Wechsler (1974)
description: The first "preschool" wave of the study took place in 1976-1977 when children recruited to the study were 18 months to 6 years of age.
A second "schoolage" assessment was conducted in 1980-1982 when children were between 8 and 11 years of age.
A third "adolescent" assessment (91 percent of the original sample retained) was conducted in 1990-1992. When they were assessed in adolescence, participants were 18 years of age on average (range: 14-23).
In 2008-2010, an "adulthood assessment" of the panel was carried out. An analysis of the currently retained sample found that fewer members of the original child welfare abuse group were retained than the comparison group. However, attrition analyses have since shown that those retained compared to those who attrited do not differ on gender, age, childhood SES, or parent-reported neglect or physical discipline. Original child participants, when last assessed, were just over 36 years of age on average (range: 31-41 years).
description: Datasets: 
DS1: Effects of Child Maltreatment, Cumulative Victimization Experiences, and Proximal Life Stress on Adult Outcomes of Substance Use, Mental Health Problems, and Antisocial Behavior, 2 Pennsylvania counties, 1976-2010
description: Respondents in Pennsylvania. Smallest Geographic Unit: None.
description: computer-assisted personal interview (CAPI); face-to-face interview; telephone interview; web-based survey