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Intergenerational Links in Victimization: Prosocial Friends as a Buffer

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Abstract

This study investigated whether having friends who engaged in more prosocial than antisocial behaviors buffered the associations between family-of-origin aggression and later victimization. Adolescent participants (N = 125) and their parents reported on different types of family aggression in early adolescence. Approximately 5 years later, adolescents reported on their victimization experiences with dating partners and friends, and their friends’ prosocial and antisocial behaviors. Only father-to-child aggression was significantly associated with dating and friend victimization, with stronger risk for females’ dating victimization. Moreover, having friends who engaged in more prosocial than antisocial behaviors had both a direct inverse relationship with dating partner victimization. This also buffered the risk for dating victimization associated with father-daughter aggression. Findings suggest that greater attention be paid to the father-daughter relationship and to the importance of having friends who engage in prosocial behaviors in the prevention of adolescents’ victimization.

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Acknowledgments

This work has been supported by NIH-NICHD Grants R01 HD 046807-05 and R21 HD 072170-A1 (Margolin, PI), the David and Lucile Packard Foundation Grant 00–12802 (Margolin, PI), and NSF GRFP DGE-0937362 (Han, PI).

We thank our USC Family Studies Project colleagues as well as the families who participated in the study. An abbreviated version of this paper was presented at the 2015 SRCD conference.

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  1. Department of Psychology, University of Southern California, SGM 921, 3620 S. McClintock Ave., Los Angeles, CA, 90089-1061, USA

    Sohyun C. Han & Gayla Margolin

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Han, S.C., Margolin, G. Intergenerational Links in Victimization: Prosocial Friends as a Buffer. Journ Child Adol Trauma 9, 153–165 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40653-015-0075-7

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