Article: Silver, Ian A. & Kelsay, James D. (2022). Examining an Indirect Pathway from the Variety of Stressful Life Events to Violent Victimization through Acquired Psychological Symptoms. Justice Quarterly, 39:5, 953-982 https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2021.1916062.
1. Background (PDF and Article)
Research has continued to explore the predictors of violent victimization, in an effort to identify the mechanisms and implement policies, practices, or programs to address those risk factors. While past research suggests that early life-course stressful life events could influence one’s risk of violent victimization, the mechanism linking this environmental factor to victimization remained unidentified in the literature. Research, however, suggested that early life-course stressful life events could lead to adverse psychological effects – mental health symptoms – and result in behavioral changes that lead to an increased likelihood of violent victimization. While most studies focused on the direct relationship between stressful life events and violent victimization, the current article explored whether adverse psychological effects acquired after early life-course stressful life events served as a mediating pathway to violent victimization. Specifically, the study examines how exposure to a variety of stressful life events affects the likelihood of subsequent violent victimization indirectly through adverse psychological effects. Adverse psychological effects included negative thought symptoms, moral disengagement and somatization, anxiety depression and paranoia, and impulsivity and psychoticism.
Drawing on lifestyle-routine activity theory (LRAT) and the Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (HiTOP) the paper suggest that early life-course stressful life events can alter psychological functioning, and result in behavioral activities that could increase the risk of future violent victimization. Figure 1 provides a visualization of the relationships examined in the current study. Additionally, the study accounted for prior violent victimization and arrests before and after acquired psychological victimization to isolate the independent effects acquired psychological effects.
2. Summary of Findings
The findings suggested that exposure to a greater variety of stressful life events between 2002 and 2007 was associated with increased levels of adverse psychological effects in 2008. These adverse psychological effects, in turn, were positively associated with experiencing violent victimization between 2008 and 2013. The results supported a partial mediation model: adverse psychological effects accounted for approximately 11% of the total relationship between stressful life events and subsequent victimization. When accounting for prior victimization and arrests, the indirect effect was slightly attenuated but remained statistically significant, confirming that the pathway through psychological symptoms was not fully explained by criminal behavior.
The model also demonstrated that individuals with a prior history of violent victimization were at increased risk for future victimization. This repeat victimization pathway was also partially mediated by adverse psychological effects, which accounted for 6% of the total effect. Importantly, after adjusting for the number of arrests (a proxy for antisocial behavior) the magnitude of the mediating pathway through adverse psychological effects remained largely the same and statistically significant, suggesting that it functions independently from the victim-offender overlap.
Sensitivity analyses indicated that among the various psychological symptom dimensions, internalizing symptoms (e.g., anxiety, depression, paranoia) and impulsivity/psychoticism were the strongest mediators. These findings lend empirical support to the idea that traumatic or stressful life experiences can lead to neuropsychological changes that increase one’s vulnerability to violent victimization.
3. Implications
The findings offer several key implications for prevention, intervention, and policy. First, they underscore the importance of screening individuals exposed to multiple stressful life events for adverse psychological effects. Early identification of adverse psychological effects may allow for targeted interventions that reduce the risk of subsequent victimization. Mental health services, particularly those aimed at addressing internalizing symptoms like depression and anxiety, could play a preventative role in reducing revictimization.
Second, the study provides further evidence that violent victimization risk is not solely shaped by situational exposure to offenders, but also by internal psychological states shaped by earlier life experiences. This expands the scope of LRAT-based prevention efforts, suggesting they should incorporate mental health support, not just environmental or behavioral controls.
Third, the results highlight the need for trauma-informed practices within the criminal legal system. Individuals with arrest histories who have also experienced significant life stressors may require psychological treatment and support services to disrupt the victimization cycle. Providing such services could mitigate both future offending and victimization, addressing the intertwined nature of these outcomes.
Finally, this study strengthens the call for upstream prevention efforts targeting structural determinants of stress. Policies that reduce family instability, improve access to housing and healthcare, and provide economic support to vulnerable families could prevent the accumulation of stressful life events that contribute to both psychological harm and future victimization. By intervening before such events lead to psychological distress, these strategies could ultimately reduce both personal suffering and public costs associated with crime and victimization.
4. Data and Methods
Data for this study were drawn from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY97), a nationally representative panel survey of nearly 9,000 respondents followed from adolescence into adulthood. Two analytic samples (n ≈ 3,200–3,400) were constructed based on data availability across three key timepoints: stressful life events (2002–2007), psychological symptoms (2008), and violent victimization (2008–2013). Arrest history from 2008–2013 was included as a correlated outcome in one of the models.
The primary independent variable was a variety score measuring whether respondents experienced any of six major stressful events (e.g., death of a close relative, homelessness, household incarceration) between 2002 and 2007. Adverse psychological effects were captured using 21 self-report items on emotional instability, depressive affect, and antisocial attitudes, which were analyzed using a confirmatory factor analysis aligned with the HiTOP model. Violent victimization was operationalized using self-reported items requesting information about the respondents being physically or sexually assaulted, robbed, or subjected to arson.
Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to test direct and indirect pathways between the variables. All models controlled for key covariates, including gender, race, prior depression, prior victimization, baseline arrests, employment history, cognitive ability, and household income. Two models were estimated: one focusing solely on victimization pathways and one incorporating offending behavior. Both models demonstrated good fit and produced substantively similar results.
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