Multi-Level Effects on Behaviour Outcomes in Canadian Children

2.4 Discussion and Policy Implications

The enumeration area types analyses sought to differentiate which aspects of the objective environment affected either type of aggression, if at all. The combination of factors in Type Three environments (high percentage of single parents and immigrants, low income, low employment) act together as risk factors for indirect aggression compared to middle class environments. The census tract level variables indicate that the proportion of low income families in the census tract also act as a borderline risk factor for indirect aggression. However, with controls for family and child level variables, the objective environment effects tend to be explained. It is the subjective environment which is consistently found to exert a significant risk effect across all models for indirect aggression.

The analyses using the enumeration area types found that Type Two environments (low youth employment, low education) and Type 8 (very high socioeconomic status) environments have a protective effect on physical aggression. These results are most consistent with "collective socialization" models of neighbourhood effects. Past research has shown an association between increased male joblessness and decreased child behavioural functioning, especially for school aged children (Leventhal, Brooks-Gunn, & Kammerman, 1997, p. 188). However, in considering joblessness among youth, actual levels of employment have been differentiated from youth perceptions of future employment possibilities (Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2000). It is possible that while youth employment can be a resource, especially for older youth, it may also act to decrease youth involvement in the neighbourhood including the supervision of young children. This finding may extend both collective socialization and contagion models of neighbourhood effects.

The results for physical aggression indicate the protective role of high socioeconomic status environments, while the indirect aggression results indicate a potential risk effect of more disadvantaged areas. The literature has found inconsistent effects of neighbourhood characteristics on behaviour problems, however, studies have shown that lower SES environments lead to higher levels of externalizing behaviour problems (see Leventhal et al., 1997; Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2000). Higher SES environments have been associated in the literature with better educational outcomes. However, higher SES environments were found in this research to also be protective against physical aggression. Future research may better identify what processes are involved in this association through indirect effects (Leventhal et al., 1997).

The findings of this report also concur with past research that has found the prominence of family factors over neighbourhood factors in explaining children's behaviour problems (see Brooks-Gunn et al., 1997a; Klebanov et al., 1997). Neighbourhood influences on younger children (aged three to six) have been found to be mediated by parental characteristics and behaviour (see Klebanov et al., 1997). These results are similar to the additive models of risk examined with the NLSCY. The current research also sought to identify some of the mediating factors, including parenting practices in explaining the role of the perceived neighbourhood environment and the home environment in the gender gap in the types of childhood aggression. Both suppression and explanatory effects were found with the addition of the parenting variables in interpreting the association between gender and aggression.

The mediational models concerning the effect of the subjective environment were not supported. Instead, the subjective and objective environments were found to act in combination in additive models as risk factors for children's aggression. The census tract level results also did not indicate a mediating effect of the subjective environment, but rather an additive contribution. Future research with longitudinal data and the expanded measurement of the subjective environment through child and interviewer reports may supplement this research. However, these findings indicate that the subjective environment may be a key aspect of children's proximal environments (see also McLeod & Nonnemaker, 2000). The investigation of ecological models also suggests an area of further research (see Furstenberg et al., 1999).

Some additional features of structural features of the family in the community and family structure not yet in the literature on aggression including the more detailed family structure effects of the number of siblings, home ownership, and the number of years lived in the neighbourhood. The latter two variables may be assessing integration into the neighbourhood environment or other support systems. Integration may act as a resource for parents in neighbourhoods to decrease children's aggressive behaviours.

The finding that some features of the neighbourhood environment contribute to childhood aggression raises the issue of inequality among environmental contexts. While macro-level processes of societal investment and disinvestment may affect environmental conditions, these concepts are also linked to personal life course "recapitalization" (Hagan, 1994). Recapitalization includes "an effort to reorganize what resources are available, even if illicit, to reach attainable goals" (Hagan, 1994, p. 70). The concept of recapitalization for both communities and individual trajectories may further inform preventive interventions. In adapting to adverse circumstances, children's aggressive behaviour may become functional and sustained. Similarly, disadvantaged communities may become recapitalized in the form of criminal rather than conventional activities. However, recognizing and attempting to prevent both indirect and direct aggression may serve to mitigate later life course consequences for both boys and girls (see also Sampson & Laub, 1995).

Finally, norm-focused scholarship from socio-legal perspectives may also inform research on aggression (Etzioni, 2000; Hagan & Foster, 2000; Meares & Kahan, 1998). As punitive policies have been found to reinforce problem behaviours (see Hagan & McCarthy, 1997), educational efforts to both peers and the broader public may be useful in altering behaviours. This may include efforts to broaden the societal recognition of aggression as including indirect as well as direct physical behaviours. Peer mediation and community centered initiatives may also be more broadly useful in reducing problem behaviours (Owens, Shute, & Slee, 2000; Sampson et al., 1997). Preventive efforts may be more urgent in disadvantaged contexts where youth have fewer structural resources available to cope with these experiences (see Taylor et al., 1995).

As in most of the research on neighbourhood effects, consideration must be given in interpreting the results reported here to separating empirical effects from selection processes or endogenous effects (Duncan, Connell, & Klebanov, 1997; Katz, Kling, & Liebman 1999; Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2000; McLeod & Edwards, 1995; Tienda, 1991). Selection effects may arise as families exert choice within constraints in determining where they live (Duncan et al., 1997). If the unobserved factors that affect residential location also affect developmental outcomes of children, then the failure to include those unobserved factors in the models may lead to biased estimates, either in the form of the overestimation or underestimation of neighbourhood effects on children's outcomes (Duncan et al., 1997, p. 230-231; Leventhal & Brooks-Gunn, 2000, p. 314). The sibling data collected over time in the NLSCY may provide further research options and definitive conclusions regarding the influences of neighbourhood effects (see Aaronsen, 1997).

Contents

Multi-Level Effects on Behaviour Outcomes in Canadian Children - May 2001

2.4 Discussion and Policy Implications