Stressful Life Events,Culture, and Violence

This study explored the contributions of stressful life events and their interactions with social support and cultural factors in predicting serious violence among American adolescent immigrants of Chinese and Southeast Asian origins. Youth differed in their exposure to stressors and how they responded to them. Cambodian and Laotian youth reported the highest levels of stressors, except for emotional abuse. Only physical abuse was an independent predictor of serious violence for all groups, except Chinese. Perceived social support buffered the effects of some stressors, whereas increased levels of acculturation, intergenerational/intercultural conflict, and individualism placed youth at increased risk for serious violence. The results suggest that the moderating effects of culture and social support need to be considered when examining the association between life stressors and serious violence for Chinese and Southeast Asian youth.