This is an overview of the types of constructs which one might look at to
determine if a student is in a high risk category for acting out in a violent
manner, and the types of tests which would measure those constructs. We will
look at some of these predictors, the constructs they attempt to measure, and
how this might aid in predicting future behavior. There have been a lot of
studies, interventions, programs, and models designed to reduce or predict
violence among our youth. The strongest predictor being past violent behavior.
Most of these studies have been linked to some type of deficiencies in the home
environment and school environment. The overwhelming question facing America now
is - Why would a student who has almost anything he desires, living in an upper
middle class neighborhood, bring a gun to school with the purpose of killing his
classmates and teachers? The question for researchers is - Can we predict which
students are likely to engage in this type of behavior? The resounding answer so
far seems to be negative. There is not any test, inventory, or self-report scale
which can tell us which students will act out in this manner. However, reviewing
the literature there appears to be different types of measurement when looked at
aggregately, might identify those students who would be at higher risk although
they do not show a past history of violence and therefore fall outside of the
previously researched areas. Some of the things we would hope to assess in
identifying violence-related attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors among youths
would be broken into three categories: 1. Attitude and Belief Assessments -
aggression, couple violence, education and school, employment, gangs, gender
roles, television, handguns 2. Psychological and Cognitive Assessments -
aggressive fantasies, role models, attributional bias, depression, psychological
distress, fatalism, future aspirations, hopelessness, hostility, moral
reasoning, perceptions of self, responsibility, self-efficacy, impulse control,
self-esteem, empathy, and social consciousness 3. Behavior Assessments -
concentration, aggressive behavior, conflict resolution skills, drug and alcohol
use, handgun access, leisure activity, parental control, social competence,
social problem solving skills, victimization, disciplinary and delinquent
behavior. 4. Environmental Assessments - exposure to violence, family
environment (adaptability, bonding, cohesion, relationships), quality of life,
quality of neighborhood Assessment of Self-Esteem One of the psychological and
cognitive assessments we choose to look at is self esteem. Self-esteem has been
viewed in different ways. Block and Robins (1993) have viewed it as a global
entity: "we view self-esteem as the extent to which one perceives oneself
as relatively close to being the person one wants to be and/or as relatively
distant from being the kind of person one does not want to be, with respect to
person-qualities one positively and negatively values". Self concept theory
has stressed that self-esteem is an attitude about oneself as a whole (global
self-esteem) as well as one's functioning in specific areas of concern to
oneself (specific self-esteem). Relatively little is know concerning
relationships between a child's self-esteem and observations of the child's
behavior. Most have come to a clinical assumption that children with
externalizing behavior suffer from poor self-esteem. The other issue about
self-esteem revolves around whether or not it is a stable trait or a fluctuating
state. Heatherton and Polivy (1991) referred to the short-lived changes in an
individual's self-esteen as "state" self-esteem and developed a scale
to measure it called the State Self-Esteem Scale (SSES) which is a 20-item
Likert-type scale designed for measuring temporary changes in individual
self-esteem. There are three self-esteem factors in the scale: Academic
Performance, Social Evaluation, and Appearance. Coefficient Alpha for the scale
equals 0.92. Linton (1996) conducted a study to test its validity by comparing
it with the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. It consists of ten items answered on a
four point scale from "strongly agree" to "strongly
disagree". The scale has a Guttman scale reproducibility coefficient of
0.92 and a test-retest correlation of 0.85. Her results showed a significant
correlation between self-esteem measures on the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale and
four components on the SSES. She demonstrated that SSES measures four distinct
components within the state self-esteem construct and provides evidence that
there is a fluctuating nature of self-esteem. It also supports the use of the
SSES for study within the adolescent populations. Another study by Frankel
(1996) compared Piers-Harris Self-Concept Scale(PHS) and the Child Behavior
Checklist Inventory (CBCL) with the Pupil Evaluation Inventory (PEI) to get a
better understanding of why children with internalizing problems (withdrawal,
somatic complaints and sadness) consistently demonstrate low self-esteem, while
results of children with externalizing behaviors (aggression, poor impulse
control, and non-compliance) have been inconsistent. Externalizing behaviors
have been demonstrated to be stable over time, in the absence of treatment
(McMahon, 1994). Schneider and Leitenberg (1989) found that externalizers
reported higher self-esteem than internalizers which seems to be inconsistent
with Olweus (1978) findings that children who bully others have lower
self-esteem than well adjusted children. The PHS is an 80-item yes-no self
report measure which takes about 20 minutes to complete. The PHS manual provides
factor scores on six scales measuring specific self-esteem and a global score
which is a weighted composite of items from the specific self-esteem factors
(composite scale). It also contains a behavior scale, an intellect scale, a
physical appearance scale, a popularity scale, and an anxiety scale. The manual
states an internal consistency of the scales ranging from 0.88 to 0.93 and
test-retest correlations were 0.81 across a 5-month interval. The CBCL consists
of 118 behavioral items. Frankel's study (1996) used the revised Externalizing
broad-band scale and the two narrow-band scales (Social Problems and Social
Competence--Social) found to tap social competence. Frankel found that the mean
Social Problems scale score was above the cutoff ofr clinical significance (98
percentile) while mean Externalizing and Social Competence--Social scale scores
were in the problematic direction but within normal limits. The PEI consists of
35 items, each rated as "describes child" or "does not describe
child". Development of withdrawal, likability, and aggression scales were
based on peer ratings. Correlations between peer and teacher ratings have
exceeded 0.54. The results from Frankel's study (1996) demonstrated that
self-esteem in boys with peer problems was associated with a combination of
social competence and externalizing problems. They showed that all the PHS
scales except popularity and appearance were related to social competence. Both
scales were related to externalizing problems. Therefore the boy without friends
who is perceived as aggressive by his mother tends to report higher self-esteem
in relation to peer acceptance that the non-aggressive boy without friends.
Assessment of Depression One of the most common and widely used assessments for
depression is the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). The BDI consists of 21 items
which cover a range of affective, behavioral, cognitive, and somatic symptoms
that are thought to be indicative of unipolar depression. The subject can select
from among four alternative responses for each item to reflect increasing levels
of severity of depressive symptomatology. Scores can range from 0 to 63. The
higher the score the more reported depression. Carter (1996) conducted research
on hospitalized adolescents, to compare the validity of the BDI, the Minnesota
Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), and the Rorschach in assessing
adolescent depression. Although these assessment scales have been researched
throughly over the years with adults, the validity of these scales with
adolescents has been conflicting. The primary means of assessing depressive
symptomatology on the MMPI is the depression (D) scale. It consists of 60 items
with the subject either agrees or disagrees, allowing for a range of scores from
0 to 60. The items are associated with clinical symptoms that characterize
feelings of hopelessness, despair, discouragement, and basic personality
features like high personal standards and intrapunitiveness. MMPI-D was able to
correctly identify 69% of a sample of depressed individuals using a T-score of
70 or above for its criterion. The Rorschach Depression Index (DEPI), is
comprised of five variables (vista responses, color-shading blends,
egocentricity index, achromatic color responses, and morbid responses) and the
subject can receive scores ranging from 0 to 5. The results of Carter's research
(1996) showed a statistically significant relationship between the BDI and the
MMPI-D scale. However, there was not a significant correlation between the DEPI
with the BDI or the MMPID. This concurrent validity was assessed by computing
Pearson correlation coefficients for the depressed and non-depressed groups.
Both the BDI and the MMPI-D were statistically significant in discriminating
depressed and non-depressed samples. The DEPI as a sole predictor variable did
not yield a significant discriminant function. When looking at the three
assessments scales as predictor variables in varying combinations, no
combination increased the classification accuracy rates produced by the MMPI-D
scale alone.BibliographyCarter, C.L. (1996). Validity of the Beck Depression Inventory, MMPI, and
Rorschach in assessing adolescent depression. Journal of Adolescence, 19,
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psychopathology in boys without friends. Personality and Individual Differences,
(20) 3, 401-407. Heatherton, T.F. & Polivy, J. (1991). Development and
validity of a scale for measuring state self-esteem. Journal of Personality and
Social Psychology, 60, 895-910. Linton, K.E., Marriott, R. G. (1996).
Self-esteem in adolescents: Validation of the State Self-Esteem Scale.
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Diagnosis, assessment, and treatment of externalizing problems in children: The
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901-917. Olweus, D. (1978). Aggression in the schools. New York: Wiley.
Schneider, M.J. & Leitenberg. H. (1989). A Comparison of aggressive and
withdrawn children's self-esteem, optimism and pessimism, and causal
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