African American Inner-City Youth Exposed to Violence: Coping Skills as a Moderator for Anxiety

The current study examined types of coping as either protective or vulnerability factors for youth exposed to community violence in a sample of 240 inner-city, African American pre- and early adolescents across sixth and seventh grade. Coping was conceptualized within a contextually relevant framework. It was predicted that avoidant coping would interact with exposure to violence to predict reductions in anxiety, cross-sectionally and longitudinally, whereas approach coping was expected to interact with violence exposure to predict increases in anxiety. Youth and parents both reported on youth exposure to community violence and anxiety symptoms; youth provided self-reports of their coping strategies. Data were analyzed by using hierarchical multiple regression analyses. As predicted, avoidant coping showed a protective function on anxiety symptoms; contrary to predictions, approach coping was unrelated to anxiety. Implications for future research on contextually and culturally relevant coping are discussed.