CHILD ABUSE AND DEVIANT BEHAVIOR: MEDIATING ROLE OF AGGRESSION IN ADOLESCENTS

Stanley Hall rightly stated that adolescence is a time of storm and stress to illustrate that it is a particularly difficult period for the adolescent because it is an age of transitional and developmental changes.(1) During this time period, young people are not just vulnerable to deviance more than either children or adults but also subjected to negative emotions like aggression due to biological changes that occur during puberty. The present study was intended to find out the relationship between child abuse, aggression, and deviant behavior among adolescents. It was hypothesized that there is likely to be a relationship between child abuse, aggression, and deviant behavior. It was also hypothesized that aggression is likely to mediate between child abuse and deviant behavior. Correlational research design was used to assess the relationship between variables. Purposive sampling technique was used to recruit the sample. The sample comprised of (N= 300) school and college students with age range 13-19 years. The questionnaires for collecting data included the Child Abuse Scale developed by Parvaneh Mohammadkhani, et al.,(2) the Aggression Scale by Pamela Orpinas and Ralph Frankowski,(3) and Deviant Behavior Scale by Shahnila Mushtaq and Rukhsana Kausar.(4) Results revealed that there was a positive relationship between child abuse, aggression, and deviant behavior. It was also revealed that aggression mediated the relationship between child abuse and deviant behavior. These results have implications in various educational settings for increasing awareness of parents about how responsive they should become for the better upbringing of their child and providing better understanding about how aggression and child abuse can lead to deviant behavior.