Despite overall reductions in youth violence, racial disparities in violent offending and victimization persist, such that racial minorities disproportionately shoulder the burden of both. It is proposed that the antecedents of youth violence are the same for all youth, regardless of race and ethnic background. Instead, racial disparities in youth violence and victimization result from sociopolitical structures of racial inequality, which historically isolate racial and ethnic minorities into underserved communities, where contact with risk is more likely. Youth violence scholarship has explored the ways community structures, such as physical disorder, social disorder, policing, and community violence, influence community perceptions, norms, and behaviors as well as individual youth behavior and development. However, many of these inquiries have occurred separately within siloed disciplines and are rarely integrated together. The purpose of this dissertation is to use a framework from human development, known as sociocultural development, to organize race-focused inquires regarding youth violence and test the relevance of several, multilevel risk factors on youth socioemotional development and violent behavior. Using data from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN), this dissertation explores the relationships between neighborhood physical disorder, community perceptions of danger, community perceptions of policing, and frequency of violence exposure on youth internalizing symptoms, externalizing symptoms, and violent offending. A combination of hierarchical linear modeling and individual growth curve modeling were used to assess multi-level impacts on neighborhood perceptions and youth outcomes. Results indicate that higher levels of neighborhood physical disorder predict greater individual perceptions of neighborhood danger and less positive attitudes towards the police. However, these perceptions at the community level did not significantly influence individual youth violence. Individual growth curve models assessed between-and within-individual change in violence exposure, internalizing symptoms, externalizing symptoms, and violent offending. Results indicate that youth display fairly similar rates of change in all dependent variables, but that early exposure to violence and neighborhood physical disorder significantly predict where youth "start" in their trajectories. Consistent with race-invariance perspectives, Black youth, in particular, report higher frequencies of violence exposure, which places them above White and Hispanic/Latino youth in externalizing issues and violent offending. However, trajectories of violence exposure were unique for Hispanic/Latino youth, indicating the need to further explore sources of risk and resiliency for this diverse group of youth. In addition, more research should be conducted to explore the unique ways Black and Hispanic/Latino youth, families, and communities adapt to violence exposure and disorder in order to tailor youth violence prevention initiatives that are strengths-based and relevant.
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