Abstract
Despite a growing body of research examining the causes and correlates of gun violence, less attention has focused on examining these factors among actively gun-carrying youth. This study addresses this gap by assessing the role of individual and environmental predictors of gun violence among a sample of adjudicated youth and a subsample who actively carry firearms. The results revealed that environmental and individual factors were associated with gun violence in the full sample. However, only perceived rewards of crime and callousness were significant predictors of gun violence among actively gun-carrying youths. This pattern suggests that while environmental and individual factors differentiate firearm noncarriers and carriers, the difference between those who carry and those who engage in gun violence are primarily individual factors. The findings highlight the need for more theoretical development on causal pathways linking risk factors to gun violence, where carrying is considered a mechanism rather than a covariate.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
