Minimal research has focused on how lynching was not purely an individual-level event but, at times, was a family-level process. Prior research has focused on the economic forces, social factors, and individual level attributes that changed the probability of being lynched. Research studying these topics has identified that marginalization, status, distinctiveness, and the racial threat hypothesis contribute to lynching. However, this research has not studied child victims and how parental level attributes may intersect differently with these theoretical perspectives. Using machine-learning tools, I created census linked data which identifies the families of child lynch victims and other non-victim families in the surrounding neighborhood. With this data, I find that marginalization, status, distinctiveness, and the racial threat hypothesis may play a different role for child victims than previous studies that studied different populations. My findings demonstrate that child victims are a unique population that have different liabilities and protections that are tied to family-level attributes.

The overall goal of the current study was to determine whether experiences of relational and physical victimization were related to anxiety and depressive symptoms in a sample of emerging adults. This study also investigated whether these associations were moderated by gender, as well as by sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) reactivity to peer stress. Although work in this area has focused on children (e.g., Cullerton-Sen & Crick, 2005; Rudolph et al., 2009), it appears the presence and function of victimization changes with age, and the negative effects of victimization can last through early adulthood (e.g., Gros et al., 2010; Kumpulainen et al., 1999; Roth et al., 2002). Despite the potential for victimization to influence outcomes in emerging adults, research on these associations is lacking in this age group (Heilbron & Prinstein, 2008). A goal of the current study was to examine these processes in an older sample. Additionally, as individuals may react to peer victimization differently, factors that may help explain these differences were investigated. Specifically, evidence suggests that the interaction of the SNS and the PNS may serve as a moderator in the relationship between stressors and adjustment outcomes (Cummings et al., 2007; El-Sheikh et al., 2009; ObradoviÄ? et al., 2010). Further, research suggests that different patterns of interaction of the SNS and the PNS provide important information in the prediction of adjustment outcomes (El-Sheikh et al., 2009) and that both systems must be examined in order to more fully understand the relationship between physiological reactivity and adjustment outcomes (Beauchaine, 2001). Thus, in the current study, the interaction between two physiological measures, SNS reactivity to stress (as measured by skin conductance reactivity [SCL-R]) and PNS reactivity to stress (as measured by respiratory sinus arrhythmia [RSA-R]), was examined as a moderator of the association between peer victimization and adjustment outcomes. The moderating role of gender was also examined. Two hundred and forty-six emerging adults participated in the current study (74% female; Mage = 18.77) and were recruited from introductory psychology courses at a northeastern public university. Participants' SCL-R and RSA-R were assessed using a stress protocol during which they discussed an experience of relational victimization (e.g., being left out). Levels of relational and physical victimization, anxiety and depressive symptoms, and gender were gathered using self-report. Findings suggested that both physical and relational victimization were related to both anxiety and depressive symptoms. Additionally, females were more likely to experience relational victimization than males, while males were more likely to experience physical victimization than females. Relational victimization was related to depressive symptoms only in individuals demonstrating coactivation (i.e., blunted RSA withdrawal and increased SCL-R) and coinhibition (i.e., RSA withdrawal and blunted SCL-R) patterns of stress reactivity, although the interaction for this effect only approached conventional levels of statistical significance. These patterns may have emerged as a result of the breakdown of regulation in the physiological response to stress, with either the SNS or the PNS failing to perform adequately (El- Sheikh & Erath, 2011; El-Sheikh et al., 2009). These findings suggest that experiences of victimization are related to negative adjustment outcomes in emerging adults, as well as highlight potential areas that may serve as mechanisms for future interventions.

Human beings are social creatures. Accordingly, fear of social situations can be severely disabling. Social anxiety disorder (SAD) is characterized by excessive fear of negative evaluation in social or performance situations. SAD has an early onset and often goes undetected an untreated. Descriptive studies on non‐clinical samples are required in order to find ways to prevent SAD and associated consequences. This thesis aimed at examining epidemiological variables of SAD in adolescence which is the critical period for onset of SAD. More exactly, issues of detection and prevalence, victimization and developmental course were addressed. Data was collected in four different community samples, using cross‐sectional and longitudinal designs. In the first study (n=169), psychometric evaluation of a screening questionnaire for use with adolescents was conducted. The second study (n=2128) investigated prevalence of SAD in students in grade 6‐8 (age 12‐14 years). In the third study (n=3211), the association between SAD and victimization in high‐school students (aged 17) was investigated. Finally, in the fourth study (n=350), longitudinal associations between social anxiety and depressive symptoms were investigated, with 4 waves of data from grade 7 to grade 11. Self‐reported SAD was found among 4.4% of students in grade 6‐8 and among 10.6% of high‐school students. Females reported SAD to a significantly higher degree than males in all age groups. Experiences of peer victimization, maltreatment and sexual victimization were significantly more common in those reporting SAD than in non‐cases. Social anxiety was stable over adolescence. Further, peer victimization in grade 7 predicted social anxiety that mediated subsequent depressive symptoms. In conclusion, self‐reported SAD is common in Swedish adolescents and especially in girls and older adolescents. Social anxiety is stable over adolescence and correlated with depressive symptoms over course. The high prevalence rates, stable course and mediation of depressive symptoms call for early detection and prevention of social anxiety. The relationship between victimization and SAD needs to be investigated further in controlled prospective studies on children and adolescents.

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This study examined social interactions between Italian preschoolers based upon sociometric status groupings. The sample consisted of 267 Italian preschoolers (mean age 64 months) taken from early childhood classrooms in southern Italy. Drawing on previous research, preschoolers' physical and relational aggression and physical and relational victimization as measured by peer nominations were analyzed. Structural equation modeling using Mplus was used to test the model, and SPSS 15 was used to run analyses of variance (ANOVAs) to examine the interaction between sociometric status and preschoolers' behaviors toward peers. Findings generally support previous research with American children as well as cross-cultural research regarding physical and relational aggression, victimization, sociability, and sociometric status groupings. Results indicate that popular children displayed high levels of social behavior, low levels of aggression, and experienced little victimization, while rejected children demonstrated high levels of aggression and victimization and low levels of social behavior. The most striking finding was that controversial children, similar to rejected children, showed high levels of aggression and victimization. Gender differences indicated that boys were more relationally and physically aggressive and victimized than girls, with the exception of controversial status girls.

This study investigated the relationship between religiosity of female college students and sexual victimization experiences. These experiences include the reporting behaviors that take place subsequent to an act of sexual victimization. The study utilized secondary data gathered from the forth wave of a longitudinal study funded by the National Institute of Justice between 1990 and 1995. The study used multidimensional levels of religiosity to analyze and to assess its impact on the sexual victimization experiences. Findings ascertained that certain behavioral measures of religiosity were consistently found to be a protective factor against sexual victimization. On the other hand, subjective measures of religiosity were not found to be a protective measure for victimization. Instead, this measure was statistically determined to be related to experiencing acts of sexual victimization. Recommendations were given for a greater focus on campus resources pertaining to student victimization and more in-depth research on the role churches have in dealing with this issue.

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