Table 1.
Description of Measures
| Variable | # of items (α) | Original response categories | Item or example item | Mean (SD) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Individual attributes and behaviors | ||||
| Anger (Zuckerman & Lubin, 1985) | 3 (.88) | 0 = never to 3 = always | “How often did you feel each of the following in the past three months (mad, angry, furious)?” | 3.10 (2.34) |
| Anxiety (Reynolds & Richmond, 1979) | 7 (.88) | 0 = strongly disagree to 4 = strongly agree | “I worried about what was going to happen” | 11.67 (7.64) |
| Depression (Angold, Costello, & Messer, 1995) | 3 (.92) | 0 = strongly disagree to 4 = strongly agree | “I hated myself” | 3.03 (3.68) |
| Social bonding (composite of endorsement of conventional beliefs, commitment to pro-social values, and degree of religiosity)a | 9 (.74) | 0 = strongly disagree to 4 = strongly agree | Endorsement of conventional beliefs (e.g. “It is good to be honest”) | 0.04 (3.43) |
| 0 = not at all important to 3 = very important | Commitment to pro-social values (e.g. “finishing high school,” “going to college”) | |||
| 0 = never to 5 = more than once a week | Degree of religiosity (frequency of church attendance, religion importance and religion influence) | |||
| 0 = not at all to 3 = very much | ||||
| Tobacco use | 1 | 0= None at all, not even a puff to 7=more than 20 whole cigarettes | How much have you every smoked cigarettes in your life? | 2.42 (2.43) |
| Alcohol use | 1 | 0 = none at all, not even a sip to 7 = More than 20 whole drinks | How much alcohol have you ever had in your life? | 1.66 (2.24) |
| Marijuana use | 1 | 0=No 1=Yes | Have you ever used Marijuana in your life? | 0.23 (0.42) |
| Aggression against peers | 6 | 0= None to 4=10 times or more | During the past 3 months, how many times have you done each of the following things to someone about the same age as you that you were NOT dating? (pushed, slapped, twisted someone’s arm, hit with fist, beat up, assaulted with knife or gun)? | 0.89 (2.27) |
| Family Context | ||||
| Family conflict (Bloom, 1985) | 3 (.86) | 0 = strongly disagree to 4 = strongly agree | “We fight a lot in our family.” | 2.87 (3.33) |
| Parental responsiveness b (Jackson, Henriksen, & Foshee, 1998) | 3 (.88) | 0 = not like him/her to 3 = just like him/her | “He/she tells me when I do a good job on things.” | 2.43 (0.78) |
| Parental monitoring b (Jackson et al., 1998) | 3 (.81) | 0 = not like him/her to 3 = just like him/her | “He/she tells me when I must come home.” | 2.43 (0.75) |
| Parental attachment b | 3 (.80) | 0 = not close at all to 3 = very close | “How close do you feel to her/him?” | 2.53 (0.58) |
| Peer Context c | ||||
| Number of friends using peer violence | Range: 0-10 | Number of in-school friends who reported using peer violence over the past three months | 1.36 (1.24) | |
| Number of friends using dating violence | Range: 0-10 | Number of in-school friends who reported using dating violence over the past three months | 0.29 (0.56) | |
| School Context | ||||
| Perceptions of school supportiveness (Roberts, Hom, & Battistich, 1995) | 3 (.86) | 0 = strongly disagree to 4 = strongly agree | “Students at this school treat each other with respect.” | 1.37 (1.12) |
| Number of school activities | 3 | 1 = yes, 0 = no | Number of school groups respondent participated in during the school year (e.g. sports teams, service clubs, performance groups, etc…) | 0.30 (.25) |
| Grade point average | 4 | Average grade point average based on self-reported grades during the two semesters in English/Language arts, Mathematics, History/Social studies, and Science. | 1.95 (0.82) | |
a
Each subscale was standardized before summing to create the social bonding composite measure
b
If two parents were in the household, the highest values of the two parents was used
c
Peer context variables were created using social network methods