Laura Voith, assistant professor and faculty affiliate at the Center on Trauma and Adversity, and Meghan Salas Atwell, senior research associate at the Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development, were awarded a grant from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
The grant is for their project, titled “Identifying the causal mechanisms of a hospital-based violence intervention program.”
About their research
Despite the development of hospital-based violence intervention programs (HVIPs) over the past two decades, few studies have examined causal mechanisms facilitating the reduction of revictimization and the promotion of wellbeing among violence-exposed youth who matriculate in HVIPs, due in part to underdeveloped theoretical orientations guiding the field. Furthermore, studies of HVIPs are primarily risk-focused with little understanding of promotive factors such as resilience.
This study will lay a strong foundation for future violence intervention research by integrating rich prospective social service data, hospital records, and clinical program data that will illuminate key developmental needs of this high-risk population and potential ameliorating factors grounded in theory.
The objective of this study is to identify the causal mechanisms of a hospital-based violence intervention program in Cleveland. They will examine these potential causal mechanisms (i.e., ACEs, resilience, and post-traumatic growth) with enrolled youth and test program effects on long-term outcomes (i.e., reinjury, juvenile justice involvement, academic success) using a matched comparison group.