This Research in Brief presents research exploring Yale professor Elijah Anderson's "code of the street" theory. Researchers looked for developmental relationships between neighborhood and family characteristics, reported experiences with racial discrimination, expressed street code values and self-reported violent behavior in young people. The results generally support Anderson's original observations: the stress of living in a poor and violent environment can cause young people to adopt the code of the street as a lifestyle guide. This, in turn, is a powerful predictor of violent conduct, amplified by the effects of negative neighborhood characteristics. The research discussed in this report emphasizes the need to consider this theory in future studies within African-American households, neighborhoods and communities.