Childhood Victimization and Risk for Alcohol and Drug Arrests
November 1995While the immediate consequences of childhood abuse or neglect on its victims may involve physical or psychological trauma, the residual effectsemotional and developmental scarsoften presage problem behaviors in adolescence and adulthood. Childhood Victimization and Risk for Alcohol and Drug Arrests Using discusses preliminary findings from a large project on child abuse and neglect as predictors of violent criminal behavior in which researchers investigated the connection between childhood maltreatment and later arrest for alcohol and drug-related offenses. The study found that childhood maltreatment is a significant predictor of adult arrests for alcohol and/or drug-related offenses. Contrary to expectations, however, juvenile arrests for these offenses were not significantly related to early victimization.
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