Title: The Acute Effect of Local Homicides on Children’s Cognitive Performance

Publication Date: June 2010

What does it say?

This article analyzes the short-term impact of 6,041 local homicides in Chicago between 1994 and 2002 on the cognitive performance of roughly 1,100 African American and Hispanic children, ages 5 to 17.

Data was taken from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN), which includes information from two child development assessments. The first is a vocabulary subtest and the second is a letter and word reading subtest. The study examined the results of these tests at different points in time after a homicide within a block group, census tract, or neighborhood cluster of a child’s residence (4 days after, 7 days after, 10 days after, 14 days after, and 28 days after).

The study found that elevated levels of stress as a result of exposure to local homicides reduced performance on vocabulary and reading assessments substantially (by roughly 0.5 SD and 0.66 SD within 7 days after the homicide, respectively). The effect of local homicides was found to be most severe in the period immediately following the homicide and diminished in a linear pattern as the period between the homicide and the cognitive assessments widened. The effect of a homicide was also strongest when it occurred close to the child’s home. However, these results only held true for African American children, not Hispanic children. The author notes that this could be because homicides “may be less salient or less threatening in the lives of Hispanics because the victims of homicides are frequently African American.”

This study makes clear that local violence weighs on the minds of children across the community. The author notes that, if these findings are simplified, and it is assumed that local homicides impair cognitive functioning for roughly 7 days, then African American children living in the city’s most violent neighborhoods spend at least one quarter of the year functioning at low cognitive levels.

How can I use it?

Use this data to emphasize that children can be impaired psychologically, emotionally, and socially from gun violence. Also use this information to educate elected officials and the media that we urgently need legislative solutions such as background checks for gun sales, childproof guns, and other sensible gun regulations to reduce the likelihood of gun violence and homicide.

Citation

Sharkey, Patrick, “The Acute Effect of Local Homicides on Children’s Cognitive Performance,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, (107) 26 (June 2010): 11733-11738.

[1686]