How does exposure to gun violence affect kids and teens?
A look at how gun violence affects kids directly and the emotional toll of being exposed to gun violence.
In the early hours of June 12, the worst mass shooting in American history happened. A gunman killed 49 people and wounded dozens more in a shooting rampage in a Florida nightclub. My first thought was "Please no, not again." Innocent people — just living their lives — gone forever in an instant. So many families and friends lost their most important person in the world. As a doctor for teenagers and a mother of three, I am anxious about how violence in the news, schools, communities, and entertainment industry will affect our children. One way or another, it has to affect them.
Looking at the United States as a whole, the massacre in Orlando is just the tip of the gun-violence iceberg. The statistics will shock you:
On average, 17,499 children and teens are shot per year in murders, assaults, suicides and suicide attempts, unintentional shootings, or by police intervention; 2,677 of these children die.
1,671 children and teens are murdered.
827 children and teens kill themselves.
124 children and teens are killed unintentionally.
24 are killed by police intervention.
30 die but the intent was unknown.
Pencil, notebook, lunch...weapon? From the time our kids start school, we think that they're embarking on a 13-year journey in which they will learn and make friends — not be exposed to gun violence. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's 2015 Youth Risk Behavior Survey indicates that safety is not always a given:
16.2 percent of students in grades 9-12 had carried a weapon (such as a gun, knife, or club) on at least one day during the 30 days before the survey.
5.3 percent of students had carried a gun on at least one day during the 30 days before the survey.
6.0 percent of students had been threatened or injured with a weapon on school property one or more times during the 12 months before the survey.
Where are teens getting these guns? The YRBS report does not say, but according to another survey, many teens have easy access to guns in their own homes. Almost 30 percent reported living in a home with a gun, and almost 41 percent of these teens reported easy access to that gun. These guns may have been equally as easy to acquire by an adult. A few days after the Orlando massacre, a Philadelphia Daily News columnist demonstrated this when she legally purchased an AR-15 in seven minutes.
After school, children and teens find more exposure to violence. Research suggests that violent video games are even worse for children and teens than violent television programs because they enable kids to practice violence — often gun violence — in ways television does not. Several studies have shown that teens who play violent video games are more likely to engage in aggression and violence than are those who play nonviolent video games.
Exposure to gun violence leaves scars. Research has shown that exposure to gun violence can traumatize children and youth both physically and emotionally by causing:
Psychological problems including intrusive thoughts, sleep disturbances, anger, withdrawal and aggression; in some cases, post-traumatic stress disorder
Difficulty concentrating in the classroom, decline in academic performance, and lower educational and career goals
Increased delinquency, substance abuse, and risky sexual behaviors
Desensitization to violence
"Protective behaviors," such as joining a gang or arming themselves with guns or knives
My advice:
When something happens involving violence, be it on a national or local level, use the opportunity to talk with your children about it. Not talking about it does not make it go away. Not talking about it means we don’t know what our children are thinking. Some youth may commit “copycat” shootings or try to "outdo" publicized school shootings. The two shooters at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. reported that they planned a "better" school ambush by learning from the "mistakes" of other publicized school shooters.
As per the American Academy of Pediatrics, it is best not to have any guns in homes where children or teenagers live. If there is a gun:
Keep it unloaded and locked up or with a trigger lock. Store the bullets in a different place that is also locked.
Do not let teens have a key to the places where guns and bullets are stored.
If a teen becomes depressed or has severe mood swings, remove the gun from the home.
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