NCJ Number
138606
Journal
Science, Technology, and Human Values Volume: 12 Issue: 3 and 4 Dated: (Summer/Fall 1987) Pages: 67-69
Date Published
1987
Length
3 pages
Annotation
The Violence Prevention Project of the Health Promotion Program for Urban Youth is an effort to reduce the incidence of violent behavior and associated social and medical hazards for adolescents through measures that have successfully prevented heart disease and hypertension.
Abstract
When violence is viewed as a learned response to environmental sources of stress, educational strategies can be used to change that response to a more positive one. The prevention of violence on a large, public scale involves broad-based implementation of individual-level education on alternative conflict-resolution techniques concurrent with community-level outreach and education that addresses the attitudes and beliefs that foster violent behavior. Role modeling, peer leadership, and social networks can be used to change broader segments of the community and generate a new community ethos about violence. At the core of the intervention is a violence-prevention curriculum used in high schools. This 10-session unit is designed to provide descriptive information on the risks of violence and homicide, provide alternative conflict-resolution techniques, and create a classroom ethos that is nonviolent and values violence-prevention behavior. 8 notes