Teens and gang violence is a subject that fascinates the media, but UCSF researcher Howard Pinderhughes, PhD, believes we need to separate the myths from the facts.

Pinderhughes, an assistant professor in the School of Nursing's department of social and behavioral sciences, is leading an ambitious project to define the nature of violence in the lives of young people in San Francisco's Mission District. "I want to put some reality into a topic that is often sensationalized."

Pinderhughes and a team of four interviewers have spoken with 200 young men and women in this largely Hispanic neighborhood, delving into their personal experiences with violence. The young people, aged 15 to 20, were drawn from schools and youth programs in the area. The researchers' questions were designed to find out how violence influenced the young people's decision-making process, whether there were gender differences in thinking about the subject, and why some youngsters were able to avoid or be only sporadically engaged in violence while for others it was a regular way of life. The researchers focused not only on gang-related violence in the community but also on the effect of domestic violence on this age group.

Pinderhughes plans to follow 30 of the young people for the next three years to see how their experience with violence changes over time.

The project is being funded by the William T. Grant Foundation, which supports research on developmental issues that affect at-risk children and adolescents.

"What jumps out at you from speaking with these kids is the normalcy of violence in their lives," says Pinderhughes. An estimated 10-20 gangs exist in the Mission District, the largest with from 50-70 members, according to Pinderhughes. "Young people have to adapt how they do things on a daily basis," he says. Young people must pay attention to what they wear, for example, because certain colors are associated with particular gangs. They must also know which territory is claimed by different groups, and often say they take circuitous routes to avoid gang activity.

Many kids grapple with violence in the home as well as the community. Indeed, school ends up being the safest place for many of them, according to Pinderhughes. "It's a relatively controlled environment and they know what the rules are." Schools offer programs such as conflict resolution, which encourage young people to talk out their differences. Such programs can work well in the structured setting of school where there is an ultimate authority, but Pinderhughes cautions that this approach is not necessarily useful on the street.

Pinderhughes has found a definite gender difference in how young adults talk about violence. Women are more willing to describe experiences in which they have been victimized, young men are loathe to descibe themselves as victims of violence occurring on either the street or at home.

Pinderhughes is particularly interested in pursuing the issue of violence in relationships with the opposite sex. "Many of the young women we spoke with talked not only about domestic violence at home, but in their relationships with their boyfriends. Physical violence isn't just something that happens in a marriage."

He is also intrigued by the range of violence in young adults' lives. "As a society we like to divide young people into good kids and bad kids, but that is not how it is." Instead, he claims, the vast majority of young people are somewhere in the middle, occasionally engaging in violence but steering clear of it most of the time.

Ultimately, Pinderhughes hopes his work can help influence policies that deal with adolescent violence. "I want to bring the ideas of young people themselves into this issue. Theirs is the voice that is missing in discussions around the policy table."

By Leslie Lingaas

1st appeared 5/12/97