A Holistic Approach to Responding to Youth Violence: A Case Study

Beijing Normal University & HYI international webinar series on Sociology and Education

The event will be held virtually over Zoom. To join the meeting, enter the following information:

Meeting ID: 851 5482 1991
Passcode: 529779

The talk will be held from 7:30 AM – 9:00 AM US East Coast time.

Language: The speaker will present in English. The Q&A/discussion will be held in both Chinese and English.

Talk synopsis: Despite gradually declining crime rates in Hong Kong over the years, the proportion of violent crime has remained at a somewhat constant level. To alleviate this issue, there is a need to investigate the antecedents of violent offending in at-risk youths – in line with the principles of early intervention – so as to prevent said youths from developing into adult career criminals.

The aims of the current study were to examine how an at-risk group of youths (N=118) aged from 13 to 18 differs from a school sample (N=218), with regards to various aspects of their psychosocial functioning; and to investigate the differences between the at-risk youth group and school sample in terms of their exposure to violent offending.

A self-report questionnaire, along with measuring participants’ demographic characteristics, includes the following: family functioning, bullying/fighting, impulsivity, self-control, criminal sentiments, and attitudes toward the law. Analyses revealed that at-risk participants had significantly adverse functioning relative to school participants on several psychosocial dimensions. Most notably, these were Family Functioning, Bullying/Fighting, Self-Control, and Criminal Sentiments. These can be regarded as the risk factors for youth violence in this study, and in order to reduce the risk of further violent behaviour, intervention programmes should be designed to address the factors associated with youth violence.

About the speaker: Wing Hong Chui is a Professor and Head of the Department of Applied Social Sciences at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University. He obtained his Bachelor degree in Social Work with a First Class Honours at The University of Hong Kong and subsequently completed his master’s and doctoral degrees both at the University of Cambridge, UK. His research interests include social work, youth studies, community corrections and criminology.