Hearing the Silence: Children’s Voices on Violence

Each year more than five million children in the United States are exposed to traumatizing events in their communities. This paper presents a discussion of multiple areas in violence and victimization research that needs to be continued as well as provides suggestions on how to un-silence child survivors through bridging the gaps between research and practice. It reviews the overarching problem of violence in the U.S. at the domestic and global levels and the effects of victimization. Suggestions on how to study possible mediators and moderators of victimization and individual and family adjustment, including: 1) The ecological perspective; 2) Court process and verdict; and 3)Utilization of victim services, are explored. Finally, a rationale and examples of combining qualitative and quantitative methods in future research that uses children’s attributions of violence as a mediator are presented.