The Associations Between Community Violence, Television Violence, Intimate Partner Violence, Parent-Child Aggression, and Aggression in Sibling Relationships of a Sample of Preschoolers

High levels of aggression between siblings have been associated with deleterious short- and long-term effects. The objective of the current study was to examine how different types of violence exposure may be related to this form of aggressive behavior in children. Methods: This study examined 213 mother-child dyads that were exposed to varying levels of community violence and disorder, intimate partner violence, father child physical aggression, and television (TV) violence. Families were from several Head Start Programs in the Midwest. Results: Main effects of hierarchical linear regression analyses indicated that higher maternal depression and children's greater exposure to violent TV were significantly associated with more aggressive behavior toward a sibling. Further, father-child physical aggression interacted with community violence or disorder exposure to predict to aggression between siblings; that is, community violence was associated with sibling aggression only for children experiencing high levels of aggression from their fathers. Conclusions: These findings illuminate the multiple contextual factors that may be related to aggression between preschool-age children and their siblings in the home. Notably, viewing violent TV programming was significantly associated with sibling aggression even after accounting for family and community violence. This suggests the importance of reducing children's exposure to violence across all domains, rather than solely focusing on one particular mode of violence exposure.