Local Homicide and Children’s Cognitive Performance

Miguel Quintana-Navarrete ()
Additional contact information
Miguel Quintana-Navarrete: University of California, Irvine

Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, 2025, vol. 177, issue 3, No 10, 1137-1159

Abstract: Abstract A growing literature indicates that local violence impairs children’s cognitive performance, but it has not systematically theorized and examined the range of potential cognitive and emotional responses and adaptations to violence that could have performance implications. I draw on the psychological study of risk/adversity and competence/adaptation to broaden yet formalize and clarify the multiple theoretical pathways that connect violence to cognitive performance. I illustrate the utility of this approach by combining test scores from Mexican children with homicide data. The results suggest that repeated recent homicide events in places with previous homicidal violence have a U-shaped association with children’s cognitive performance. A similar pattern of results can be found when child attentiveness is examined as the outcome. I argue that children’s cognitive performance decreases and then increases with homicides–along with impulse control and attentiveness – as a result of processes of sensitization, desensitization, and challenge.

Keywords: Cognitive performance; Homicide; Sensitization; Desensitization; Challenge; Mexico (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11205-025-03560-7 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:soinre:v:177:y:2025:i:3:d:10.1007_s11205-025-03560-7

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11135

DOI: 10.1007/s11205-025-03560-7

Access Statistics for this article

Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement is currently edited by Filomena Maggino

More articles in Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().