Angie C. Kennedy

Michigan State University | MSU · School of Social Work

As empirical evidence has demonstrated the pervasiveness of sexual assault and intimate partner violence in the lives of women, and the links to poor mental health outcomes, attention has turned to examining how women seek and access formal help. We present a conceptual model that addresses prior limitations and makes three key contributions: It fo...

Child sexual abuse (CSA), sexual assault (SA), and intimate partner violence (IPV) occur within social contexts that shape how survivors judge themselves and are evaluated by others. Because these are gendered sexual and intimate crimes that violate social norms about what is appropriate and acceptable, survivors may experience stigma that includes...

We explored patterns of intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization at the relationship level within a socioeconomically diverse sample of young women who had experienced IPV. We recruited from a university, a 2-year college, and high-risk community settings. Drawing on life course theory and utilizing the life history calendar, we conducted retr...

The goal of the current study was to identify risk factors that predict sexual intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization across young women's relationship histories, within a socioeconomically diverse sample recruited from a university, a 2-year college, and community organizations serving low-income young women. We interviewed 148 young women...

While there is a growing literature on intimate partner violence (IPV) survivors and service providers, it is limited by its largely atheoretical and descriptive nature, and its emphasis on individual-level survivors' help-seeking. We seek to broaden our understanding by shifting the focus onto organizations and service systems and introducing the...

Transgender women are at increased risk for interpersonal violence victimization, including physical and sexual child abuse and mistreatment, intimate partner violence and sexual assault, and transgender-related community violence. Experiencing multiple forms of interpersonal victimization is associated with a range of adverse mental health outcome...

College students’ individual-level risk factors for sexual assault victimization have been studied for decades, but fewer studies have looked at whether and how campus-level factors, such as campus-level rates of discrimination and campus diversity, might also influence student victimization risk. Identifying these broader factors can inform effort...

A staggering number of adolescents in the United States report victimization within peer contexts (e.g., physical, verbal, or cyber forms of bullying) and dating relationships (e.g., physical, or psychological abuse from dating partners). However, little research has examined grade-level differences in forms of victimization by gender, inclusive of...

The goal of the study was to examine disclosure of physical and sexual intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization across abusive relationships within a sociodemographically diverse sample of young women. We recruited 283 participants, ages 18 to 24, from a university, a 2-year college, and community sites serving low-income young women, and asse...

We qualitatively explored young women's intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization within abusive first relationships (characterized by physical IPV, coercive control, and/or sexual IPV), and their disclosure process. We recruited a diverse sample (N = 21) from a university, a two-year college, and community sites serving low-income young women....

Sexual intimate partner violence (sexual IPV) is a significant social problem that affects millions of adolescent and adult women across the globe. Though sexual IPV is experienced by women as particularly humiliating, degrading, and shameful, it has been under-researched in comparison to physical and psychological IPV. Sexual victimization within...

Homeless youth who identity as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or queer (LGBTQ) face considerable issues including victimization, mental health needs, and substance use, yet are less likely than their heterosexual homeless peers to utilize services. Although research in this area is growing, studies tend to focus on the experiences and service use of homel...

Intimate partner violence (IPV), which includes physical, sexual, psychological, and economic abuse, as well as coercive control and stalking, affects millions of women and girls around the world. In the U.S., over one-third of women report experiencing some form of IPV victimization during their lifetime, with a majority reporting that their first...

Adolescents who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer (LGBTQ) are overrepresented among runaway and homeless youth (RHY) and experience increased rates of sexual victimization, mental health issues, and substance use in comparison to their heterosexual and cisgender peers. Additionally, some sexual minority homeless youth experi...

Background: We developed and beta-tested a patient-centered medication management application, PresRx optical character recognition (OCR), a mobile health (m-health) tool that auto-populates drug name and dosing instructions directly from patients' medication labels by OCR. Materials and methods: We employed a single-subject design study to eval...

Background and Purpose: Child sexual abuse (CSA), sexual assault (SA), and intimate partner violence (IPV) occur within social contexts that shape how survivors judge themselves and are evaluated by others, such as family members, friends, and formal service providers. Because these are gendered sexual and intimate crimes that violate social norms...

Objective: To examine the effects of cumulative victimization on intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization among young mothers. Method: With a cross-sectional design that utilized the life history calendar method and was grounded in developmental traumatology and life course stress theory, we interviewed 60 young mothers (ages 16 to 21) about t...

Using a cluster analysis approach with a sample of 205 young mothers recruited from community sites in an urban Midwestern setting, we examined the effects of cumulative violence exposure (community violence exposure, witnessing intimate partner violence, physical abuse by a caregiver, and sexual victimization, all with onset prior to age 13) on sc...

Background and Purpose: Cumulative victimization has emerged as a critical research area. Poor, female youths of color are disproportionately likely to experience high cumulative victimization, with adolescent mothers especially vulnerable. Exposure to multiple types of victimization during childhood has been positively linked with adolescent and a...

Objective: Sexual Assault Response Teams (SARTs) seek to improve the response to sexual assault by coordinating the efforts of police, prosecutors, nurses/doctors, victim advocates, and other sexual assault responders. However, SARTs vary with respect to their structure, that is, the composition and organization of their team. Therefore, the curren...

This study examines the relationships between cumulative victimization that began during childhood (witnessing intimate partner violence [IPV], physical abuse by a caregiver, and sexual victimization), adolescent IPV victimization, homelessness, and depression symptoms within a sample of 206 urban adolescent mothers. We used cluster analysis to ide...

Innovative life course research methods are gaining favor among qualitative and quantitative researchers alike, for their ability to improve participant engagement while also facilitating data accuracy through improved recall and event sequencing. Life history calendar and time diary methods are among two of many novel approaches for collecting rel...

In this study, we conducted semistructured interviews with N = 20 adolescent sexual assault victims who sought postassault help from the medical and legal system to understand young survivors' disclosure and help-seeking processes. Results revealed three distinct disclosure patterns and pathways to help-seeking. First, in the voluntary disclosure g...

Background and Purpose: While researchers have studied individual types of violence exposure among youths, including community violence, physical abuse by a caregiver, witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV), and sexual victimization, attention has recently turned to examining cumulative violence. Among adolescents who are poor, female, and resi...

Exposure to intimate partner violence (IPV) has negative consequences for children's well-being and behavior. Much of the research on parenting in the context of IPV has focused on whether and how IPV victimization may negatively shape maternal parenting, and how parenting may in turn negatively influence child behavior, resulting in a deficit mode...

Due to an error in the production process, there were errors in the sixth sentence of the abstract. The corrected sentence should read: When parenting practices were examined individually as mediators of the relationship between IPV and child behavior over time, one type of parenting was significant, such that higher IPV led to higher authoritative...

This study examines patterns of lifetime victimization within the family, community violence exposure, and stigma as contributors to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms within a sample of 198 high-risk young women who are pregnant or parenting. We used cluster analysis to identify 5 profiles of cumulative victimization, based on participa...

Background and Purpose: While researchers have studied individual types of violence exposure among youths, including physical abuse by a caregiver, witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV), and sexual abuse, attention has recently turned to examining cumulative violence. Among adolescents who are poor, female, and residing in urban areas, cumulat...

Intimate partner violence (IPV) has detrimental consequences for women’s mental health. To effectively intervene, it is essential to understand the process through which IPV influ- ences women’s mental health. The current study used data from 5 waves of the Women’s Employment Study, a prospective study of single mothers receiving Temporary Assis- t...

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a serious, widespread problem that negatively affects women's lives, including their economic status. The current study explored whether the financial harm associated with IPV begins as early as adolescence. With longitudinal data from a sample of 498 women currently or formerly receiving welfare, we used latent g...

This study sought to extend our understanding of the mechanisms by which intimate partner violence (IPV) harms women economically. We examined the mediating role of job instability on the IPV-economic well-being relationship among 503 welfare recipients. IPV had significant negative effects on women's job stability and economic well-being. Job stab...

Guided by an intersectional feminist perspective, we examined sexual victimization, witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV) in the family, and familial physical abuse among a sample of 180 urban African American adolescent women. We used cluster analysis to better understand the profiles of cumulative victimization, and the relationships between...

This project had two main objectives. First, qualitative interviews with adolescent sexual assault victims were conducted regarding their initial post-assault disclosures and their pathways to seeking help from the medical and legal systems. It is important to understand how and why teen survivors decide to seek help from these programs in the firs...

Adolescent mothers and their children are among the most vulnerable and challenging clients that social workers serve. With the profession's strong commitment to evidence-based practice in mind, we synthesize current research and theory within a framework that promotes enhanced awareness of the client, practitioner, and larger sociopolitical enviro...

This longitudinal study used multilevel modeling to examine the relationships between witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV), community and school violence exposure (CSVE), family social support, gender, and depression over 2 years within a sample of 100 school-aged children. We found significant between-child differences in both the initial le...

Background and Purpose: For many children, witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV) may be ongoing, and co-occur with other forms of victimization such as community violence exposure. Witnessing IPV and community violence have both been linked to children's depression, with some gender differences found. Though family social support has been show...

This 2-year longitudinal study investigated the relations between community and school violence exposure, witnessing intimate partner violence (IPV), family social support, and anxiety, within a sample of 100 school-age children (39% female, M age = 9.90 years). Using multilevel modeling, we found heterogeneity across children in terms of their ini...

Using an ecological approach, this study examined experiences with community, family, and partner violence within a sample of 280 urban, African American high school students. The prevalence of each type of violence by gender, associations between severe violence exposure, and the rate of exposure to multiple types of violence were examined. Findin...

The U.S. eugenics movement, which sought to encourage the “wellborn” to have children and actively discourage and even prohibit the “unfit” from having children, became increasingly popular and influential during the Progressive Era, shaping public discourse, emerging social work practice approaches, and state and federal public policy. This articl...

Using a risk and resilience framework, this exploratory study examines the relationships between homelessness, exposure to multiple types of violence, and school participation within a survey sample of poor adolescent mothers living in an urban setting. Participants who were homeless either currently or historically were compared with participants...

Using a risk and resilience perspective, the authors assessed urban adolescent mothers' exposure to community, family, and partner violence and analyzed the relationships between cumulative violence exposure and multiple school outcomes, within the context of welfare reforms. Positive attitude toward school and social support were examined as moder...

The federal welfare reforms of 1996 mandated that all minor adolescent mothers receiving cash assistance must attend school and live at home to receive their cash grant. Though this law has been in place for over 8 years, little research has been done that explores the barriers facing adolescent mothers who try to attend school and live at home. An...

Using a risk and resilience approach grounded in a multicultural feminist perspective, this qualitative study explores 10 urban adolescent mothers' experiences with multiple forms of violence, the relationships between violence and school, and their resilience, all within the context of welfare reforms. The findings suggest lives rife with simultan...