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Journal of
Adolescence
Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158
Hopelessness and risk behaviour among adolescents living in
high-poverty inner-city neighbourhoods
John M. Bolland
Institute for Social Science Research, University of Alabama, Box 870216, Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0216, USA
Abstract
Ethnographic literature on inner-city life argues that adolescents react to their uncertain futures by
abandoning hope, leading them to engage in high levels of risk behaviour. However, few quantitative
studies demonstrate this relationship. This study tests this relationship using a survey of 2468 inner-city
adolescents, asking them questions about hopelessness, violent and aggressive behaviour, substance use,
sexual behaviour, and accidental injury. Nearly 50% of males and 25% of females had moderate or severe
feelings of hopelessness. Moreover, hopelessness predicted of each of the risk behaviours considered. These
results suggest that effective prevention and intervention programmes aimed at inner-city adolescents
should target hopelessness by promoting skills that allow them to overcome the limitations of hopelessness.
r2003 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.
All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Arguably, one of the most important problems facing American inner cities is the feeling of
hopelessness about the future among adolescents living in low-income neighbourhoods. Libraries
are filled with analyses of lives lived on the edge of American society. Of course, this has been a
topic of interest for some time: Lewis (1965) and Liebow (1967) wrote about life in the inner city
several decades ago, and how people living in poverty came to believe that they were unable to
take control over their lives and make things better for themselves. Banfield (1974) went so far as
to suggest that this belief is a defining characteristic of the ‘‘underclass personality’’. But more
recent books by novelists (e.g. Lopez, 1994;Naylor, 1998;Qui*
nonex, 2000), journalists (e.g.
Donaldson, 1993;Simon & Burns, 1998), and academics (e.g. MacLeod, 1987;Bourgois, 1995;
Wilson, 1996;Anderson, 1999) are much more intense in their portrayals, and they do little to
provide any sense of hope in their depiction of despair. For example, MacLeod (1987, p. 1)
E-mail address: jbolland@bama.ua.edu (J.M. Bolland).
0140-1971/03/$ 30.00 r2003 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents. Published by Elsevier
Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/S0140-1971(02)00136-7
reports an interview with an 11-year-old public housing resident named Freddie, who says,
‘‘I ain’t goin’ to college. Who wants to go to college? I’d just end up gettin’ a [lousy] job anyway’’.
This perhaps is a reflection of reality; or it is perhaps an attitude of giving up. Holzman (1996,
p. 365) confounds the two when he states, ‘‘today, neither hope nor work is as plentiful for public
housing residents as it once was’’.
Even more disturbing is the expectation of death at an early age. One of the most poignant
depictions of life in inner-city neighbourhoods is provided by Kotlowitz (1987, p. 26), who
describes an incident involving 9-year-old Diante, a boy caught in a crossfire between rival gangs
as he was swinging on playground equipment in his high-rise public housing development;
despite pleas from his friends to take cover, he kept swinging, saying merely ‘‘I want to die, I want
to die’’ (1987, p. 26). Diante’s reality was that an early death is inevitable, and he merely wanted
to get it over with. This expectation of an early death was also uncovered by MacLeod (1987,
p. 61). When he asked Stoney (a teenager living in public housing) what he thought his life
would be like in 20 years, Stoney replied, ‘‘Hard to say. I could be dead tomorrow. Around here,
you gotta take life day by day’’. And Greene (1993), in his interviews with inner-city youths, notes
that it seemed common for teens growing up in poverty and around violence to question whether
they will survive into adulthood. He concludes that poverty and violence may vitiate an
adolescent’s sense of safety, security, and hope, leaving little room for long-term aspirations and
planning.
These feelings are further exemplified by the discussion of resilience that is often found in
portrayals of inner-city youth. Resilience is defined by Masten, Best, and Garmezy (1990, p. 426)
as ‘‘the process of, capacity for, or outcome of successful adaptation despite challenging or
threatening circumstances’’. In most discussions of inner-city life, resilience is treated as
something very rare that should be celebrated when it is found. By implication, most youths
succumb to the challenging or threatening circumstances they face. This is the essence of
hopelessness.
McLaughlin, Miller, and Warwick (1996) propose that an individual’s sense of hopelessness can
be defined in terms of a system of negative expectations concerning self and future life. Joiner and
Wagner (1995, p. 778) define hopelessness as ‘‘an expectation that highly desired outcomes will
not occur or that negative ones will occur..., and that nothing is going to change things for the
better...’’. Several observers suggest that inner-city adolescents deal with these feelings by
abandoning conventional, long-term approaches to success in favour of things they can achieve in
the short term (Peterson, 1991;Anderson, 1999). Lorion and Saltzman (1993, p. 56) suggest that
children living in impoverished and violent neighbourhoods ‘‘may despairingly conclude that...
they have neither the resources nor the likelihood of achieving lasting or socially approved
outcomes. For them, socially unacceptable and risky... alternatives may become highly
attractive’’. Indeed, youths who end up hurting themselves or others tend to have a pessimistic,
dark outlook on life (Lau & Lau, 1996). Many of these youths apparently see little sense in being
careful for themselves or others if failure seems an inevitable part of their future (Lorion &
Saltzman, 1993). Other studies come to substantially similar conclusions (Garbarino, Dubrow,
Kostelny, & Pardo, 1992;Bell & Jenkins, 1993;Friedlander, 1993;Jenkins, 1996). Not
surprisingly, hopelessness is associated with increased levels of violence among adolescents
(DuRant, Cadenhead, Pendergrast, Slavens, & Linder, 1994a;DuRant, Pendergrast, & Cadenhead,
1994b;DuRant, Getts, Cadenhead, Emans, & Woods, 1995;Bolland, McCallum, Lian, Bailey, &
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158146
Rowan, 2001), although neither Bolland nor DuRant found hopelessness to be particularly
prevalent among inner-city adolescents.
Thus, despite the substantial portrayal of hopelessness in ethnographic discussions of the inner
city, rigorous quantitative documentation of hopelessness and its effects among adolescents
growing up in inner-city neighbourhoods has lagged behind. While a number of quantitative
studies of hopelessness among adolescents have been conducted (e.g. Kazdin, French, Unis,
Esveldt-Dawson, & Sherick, 1983;Reifman & Windle, 1995;Cotton & Range, 1996;McLaughlin
et al., 1996;Kashani, Suarez, Allen, & Reid, 1997), these have either concentrated on youths in
psychiatric institutions or on youths from a broad cross-section of socioeconomic situations. Only
studies by Bolland et al. (2001) and by DuRant (e.g. Durant et al., 1994a, 1995) consider
hopelessness among adolescents living in inner-city neighbourhoods, a population that the
ethnographic literature suggests should be particularly susceptible to hopelessness and its
consequences; and these studies are limited to consideration of violent consequences of
hopelessness. This paper helps fill that void by reporting levels of hopelessness among adolescents
living in high-poverty neighbourhoods in Mobile and Prichard, AL, and showing the prevalence
of risk behaviours among youths with low levels of hopelessness compared to those with moderate
or severe levels of hopelessness.
2. Method
2.1. Site
Mobile is a city of 203,000 located on Mobile Bay in southern Alabama; it is the major city in
the Mobile MSA, which has a population of nearly 520,000 people. In 1990, 38.9% of Mobile’s
population was African American and 22.4% lived below the poverty level. Per capita income in
1990 was $12,509. Prichard borders Mobile on its north side. It is a city of 33,000 people; the 1990
census figures show that 79.4% of the population was African American, and 44.1% lived in
poverty. Per capita income in 1990 was $5820. In 1990, the MSA population was 28.0% African
American and had a poverty rate of 21.9%. The 1990 census showed that 26 census tracts in the
MSA, containing 59,438 people, had poverty rates in excess of 40%; 42% of African Americans in
the MSA lived in these high-poverty census tracts, placing Mobile third in the nation in this
measure of ghetto poverty (Jargowsky, 1997). In the following discussion, we refer to the site
simply as Mobile.
2.2. Participants
As part of a multiple cohort longitudinal study, we surveyed 2468 adolescents (aged 9–19) living
in 12 low-income neighbourhoods in 1999. Half of these neighbourhoods were public housing.
Data from the 1990 census show that the poverty rates in the census tracts or block groups
comprising these neighbourhoods range between 57% and 91%, with a median poverty rate of
74%. The mean age of respondents was 13.67 years (s¼2:61 years), and 51.0% were males. Over
98% of respondents were African American or Creole.
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158 147
2.3. Procedure
In 1998, the Mobile and Prichard Housing Authorities provided us with a list of addresses
where youths between the ages of 10 and 18 were listed on the lease. We targeted 50% of these
apartments, and during an 11-week period attempted to contact the leaseholder in each of the
targeted residences and verify that appropriately aged youths were staying at that address. We did
not have any lists of residences where adolescents lived to guide us in the non-public housing
neighbourhoods, so in 1998 we randomly targeted half of the residences in these neighbourhoods
and attempted to determine whether or not youths stayed there. In each residence where youth
stayed, the study was explained to both the caregiver and the youth(s). The youth(s) was (were)
asked to participate in the study, and the caregiver was asked to sign a consent form. A time was
then scheduled for the youth(s) to attend a group-administered survey. Youths who agreed to
participate were promised confidentiality and $10 for their participation. We allowed youths
living in non-targeted apartments to participate as well, so long as we could obtain parental
consent for them. In 1999, we targeted all 1998 participants, regardless of where they lived. Within
each neighbourhood, we also randomly targeted 50% of the residences that were untargeted in
1998.
Survey administration times were scheduled during the afternoons and early evenings. In no
case were parents or other caregivers allowed to be in the room during administration of the
survey. Questions were read aloud to the younger respondents (and in some cases, to the older
respondents as well) to ensure that reading level did not affect respondents’ ability to answer the
questions; when respondents did not understand a question, it was explained either to the group
by the survey administrator or to the individual by monitors who were in the room. Respondents
who appeared to have difficulty keeping up were invited to go into a separate area where the
questions could be read to them individually or in a very small group. Each respondent was paid
$10 when the survey was completed. Total time for the survey, including check-in, administration,
and payment averaged an hour and a half. The response rate in 1999 was 83.4%, and the
cooperation rate was 89.6%.
2.4. Questionnaire and measures
The questionnaire consisted of 294 multiple choice questions. Many of the questions were
adapted from existing scales, modified to reflect the unique characteristics of this sample (e.g. a
wide range of ages, heavy use of street vernacular).
The questionnaire included five questions adapted from the Hopelessness Scale for Children,
chosen for their high item-total correlations (Kazdin et al., 1983). Each was asked in the form of a
statement, about which the respondents agreed or disagreed; these statements are listed in Table 1.
We added a sixth statement (‘‘I do not expect to live a very long life’’), based on its relevance to
the population we were studying, to create an additive Brief Hopelessness Scale. The internal
reliability is reasonable for the six-item scale (Cronbach a¼0:71), and comparable to the internal
reliability reported for the full 17-item scale, which ranges between 0.62 (Reifman & Windle, 1995)
and 0.75 (Cotton & Range, 1996). Five-week test–retest reliability for the six-item scale (obtained
for a sample of 49 respondents in an unpublished study of inner-city adolescents we conducted in
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158148
Huntsville, AL) is 0.62, comparable to the 0.52 six-week test–retest reliability obtained (Kazdin
et al., 1983) using the full scale.
In addition, a number of risk behaviours were assessed using questions developed by a team of
investigators funded by the National Institutes of Health Office of Minority Health through a
cooperative agreement administered by the National Institute for Child Health and Human
Development (Brown, Clubb, Aubrecht, & Jackson, 2001). Many of these questions were adapted
from the Youth Risk Behavior Survey developed and administered by CDC, and from the
National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health; others were developed to meet the specific
needs of this project.
3. Results
Table 1 reports age-standardized means, standard errors, and 95% confidence intervals (CIs)
separately for males and females for the six items that comprise the Brief Hopelessness Scale. For
each item, males respond in a more hopeless way than females (all p’s o0.001). Although
comparisons between the full Hopelessness Scale for Children and the six-item Brief Hopelessness
Scale used here are risky, they do suggest substantial levels of hopelessness among Mobile’s low-
income adolescents. The 1999 Mobile sample has an extrapolated mean of 5.0; this compares with
an extrapolated mean of between 2.5 and 3.4 for similar, unpublished data we collected in
Huntsville, AL and a full-scale mean of 2.4 among a sample of low-income adolescents living in
Augusta, GA (DuRant et al., 1994a, b, 1995). Full-scale means reported for general school
Table 1
Proportion of respondents agreeing with hopelessness statements
Males Females
Proportion s.e. 95% CI NProportion s.e. 95% CI N
1. All I see ahead of me are bad
things, not good things
n
0.348 0.017 0.315,0.382 1228 0.240 0.015 0.211, 0.268 1183
2. There’s no use in really trying
to get something I want
because I probably won’t
get it
n
0.416 0.019 0.379,0.452 1237 0.334 0.017 0.300, 0.368 1187
3. I might as well give up
because I can’t make things
better for myself
n
0.350 0.017 0.317, 0.384 1239 0.234 0.014 0.206, 0.263 1192
4. I don’t have good luck now
and there’s no reason to think
I will when I get older
n
0.358 0.017 0.324,0.392 1235 0.236 0.014 0.208, 0.264 1191
5. I never get what I want,
so it’s dumb to want anything
n
0.392 0.018 0.356,0.427 1242 0.206 0.013 0.180,0.233 1196
6. I don’t expect to live a
very long life
n
0.284 0.016 0.254,0.314 1230 0.202 0.013 0.176,0.228 1190
n
Male–female differences: po0:001:
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158 149
samples are 2.7 (Cotton & Range, 1996) and 3.4 (McLaughlin et al., 1996),
1
and means reported
for various inpatient psychiatric samples range between 4.8 and 6.0 (Kazdin et al., 1983;Kashani,
Canfield, Borduin, Soltys, & Reid, 1994;McLaughlin et al., 1996;Kashani et al., 1997).
Using a cutoff of 4.0 suggested by Kazdin et al. (1983) to distinguish between low and
moderate-to-high levels of hopelessness, we grouped respondents into two categories: those
expressing a low level of hopelessness and those expressing a high level of hopelessness. Among
males in the sample, 46.8% (95% CI ¼0:441;0.495) of respondents fell into the high hopelessness
category; among females in the sample, 26.9% (95% CI ¼0:244;0.294) of respondents fell into
the high hopelessness category. More males than females have high levels of hopelessness ðt¼
10:4;df ¼2441;po0:001Þ:Among males, age is not correlated with level of hopelessness; among
females, age and hopelessness are modestly correlated ðr¼0:14;po0:001Þ:
Tables 2 and 3 report age-standardized prevalence rates (based on known age distributions for
public housing residents; cf., Woodward, 1999) for a number of risk behaviours separately for
males and females, comparing those respondents with low levels of hopelessness and those with
high levels of hopelessness; it also reports Mantel–Haenszel estimates of these odds ratios,
stratified by age.
For males, violence behaviours are considerably more prevalent among those respondents who
express high levels of hopelessness, with odds ratios as large as 4.5 for carrying a gun during the
previous week, cutting or shooting someone else during the past year, and current gang
membership. For females, the same pattern occurs, with violence much more prevalent among
those respondents who indicate high levels of hopelessness about their futures. Differences are
particularly notable for carrying a gun during the previous week ðOR ¼4:6Þ;being cut or stabbed
during the previous year ðOR ¼4:9Þ;and current gang membership ðOR ¼5:3Þ:
Substance use shows much the same pattern for both males and females. For males, odds ratios
are uniformly high, ranging between 2.6 for smoking cigarettes during the previous month and 6.4
for cocaine use during the previous year. For females, the differences are only slightly less
dramatic, with odds ratios ranging between 1.9 for alcohol consumption during the previous week
and 6.0 for cocaine use during the previous year. Patterns for sexual behaviour are clear for males,
1
None of the published studies report item means, so comparisons between the extrapolated mean from the Brief
Hopelessness Scale and the 17-item Hopelessness Scale for Children is problematic. However, based on data provided
by Michael Windle from his study (Reifman & Windle, 1995), the estimates of hopelessness in Mobile based on the
extrapolated mean may be conservative. Question-by-question comparisons are listed below:
Mobile (%) Reifman and
Windle (%)
1. All I see ahead of me are bad things, not good things 29.15 4.35
2. There’s no use in really trying to get something I want because I probably
won’t get it
36.78 6.85
3. I might as well give up because I can’t make things better for myself 28.99 1.87
4. I don’t have good luck now and there’s no reason to think I will
when I get older
29.46 11.53
5. I never get what I want, so it’s dumb to want anything 29.64 4.05
The mean scale value for the five items from the Mobile survey is 1.54, compared with a mean scale value for the same
five items from the Reifman and Windle study equal to 0.29.
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158150
Table 2
Prevalence rates and odds ratios for risk behaviours by level of hopelessness: males
Prevalence 95% CI NOdds ratio 95% CI
Violence
Suicidal ideation: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.294 0.250, 0.339 576 3.743 2.74, 5.11
Low hopelessness 0.101 0.076, 0.125 655
Suicide attempt: lifetime
High hopelessness 0.215 0.177, 0.253 575 2.468 1.79, 3.41
Low hopelessness 0.101 0.076, 0.126 655
Got into a physical fight: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.474 0.417, 0.531 567 2.707 2.13, 3.44
Low hopelessness 0.255 0.216, 0.295 660
Got other kids to fight: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.447 0.392, 0.503 561 3.275 2.54, 4.22
Low hopelessness 0.205 0.170, 0.241 651
Carried a knife: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.347 0.299, 0.396 566 3.648 2.74, 4.86
Low hopelessness 0.129 0.102, 0.157 649
Carried a gun: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.346 0.298, 0.395 568 4.523 3.34, 6.13
Low hopelessness 0.110 0.085, 0.135 652
Pulled a weapon: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.306 0.261, 0.352 561 3.769 2.78, 5.11
Low hopelessness 0.111 0.085, 0.137 642
Cut or shot someone else: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.389 0.337, 0.441 550 4.540 3.40, 6.06
Low hoplessness 0.130 0.102, 0.158 647
Cut or shot by someone else: 1 year
High hoplessness 0.465 0.409, 0.521 565 3.749 2.89, 4.86
Low hopelessness 0.196 0.162, 0.230 647
Gang membership: current
High hopelessness 0.269 0.226, 0.312 566 4.545 3.22, 6.41
Low hopelessness 0.077 0.056, 0.099 656
Substance use
Smoked cigarettes: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.374 0.324, 0.424 567 2.560 1.96, 3.34
Low hopelessness 0.202 0.168, 0.236 656
Drank alcohol: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.395 0.343, 0.447 566 3.020 2.30, 3.96
Low hopelessness 0.189 0.156, 0.222 651
Used marijuana: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.330 0.283, 0.377 574 2.942 2.22, 3.91
Low hopelessness 0.151 0.122, 0.180 654
Used cocaine: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.223 0.186, 0.262 569 6.357 4.18, 9.66
Low hopelessness 0.043 0.028, 0.059 656
Got drunk or high: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.306 0.261, 0.352 571 3.965 2.90, 5.42
Low hopelessness 0.110 0.085, 0.135 651
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158 151
with respondents reporting high levels of hopelessness more likely than those reporting low levels
of hopelessness to have had sexual intercourse during the previous week ðOR ¼2:4Þ;to have a
child ðOR ¼3:4Þ;and to be currently trying to get someone pregnant ðOR ¼4:6Þ:Among females,
results are similar although less dramatic, with those respondents reporting high levels of
hopelessness more likely to have had sexual intercourse during the previous week ðOR ¼1:8Þ;
have a child ðOR ¼2:2Þ;and currently attempting to get pregnant ðOR ¼3:5Þ:
Finally, accidental injuries are considerably more prevalent among those respondents reporting
high levels of hopelessness than among those reporting low levels of hopelessness, raising
questions about how accidental these injuries actually are. Among males, odds ratios for being
badly burned during the previous year, being cut accidentally during the previous year, and
breaking a bone during the previous year all exceed 3.0; among females, odds ratios for all of these
‘‘accidental’’ injuries exceed 2.0.
2
Table 2 (continued)
Prevalence 95% CI NOdds ratio 95% CI
Sexuality
Had sexual intercourse: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.374 0.324, 0.424 568 2.384 1.84, 3.09
Low hopelessness 0.207 0.173, 0.242 646
Trying to get a girl pregnant: current
High hopelessness 0.318 0.272, 0.364 570 4.597 3.35, 6.31
Low hopelessness 0.095 0.071, 0.119 647
Has a child
High hopelessness 0.370 0.315, 0.425 473 3.404 2.54, 4.56
Low hopelessness 0.151 0.120, 0.182 606
Accidental injury
Got badly burned: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.326 0.279, 0.373 570 3.106 2.39, 4.13
Low hopelessness 0.136 0.108, 0.165 650
Got accidently cut: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.399 0.348, 0.451 577 3.484 2.67, 4.55
Low hopelessness 0.164 0.133, 0.195 655
Broke a bone: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.342 0.294, 0.390 571 3.167 2.39, 4.19
Low hopelessness 0.142 0.113, 0.170 654
2
Since these measures or behaviour are self-reports, and they are part of a long questionnaire, they may be subject to
measurement error due to fatigue and inattention. The level of random measurement error can be assessed, however, by
examining the consistency of responses to multiple questions addressing the same behaviour. For example, we asked
respondents to indicate (a) whether they had ever engaged in sexual intercourse, (b) whether they had engaged in sexual
intercourse during the previous 3 months, (c) whether they had engaged in sexual intercourse during the previous
month, and (d) whether they had engaged in sexual intercourse during the previous week. Response options to (a) were
no and yes; response options to (b)–(d) were no, yes just once, and yes more than once. Thus, the total number of
response combinations for these four questions is 54 (2 333), of which 11 are consistent and 43 are inconsistent.
The probability of responding consistently to the four sexual intercourse questions given random responses is only
0.204 (11/54); in contrast, the observed consistency rate for the sexual intercourse responses was 0.904. Similarly,
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158152
In most cases, odds ratios are not statistically different for males and females. However, odds
ratios are higher for males than for females for drinking alcohol ðw2¼4:74;df ¼1;po0:05Þ;
getting drunk or high ðw2¼5:57;df ¼1;po0:05Þ;and having a child ðw2¼6:31;df ¼1;po0:05Þ:
In each case, there exist no statistical differences between males and females with low levels of
hopelessness; but large and statistically significant differences do exist between males and females
with high levels of hopelessness, with males engaging in more extreme behaviour in each case (for
drinking alcohol, w2¼18:85;df ¼1;po0:001;for getting drunk or high, w2¼16:66;df ¼1;
po0:001;for having a child, w2¼7:01;df ¼1;po0:01).
The modest correlation between age and hopelessness for females suggests the possibility that
age may mediate the relationship between hopelessness and risk behaviour. To explore this, the
interaction between age (treated as a categorical variable) and dichotomized hopelessness was
tested as a predictor of each of the risk behaviours listed in Table 2 for males and Table 3 for
females. For males, the interaction between age and hopelessness is a significant predictor of only
two of the 21 risk behaviours (sexual intercourse and gang membership); not only is this result
almost at the level of chance, but the nature of the interaction is not consistent across the two
behaviours. For females, the interaction between age and hopelessness is a significant predictor of
five of the 21 risk behaviours (physical fights, attempts to get others to fight, cut or shot by
someone else, sexual intercourse, and children). Whereas the results for sexual behaviour are
inconsistent, the results for the three violence behaviours are remarkably consistent: the difference
between the violence of younger females with low and high levels of hopelessness is smaller than
the difference between older females with low and high levels of hopelessness. This finding is
suggestive, and perhaps warrants further investigation.
4. Discussion
Despite the attention given to hopelessness among inner-city residents in the popular
and ethnographic literature, we have seen relatively little rigorous documentation of either the
levels of or the effects of hopelessness on this population. The results presented here demonstrate
more clearly than any previous study how feelings of hopelessness are associated with virtually
every domain of risk behaviour, including violence, substance use, sexuality, and even accidental
injury. Further, they demonstrate that while feelings of hopelessness are not universal among
inner city adolescents, roughly 50% of young males and 25% of young females growing up
in the Mobile–Prichard inner city do experience high levels of hopelessness. Notably, this is higher
than results reported in other inner-city studies (DuRant et al., 1994a, b, 1995;Bolland et al.,
2001).
(footnote continued)
comparisons between expected and observed consistency is 0.204 vs. 0.919 for both carrying a gun and for getting drunk
or high. Thus, respondents appear to be responding in non-random ways, although the frequency of inconsistencies
does suggest the presence of some random measurement error. Overall, the questionnaire contained 20 sets of questions
for which inconsistencies could be assessed, with 59.4% of respondents producing completely consistent responses for
all 20 sets of questions and 91.1% of respondents producing consistent responses for 15 or more of the 20 sets of
questions. When inconsistent respondents are removed from the analyses, the relationship between hopelessness and
risk behaviour remains, albeit at a slightly attenuated level.
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158 153
Table 3
Prevalence rates and odds ratios for risk behaviours by level of hopelessness: females
Prevalence 95% CI NOdds ratio 95% CI
Violence
Suicidal ideation: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.257 0.200, 0.314 320 2.534 1.82, 3.52
Low hopelessness 0.122 0.094, 0.146 865
Suicide attempt: lifetime
High hopelessness 0.174 0.127, 0.222 317 2.348 1.60, 3.45
Low hopelessness 0.085 0.065, 0.105 861
Got into a physical fight: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.394 0.325, 0.465 320 2.340 1.77, 3.10
Low hopelessness 0.218 0.216, 0.295 863
Got other kids to fight: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.334 0.270, 0.399 316 2.302 1.71, 3.10
Low hopelessness 0.175 0.146, 0.204 851
Carried a knife: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.253 0.196, 0.310 314 2.605 1.86, 3.65
Low hopelessness 0.122 0.099, 0.146 856
Carried a gun: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.182 0.134, 0.230 315 4.577 2.96, 7.08
Low hopelessness 0.049 0.034, 0.064 851
Pulled a weapon: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.224 0.169, 0.278 311 3.484 2.40, 5.07
Low hopelessness 0.077 0.059, 0.096 861
Cut or shot someone else: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.235 0.180, 0.291 312 3.818 2.63, 5.54
Low hoplessness 0.076 0.057, 0.094 855
Cut or shot by someone else: 1 year
High hoplessness 0.294 0.232, 0.355 307 4.903 3.44, 6.99
Low hopelessness 0.080 0.060, 0.099 848
Gang membership: current
High hopelessness 0.146 0.104, 0.188 314 5.268 3.20, 8.68
Low hopelessness 0.033 0.002, 0.045 864
Substance use
Smoked cigarettes: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.266 0.208, 0.325 320 2.415 1.74, 3.36
Low hopelessness 0.136 0.116, 0.160 867
Drank alcohol: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.249 0.192, 0.307 308 1.873 1.35, 2.60
Low hopelessness 0.157 0.130, 0.183 858
Used marijuana: 1 month
High hopelessness 0.219 0.164, 0.273 312 2.132 1.50, 3.04
Low hopelessness 0.124 0.100, 0.147 864
Used cocaine: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.083 0.050, 0.115 312 6.049 2.99, 12.23
Low hopelessness 0.015 0.006, 0.023 865
Got drunk or high: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.180 0.133, 0.228 314 2.130 1.47, 3.09
Low hopelessness 0.098 0.077, 0.119 862
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158154
The finding that males experience more severe feelings of hopelessness than females is not
surprising, given the greater tendency of males to attribute success to their personal abilities rather
than to external factors (Beyer, 1998–99); moreover, inner-city males tend to be more affected by
racial discrimination and job loss than inner-city females (Peterson, 1991;Anderson, 1999),
creating greater roadblocks to success. Although the odds ratios for risk behaviours were
generally comparable for males and females with low vs. high levels of hopelessness, they did
differ significantly for several behaviours: drinking alcohol, getting drunk or high, and having a
child. In each of these cases, males and females with low levels of hopelessness had similar
prevalence rates; but among those with high levels of hopelessness, prevalence among males was
significantly higher than among females. Thus, at least in these three cases, hopelessness may
affect males in more profound ways than females, leading to steeper trajectories in their risk
behaviours. Although not statistically significant, other behaviours suggest similar trends. This
appears to be an important area for further investigation.
While the results presented here are strong, they are subject to several limitations. First, all of
the data involve self-reports, and are valid only to the extent that the self-reports are valid
reflections of respondents’ behaviours. Second, these are cross-sectional data which limit the
causal inference that can be drawn. For instance, carrying a gun or using drugs may distinctly
limit the possible futures of an adolescent; thus, in this case, behaviour may create hopelessness
(or at least reinforce hopelessness). Third, we examined the relationship between hopelessness and
risk behaviours using a sample of adolescents residing in high-poverty inner-city neighbourhoods
located in a single metropolitan area. The specific sample, therefore, may limit our ability to
generalize the results, both geographically and to other types of neighbourhoods. But although
Table 3 (continued)
Prevalence 95% CI NOdds ratio 95% CI
Sexuality
Had sexual intercourse: 1 week
High hopelessness 0.236 0.180, 0.292 314 1.777 1.26, 2.50
Low hopelessness 0.160 0.134, 0.187 855
Trying to get pregnant: current
High hopelessness 0.163 0.119, 0.208 317 3.456 2.26, 5.29
Low hopelessness 0.055 0.039, 0.071 857
Has a child
High hopelessness 0.276 0.211, 0.341 282 2.182 1.54, 3.09
Low hopelessness 0.167 0.139, 0.195 817
Accidental injury
Got badly burned: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.204 0.154, 0.254 319 2.930 2.02, 4.25
Low hopelessness 0.081 0.061, 0.101 866
Got accidently cut: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.235 0.182, 0.289 315 2.278 1.63, 3.19
Low hopelessness 0.119 0.096, 0.143 865
Broke a bone: 1 year
High hopelessness 0.230 0.176, 0.284 315 2.956 2.07, 4.22
Low hopelessness 0.091 0.070, 0.111 866
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158 155
Mobile and Prichard are unlike the kinds of places that the concept of ‘‘the inner city’’ typically
invokes (e.g. Chicago’s southside, north Philadelphia, the Bronx), it is no doubt representative of
the kind of inner cities that characterize most Metropolitan Statistical Areas in the United States.
Moreover, restricting the heterogeneity of the sample enables us to control, in the most effective
way possible, for a variety of factors that potentially confound other studies on youths in low-
income neighbourhoods. These variables include household income, level of neighbourhood
poverty, and level of neighbourhood risk. This, in turn, gives us greater confidence that the
relationships we have found are not spurious. Finally, the measurement of hopelessness is
based on only five of the 17 items from the full Hopelessness Scale, plus an additional item that
we added. However, the six-item Brief Hopelessness Scale has psychometric properties
comparable to those observed for the full scale, and it may be more portable to other studies
because of its size.
The implications of the findings are substantial. First, public health can likely be improved
dramatically if hopelessness among inner-city adolescents can be reduced. If, as some
argue, hopelessness is tied to structural explanations (e.g. income inequality, racial discrimination,
lack of good jobs, unequal criminal justice), then this goal of reducing hopelessness will
require a fundamental restructuring of American society (e.g. Weinger, 1998;Duncan & Brooks-
Gunn, 2000) and be very difficult to achieve. However, if hopelessness is a cognitive style,
for instance reflecting the interpretation of inequality and life chances (e.g. Abramson, Seligman,
& Teasdale, 1978;Abramson, Metalsky, & Alloy, 1989;Allen & Tarnowski, 1989), then it can
be more easily addressed—through individual and group cognitive development and ther-
apeutic interventions. Certainly, one line of promising research is to identify the aetiology of
hopelessness, and if the causes are other than structural, explore various intervention
strategies.
Second, prevention and intervention programmes designed to reduce adolescent risk behaviours
can produce desired outcomes only to the extent that they address hopelessness. Many health
promotion programmes attempt to empower individuals with the skills and the confidence to
engage in healthy behaviours, based typically on the health belief model (Becker, 1974;Janz &
Becker, 1984) or social learning theory (Bandura, 1977, 1986). Both of these models, and many of
the programmes they have spawned, assume that the individuals they target can imagine a positive
future that can be achieved by engaging in healthy behaviour. For those who are hopeless about
their futures, these assumptions are questionable. Thus, it is important that prevention and
intervention programmes also attempt to build skills that allow participants to better understand
their cognitive–affective responses to adversity, or that provide them with the ability to take
advantage of life opportunities that they encounter; both of these approaches may allow
individual adolescents to overcome the limitations of hopelessness.
Third, however, it is important to recognize that only a minority of inner-city adolescents
experience high levels of hopelessness, and that programmes designed to change the cognitive
styles of individuals with low levels of hopelessness may not be successful in reducing risk
behaviours; they, in fact, may benefit most from the types of skill-building and efficacy-enhancing
interventions discussed in the previous paragraph. Thus, it is important to have available both
these types of interventions and those designed to reduce feelings of hopelessness; and it is equally
important to assess the specific needs of the adolescent before enrolling him or her in a particular
type of prevention or intervention programme.
J.M. Bolland / Journal of Adolescence 26 (2003) 145–158156
Acknowledgements
The research reported here was supported by the National Institutes of Health Office for
Research on Minority Health through a cooperative agreement administered by the National
Institute for Child Health and Human Development (HD30060); by the Cities of Mobile and
Prichard, Alabama; by the Mobile Housing Board; by the Mobile County Health Department;
and by the University of Alabama. Brad Lian, Debra McCallum, Holli Drummond, Cecelia
Formichella, Martha Daughdrill, and Paul Rowan contributed substantially to the formulation of
this manuscript.
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