Research Essay

Dangerous Weapons or Dangerous People? The Temporal Associations between Gun Violence and Mental Health

Yu Lu1 and Jeff R. Temple2

1.Corresponding author, University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, TX, 77555-0587, USA, [email protected]

2.University of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, TX, 77555-0587, USA, [email protected]

Abstract

Despite the public, political, and media narrative that mental health is at the root of gun violence,

evidences are lacking to infer a causal link. This study examines the temporal associations

between gun violence (i.e., threatening someone with a gun and gun carrying) and mental health

(i.e., anxiety, depression, stress, PTSD, hostility, impulsivity, and borderline personality disorder)

as well the cross-sectional associations with gun access and gun ownership in a group of emerging

adults. Waves 6 (2015) and 8 (2017) data were used from a longitudinal study in Texas, US.

Participants were 663 emerging adults (61.7% female) including 33.6% self-identified Hispanics,

26.0% white, 27.0% Black, and 13.4% other, with an average age of 22 years. Multivariate logistic

regression indicated that, individuals who had gun access were 18.15 times and individuals with

high hostility were 3.51 times more likely to have threatened someone with a gun, after controlling

for demographic factors and prior mental health treatment. Individuals who had gun access were

4.74 times, individuals who reported gun ownership were 5.22 times, and individuals with high

impulsivity were 1.91 times more likely to have carried a gun outside of their homes, after

controlling for prior gun carrying, mental health treatment, and demographic factors. Counter to

public beliefs, the majority of mental health symptoms examined were not related to gun violence.

Instead, access to firearms was the primary culprit. The findings have important implications for

gun control policy efforts.

Keywords

gun violence; mental health; gun access

Each year, an estimated 75,000 to 100,000 Americans are nonfatally injured by firearms and

30,000 – 40,000 die from firearms (CDC, 2017; Galea et al., 2018; Swanson, McGinty,

Fazel, & Mays, 2015). About a third of the US annual gun-related deaths are homicides with

the remaining attributed to suicide (61%) and accidents (1%) or other reasons (Murphy, Xu,

Conflict of Interests: The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.

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HHS Public Access Author manuscript Prev Med. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2020 April 01.

Published in final edited form as: Prev Med. 2019 April ; 121: 1–6. doi:10.1016/j.ypmed.2019.01.008.

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Kochanek, Curtin, & Arias, 2017). There has been one mass shooting (defined as incidences

where four or more people are killed) per day over the past two years (Galea et al., 2018).

While mass shootings, including school shootings, account for a relatively small fraction of

gun related deaths and can be due to different motives, they understandably account for the

majority of public awareness related to firearms.

The media, public, and political attention to firearm ownership and carriage has steadily

increased and changed over the last several decades. News media coverage on gun violence

tended to implicate mental illness as the cause of gun violence and frequently proposed gun

restrictions for people with mental illnesses as a solution (McGinty, Webster, Jarlenski, &

Barry, 2014). This narrative likely contributed to a general public perception that people

with mental illness are the cause of gun violence and potentially have influenced

policymaking (McGinty, Webster, & Barry, 2013). Indeed, a report analyzing state law

trends in all 50 US states from 1991 to 2016 identified a significant rise in the number of

states enacting laws prohibiting firearm possession by people who have been involuntarily

committed for inpatient mental health treatment (Siegel et al., 2017).

Given the depiction outlined above, scholars have raised the question of “dangerous people”

versus “dangerous weapons” (Gostin & Record, 2011). The dangerous people framework

suggests that the group of people with mental illness should be responsible for gun violence

whereas the dangerous weapons framework suggests that the responsibility is in the

widespread access to guns (Swanson & Gilbert, 2011). A group of scholars (Friedman,

2006; Gostin & Record, 2011; Swanson & Gilbert, 2011) have criticized the dangerous

people framework, which is frequently used in policy making, legislation, and public media,

for targeting mental illness despite an overall lack of empirical evidence on its ability to

predict gun violence. Scholars argue that this framework, which results in a misaligned focus

on mental illness as the cause of gun violence could (1) lead to policies that restrict the

rights of people with mental illness without meaningfully reducing gun violence (McGinty

et al., 2014; Swanson & Gilbert, 2011); and (2) prevent people from seeking needed mental

health treatment in fear of stigma or having their rights restricted (Gostin & Record, 2011;

McGinty et al., 2014). Overall, the extant research suggests that restricting firearm access on

the basis of dangerous behaviors (e.g., substance abuse, domestic violence) may reduce gun

violence, whereas there is a general lack of evidence (and studies) that suggests that

restricting gun ownership based on mental illness is effective (McGinty et al., 2014).

Much of the limited research on gun violence and mental illness has focused on violence

among individuals with severe mental illnesses or rates of mental illness among individuals

arrested for violent crimes (e.g., Bonta, Law, Hanson, 1998; Buckley, Hrouda, Friedman,

Noffsinger, Resnick, & Camlin-Shingler, 2004; Swanson et al., 2006). However, as

Friedman (2006) argued, to conclude a link between mental illness and violence based on

this body of research is subject to selection bias, and the population examined is not

representative of individuals with mental illness in the general population.

In recognition of the above limitation of existing research, scholars have attempted to

examine the link between mental illness and gun violence in the general population

(Swanson, Holzer, Ganju, & Jono, 1990; Van Dorn, Volavka, & Johnson, 2012). For

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example, using a national representative sample, Casiano and colleagues (Casiano, Belik,

Cox, Waldman, & Sareen, 2008) examined how mental disorders were associated with

threatening others with a gun and found significant association with impulse control

disorders. Overall, scholars conclude that only about 5% of violence is attributable to mental

illness (Ahonen, Loeber, & Brent, 2017). However, a vast majority of these studies have

relied on cross-sectional data (e.g., Casiano et al., 2008; Silver & Teasdale, 2005), thus

preventing any causal inferences.

The literature is also inconsistent with how mental illness is defined. For example, Swanson

et al. (2006) defined mental disorder using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-III criteria

and found that individuals who met one or more psychiatric disorder criteria were more

likely to have reported violent behavior in the prior year. Silver and Teasdale (2005)

stratified individuals by severity of mental illness, including more severe (e.g., schizophrenia

or major affective disorders) and less severe (e.g., phobias and somatic, panic, and eating

disorders) categories. They found that only major mental disorders were significantly

associated with past year violence. Casiano et al. (2008) examined mental disorder in two

ways: individual mental disorders (e.g., depression, bipolar disorder, PTSD) and categories

of mental disorders (i.e., any mood disorder, any anxiety disorder, and any impulse

disorder). When looking at individual mental disorders and after adjusting for other

disorders, only PTSD was significantly associated with threatening others with a gun. When

examining by categories, only impulse disorder emerged as a significant predictor. Given the

limitations of existing research, the link between gun violence and mental health remains

unclear.

The present study analyzes the temporal relationships between mental health and gun

violence among an ethnically diverse sample of emerging adults. This study examines gun

carrying in addition to gun threatening behavior because existing research indicates that

individuals in possession of a gun are over four times more likely to be shot in an assault

than those not in possession (Branas, Richmond, Culhane, Ten Have, & Wiebe, 2009). Thus,

although gun carrying itself may not be a violent behavior, it potentially marks heightened

risk among gun carriers. This study focuses on three sets of independent variables, including

(1) demographic characteristics, (2) gun access and gun ownership, and (3) mental health

variables.

Methods

Participants

Data are from an ongoing longitudinal study of 1,042 participants in the southern U.S.

(reference masked for blind review) This study used Wave 6 (spring, 2015, N = 758,

retention rate from Wave 5: 108.5%) and Wave 8 (spring, 2017, N = 686, retention rate from

Wave 6: 90.5%) data. Notably, firearm questions of relevance were only asked at these

waves (Wave 7 was an abbreviated health interview). The final sample included in analyses

were 663 participants (61.7% female) who responded to the firearm questions. The sample

consisted of 33.6% self-identified Hispanics, 26.0% white, 27.0% Black, and 13.4% other

(i.e., Asian American, American Indian, and “other”). At Wave 8, participants had an

average age of 22.05 years (SD = .77, range from 20 to 25 years).

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Procedure

Researchers visited mandatory classes (e.g., English, World History) in seven public high

schools in spring 2010 to recruit participants. Students were asked to participate in a study

about teen health behaviors. Interested students who returned signed parental consent forms

and gave assent completed paper-and-pencil surveys during regular school hours. At later

assessments, participants who no longer attended the recruitment schools were provided a

web link to complete the survey online. The Waves 6 and 8 data used in the present study

were all collected using online surveys. Participants received compensations of $30

(electronic gift card) at each wave. The study procedure was approved by the last author’s

institutional review board.

Measures

Firearm possession and use.—Four gun related variables were measured in this study: gun carrying (Waves 6 and 8), threatening someone with a gun (Wave 8), gun access (Wave

8), and gun ownership (Wave 8). For gun carrying, one question was asked, “within the past

12 months, about how often would you say you’ve carried a gun with you when you were

outside your home – including in your car? DO NOT count the times you’ve carried a gun

for hunting or target shooting”. Participants reported “never”, “1 time”, “2 times” and up to

“more than 20 times.” Given the small percentages of participants endorsing different

response options on the number of times (.04% - 3.5%), these responses were combined and

this variable was dichotomized to yes/no for the analyses. For threatening someone with a

gun, participants reported yes/no to the question “have you ever threatened someone else

with a gun?” For gun access, participants responded yes/no to the question “do you have

access to a gun if you needed or wanted one?” Finally, for gun ownership, participants

responded yes/no to the question, “do you or does someone living in your home own a gun?”

All gun related variables were treated as individual variables with a single item, thus, scale

reliability cannot be calculated.

Anxiety (Wave 6).—The Generalized Anxiety Disorder subscale of the Screen for Child Anxiety Related Emotional Disorders (Birmaher et al., 1999) was used to measure anxiety.

Participants were asked to rate on a scale of 0 (almost never) to 2 (often) on nine items such

as “I worry about how well I do things” in general situations. This scale showed good

reliability (Cronbach’s α = .92).

Depression (Wave 6).—The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Short Depression Scale (Andresen, Malmgren, Carter, & Patrick, 1994) measured depression. Participants indicated

on a scale of 1 (rarely or never) to 4 [more or all of the time (5-7 days)] on how often they

experienced 10 depressive symptoms (e.g., “my sleep was restless”) during the past week.

The scale had acceptable reliability (Cronbach’s α = .79).

Stress (Wave 6).—The Perceived Stress Scale (Cohen, Kamarch, & Mermelstein, 1983) measured stress. Participants were asked to indicate how often in the last month they felt or

thought in the ways that were described in 10 statements on a scale from 1 (= never) to 5 (=

very often). The statements describe situations like “how often have you felt confident about

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your ability to handle your personal problems?” The scale had acceptable reliability

(Cronbach’s α = .79).

Posttraumatic stress disorder (Wave 6).—PTSD was measured with the 4-item Primary Care-PTSD questionnaire (Prins et al., 2003). Participants reported in a yes/no

format whether, in the past month, they had experienced PTSD symptoms, such as having

nightmares in response to lifetime traumatic events. The scale had good reliability

(Cronbach’s α = .82).

Hostility (Wave 6).—The Symptom Checklist-90 (Derogatis, Rickels, & Rock, 1976) measured hostility. Participants provided their answers to the question “in general, how often

do you…?” on six items such as “feel easily annoyed or irritated.” The response options

were on a scale from 1 (never) to 4 (most of the time). This scale had good reliability

(Cronbach’s α =. 88).

Impulsivity (Wave 6)—was measured with the 4-item Impulsiveness Scale from the Teen Conflict Survey (Bosworth & Espelage, 1995). Participants reported on a scale of 1 (never)

to 5 (always) to items such as “I do things without thinking”. The scale had acceptable

reliability (Cronbach’s α = .79).

Borderline personality disorder (Wave 6)—was measured with the Borderline Personality Features Scale for Children (Crick, Murray-Close, Woods, 2005). Participants

responded on a scale of 1 (not at all true) to 5 (always true) to 24 items such as “I change my

mind almost every day about what I should do when I grow up.” The scale had good

reliability (Cronbach’s α = .87).

Mental health treatment (Wave 8).—Participants responded yes/no to the question “have you received mental health treatment/counseling in the past year from a psychologist,

psychiatrist, social worker, or counselor?”

Demographic variables.—Age, gender, and race information were collected at baseline. At Wave 8, participants were asked about their current life situations, including whether they

were “attending college/trade school (even if working)”, “working (not in school)” or “not in

school and not working.”

Data Analysis

Data analyses were performed using SPSS 24 (IBM Corporation, 2016). Preliminary

analyses were carried out to examine variable means, frequencies, and correlations. For all

mental health variables, the scale means were used for the analysis. First, to examine the two

dependent variables, gun carrying (Wave 8) and threatening others with a gun (Wave 8) by

demographic characteristics, a series of logistic regressions were carried out. Next,

multivariate logistic regression tests (Models 1-4) were conducted to predict the two

dependent variables. All models controlled for age, gender, race, and current life situation.

In additional, school cluster standard errors were adjusted for by including six dummy-

coded school variables (i.e., 1 = students in school X and 0 = students in all other schools; 1

= students in school Y and 0 = students in all other schools; and so forth). Model 1 examined

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whether gun access and gun ownership, both at Wave 8, predicted the two dependent

variables after controlling for the aforementioned demographic and school variables. Model

2 tested whether prior year mental health treatment (Wave 8) associated with the dependent

variables after controlling for demographics and school factors. Model 3 examined the

associations of the seven mental health variables (i.e., anxiety, depression, stress, PTSD,

hostility, impulsivity, and borderline personality disorder) at Wave 6, after controlling for

mental health treatment, demographic, and school variables. Finally, Model 4 examined the

associations including all gun variables, mental health variables, demographic and school

variables in the same model.

Results

Table 1 presents variable means, frequencies, and bivariate correlations. As shown in Table

2, univariate logistic regression results indicated that gun carrying and threatening someone

with a gun did not differ based on age, gender, race, and current life situations. However,

based on multivariate logistic regression analyses, when other demographic characteristics

were controlled, males were 3.04 times (95% CI: 1.06, 8.73) more likely to have threatened

someone with a gun compared to their female counterparts.

As shown in Table 3, Wave 8 gun carrying was significantly associated with gun access

(Wave 8), gun ownership (Wave 8), and impulsivity (Wave 6) once we controlled for other

factors (Model 4). Specifically, those who had access to a gun at Wave 8 were 4.74 times

(95% CI: 2.01, 11.16) more likely to carry a gun outside of their home at Wave 8. Those

who reported owning a gun at Wave 8 were 5.22 times (95% CI: 2.31, 11.77) more likely to

carry a gun outside of their home at Wave 8. A temporal association was identified for

impulsivity in that those who reported higher impulsivity at Wave 6 were 1.91 times (95%

CI: 1.25, 2.93) more likely to carry a gun at Wave 8. Other mental health variables,

including anxiety, stress, depression, PTSD, hostility, and borderline personality disorder did

not show significant temporal associations with gun carrying once prior gun carrying,

demographics, other gun-related variables and prior mental health treatment were controlled

for.

As shown in Table 4, having received past-year mental health treatment at Wave 8

significantly predicted threatening someone with a gun at Wave 8 after controlling for

demographic characteristics (Model 2; adjusted odds ratio = 3.68, 95% CI: 1.17, 11.54).

However, when other mental health variables were included in the model, the association

became non-significant (Model 3; adjusted odds ratio = 3.28, 95% CI: .89, 12.12). Overall,

after controlling for demographic characteristics and other factors (Model 4), these who had

access to a gun were 18.15 times (95% CI: 2.52, 130.48) more likely to have threatened

someone with a gun. A temporal association was identified for hostility (Wave 6) in that

those who had a hostile demeanor were 3.51 times (95% CI: 1.27, 9.71) more likely to have

threatened someone with a gun (Wave 8) even after controlling for demographic, gun-related

variables, prior mental health treatment and other mental health variables.

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Discussion

Using a large, racially diverse sample of emerging adults, this study examined the temporal

link between mental health symptoms and gun violence (i.e., gun carrying and threatening

someone with a gun). Notable in the findings was that most mental health symptoms were

unrelated to gun violence. Indeed, after controlling for gun-related and demographic

variables, only hostility significantly predicted having threatened someone with a gun. While

hostility is a characteristic of some mental health problems (e.g., oppositional defiant

disorder, Hamilton & Armando, 2008; schizophrenic spectrum disorders, Lysaker, Wright,

Clements, & Plascak-Hallberg, 2002), it could also be a characteristic of general personality

demeanor as opposed to representative of mental illness, per se. By definition, hostility is a

cognitive trait that represents “a devaluation of the worth and motives of others, an

expectation that others are likely sources of wrongdoing, a relational view of being in

opposition toward others, and a desire to inflict harm or see others harmed” (Smith, 1994, p.

26). Research has suggested that hostility and angry affect, a consequence of hostile

cognitions (Eckhardt, Norlander, & Deffenbacher, 2004), is often linked to aggression and

violence (Norlander, & Eckhardt, 2005; Wilkowski & Robinson, 2010). To potentially

reduce the risk of gun violence, programs that promote mindfulness and cognitive control,

strategies that have shown to reduce anger and hostility (Borders, Earleywine, & Jajodia,

2010; Wilkowski, Robinson, & Troop-Gordon, 2010), may be helpful.

Interestingly, impulsivity did not significantly predict threatening someone with a gun,

contrary to prior research (Casiano et al., 2008). This inconsistency may be due to how

impulsivity is defined. Casiano and colleagues examined “any impulsive disorder” whereas

this study asked about specific impulsive behaviors. Other mental health symptoms,

including depression, anxiety, stress, PTSD, and borderline personality disorder did not

significantly predict threatening someone with a gun. Although the non-significant finding

of anxiety is consistent with prior research (Swanson, 1994), the findings of depression and

PTSD are counter to expectation (Arseneault, Moffitt, Caspi, Taylor, & Silva, 2000;

Freeman, Roca, & Kimbrell, 2003). One possible reason is that participants who report

symptoms of a mental disorder (e.g., depression) do not necessarily reach criteria to be

diagnosed (e.g., with major depression). It is also possible that individuals with severe

mental illnesses are not violent unless they have a comorbid substance use disorder or a

history of violence (Gostin & Record, 2011). Overall, the findings highlight the importance

of examining different types of mental illness and symptoms and their specific associations

with gun violence.

Prior gun carrying, having access to a gun, and owning a gun were all linked to future gun

carrying. Although gun carrying itself is not a violent behavior, research has demonstrated a

strong link between this behavior and gun violence victimization (Branas et al., 2009). The

finding has important implications for states and campuses considering open carry laws α while these policies may be intended to increase safety, they may have the unintended result

of increasing gun violence victimization. Among mental health variables, only impulsivity

was identified as a significant predictor of gun carrying. Research has suggested that

impulsivity is associated with a host of risk behaviors, including suicide attempts and drug

abuse (Bakhshani, 2014). That impulsivity is related to gun carrying does not necessarily

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make it dangerous, given the varied reasons individuals choose to carry. Indeed, when asked

about the reasons for gun carrying, among the 91 participants who provided an answer, 80

(88%) reported that it was because they needed protection or to feel safe. This finding

suggests that the best method to preventing gun carrying may be the building of an overall

safer environment.

This study found that individuals who had access to guns, compared to those with no such

access, were over 18 times more likely to have threatened someone with a gun, even after

controlling for a number of demographic and mental health variables. Research has shown

that areas or states in the US with higher gun ownership rates had higher firearm homicide

rates (Miller, Azrael, & Hemenway, 2002; Siegel, Ross, & King, 2013) indicating an

expected link between gun access and gun violence. This finding extends this knowledge by

providing evidence for the link between gun access and gun violence on an individual level.

While an argument can be made that threating someone with a gun does not necessarily

equal gun violence, it is an adequate proxy or precursor to actual gun violence. Taken

together, limiting access to firearms, regardless of demographic characteristics, mental

health status, and prior mental health treatment, would likely reduce threats made with a gun

and gun violence.

Counter to the limited prior research (Casiano et al., 2008), age, race, and current life

situation was not significantly linked to gun carrying or threatening someone with a gun. It

is possible that the study sample was relatively homogeneous (i.e., emerging adults in

similar life situations) and thus potential differences cannot be identified. Notably, males

were 3.04 times more likely to have threatened someone with a gun after controlling for

other demographic factors. This finding is consistent with prior research (Swanson, 1994;

Van Dorn et al., 2012) and highlight the importance of targeted intervention for males.

Limitations

Several limitations should be noted. First, this study examined the link between gun violence

and mental health in a sample of emerging adults. The generalizability of the findings to

other age groups must be done with caution. Second, a small portion of the participants (n = 16, 1.5%) reported having threatened someone with a gun, which introduces potential bias of

analysis. However, the fact that this study was able to identify statistically significant

findings with such a small sample highlights the strong associations and is by itself

noteworthy. Third, the study used self-report measures of mental health symptoms and do

not represent actual diagnoses. Fourth, the included mental health symptoms were by no

means exhaustive; other more serious symptoms (e.g., hallucinations) and mental disorders

(e.g., schizophrenia) were excluded in the survey. Fifth, this study only focused on gun

access and mental health symptoms. Other factors, such as substance misuse, which has a

known link to gun violence (Friedman, 2006), was out of the study scope but should be

examined in future research.

Conclusion

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine the temporal

association between gun violence and mental health symptoms. Despite the public, political,

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and media narrative that mental health is at the root of gun violence (especially mass

shootings, McGinty et al., 2014), this study did not find it to be the case. Indeed, of all the

mental health symptoms considered, only impulsivity was associated with gun carrying and

only hostility was associated with threatening someone with a gun. A strength of the present

study is that it examined the joint effects of gun access and mental health and found that

access to guns was especially strong in predicting gun carrying and threatening someone

with a gun, even after controlling for demographic characteristics, prior mental health

treatment, and mental health symptoms. This finding has important implications for gun

control policy efforts.

Acknowledgments

Funding: This research was supported by Award Number K23HD059916 (PI: Temple) from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and 2012-WG-BX-0005 (PI: Temple) from the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of NICHD or NIJ.

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Highlights

Most mental health symptoms examined were unrelated to gun violence

Hostility predicted threatening someone with a gun

Impulsivity predicted gun carriage

Gun access strongly predicted gun violence even after controlling for mental health

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Table 1.

Construct Frequency, Mean, and Bivariate Correlations

Frequency (%)/M (SD)

Scale Range

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11

1. Gun Carrying W8

95 (9.1%) yes/no 1.00

2. Threatening Someone with a Gun W8

16 (1.5%) yes/no .22** 1.00

3. Gun Access W8 274 (26.3%) yes/no .40** .15** 1.00

4. Gun Ownership W8

249 (23.9%) yes/no .41** .10** .65** 1.00

5. Mental Health Treatment W8

92 (13.9%) yes/no −.00 .08* −.04 −.04 1.00

6. Anxiety W6 .91 (.59) 0-2 −.07 .02 −.09* −.02 .14** 1.00

7. Depression W6 1.88 (.54) 1-4 −.07 .03 −.09* −.07 .16** .58** 1.00

8. Stress W6 1.67 (.68) 0-4 −.05 .03 −.12** −.07 .11** .55** .73** 1.00

9. PTSD W6 .24 (.34) 0-1 −.04 −.01 −.02 −.08 .15** .33** .49** .42** 1.00

10. Hostility W6 1.69 (.60) 1-4 .03 .14** −.04 −.05 .16** .29** .39** .42** .28** 1.00

11. Impulsivity W6 2.24 (.89) 1-5 .10* .02 .01 −.01 .14** .43** .48** .41** .38** .39** 1.00

12. Borderline Personality Disorder W6

2.26 (.58) 1-5 −.02 .06 −.10* −.10* .09* .39** .53** .50** .42** .46** .48**

Note.

* Correlation is significant at the .05 level (2-tailed).

** Correlation is significant at the .01 level (2-tailed).

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Table 2.

Gun Carrying and Threatening Someone with a Gun by Demographics

Gun Carrying Threatening Someone with a Gun

Yes (n = 95) n (%)

No (n = 568)

n (%)

Unadjusted OR

(95% CI)

Adjusted OR

(95% CI)

Yes (n = 16)

n (%)

No (n = 647)

n (%)

Unadjusted OR

(95% CI)

Adjusted OR

(95% CI)

Age .83 (.63, 1.11) .84 (.60, 1.16) 92 (.48, 1.76) .76 (.38, 1.53)

Gender

Female 53 (55.8) 356 (62.7) 1.00 6 (37.5) 403 (62.3) 1.00

Male 42 (44.2) 212 (37.3) 1.33 (.86, 2.06) 1.53 (.96, 2.44) 10 (62.5) 244 (37.7) 2.75 (.99, 7.67) 3.04 (1.06, 8.73)

Race

White 31 (32.6) 141 (24.8) 1.00 5 (31.2) 167 (25.9) 1.00

Hispanic 30 (31.6) 193 (34.0) .71 (.41, 1.22) 1.31 (.70, 2.45) 3 (18.8) 220 (34.0) .46 (.11, 1.93) .47 (.10, 2.17)

Black 24 (25.3) 155 (27.3) .70 (.39, 1.26) 1.80 (.84, 3.86) 4 (25.0) 175 (27.0) .76 (.20, 2.89) .69 (.13, 3.85)

Other 10 (10.5) 79 (13.9) .58 (.27, 1.24) 1.01 (.44, 2.34) 4 (25.0) 85 (13.1% 1.57 (.41, 6.00) 1.67 (.39, 7.24)

Current Situation

At School 41 (43.2) 295 (51.9) 1.00 5 (31.3) 331 (51.2) 1.00

Working 47 (49.5) 237 (41.7) 1.43 (.91, 2.24) 1.18 (.72, 1.92) 10 (62.5) 274 (42.3) 2.42 (.82, 7.15) 2.84 (.88, 9.17)

Not at school or working

7 (7.4) 36 (6.3) 1.40 (.58, 3.35) 1.36 (.54, 3.44) 1 (6.3) 43 (6.5) 1.58 (.18, 13.82) 1.66 (.17, 15.90)

Notes. OR = odds ratio, CI = confidence interval. Unadjusted OR are based on univariate logistic regression, adjusted OR are based on multivariate logistic regression controlling for other demographic characteristics.

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Table 3.

Multivariate Logistic Regression of Gun Carrying

Model 1 AOR (95% CI)

Model 2 AOR (95% CI)

Model 3 AOR (95% CI)

Model 4 AOR (95% CI)

Gun Access W8 4.61 (2.00, 10.64) 4.74 (2.01, 11.16)

Gun Ownership W8 4.64 (2.12, 10.16) 5.22 (2.31, 11.77)

MH Treatment W8 1.11 (.57, 2.16) 1.32 (.63, 2.73) 1.11 (.44, 2.84)

Anxiety W6 .68 (.39, 1.19) .58 (.30, 1.12)

Depression W6 .63 (.30, 1.33) .50 (.21, 1.18)

Stress W6 1.13 (.64, 1.98) 1.51 (.78, 2.90)

PTSD W6 .79 (.33, 1.90) .70 (.25, 1.93)

Hostility W6 1.12 (.70, 1.80) 1.11 (.62, 2.00)

Impulsivity W6 1.68 (1.18, 2.38) 1.91 (1.25, 2.93)

BPD W6 .82 (.46, 1.47) .92 (.47, 1.83)

Note. Results were adjusted for Wave 6 gun carrying, age, gender, race, current situation, and school cluster standard errors. AOR = adjusted odds ratio, CI = confidence interval. MH Treatment = prior year mental health treatment, BPD = borderline personality disorder, W6 = Wave 6, W8 = Wave 8.

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Table 4.

Multivariate Logistic Regression of Threatening Someone with a Gun

Model 1 AOR (95% CI)

Model 2 AOR (95% CI)

Model 3 AOR (95% CI)

Model 4 AOR (95% CI)

Gun Access W8 11.89 (1.98, 71.33) 18.15 (2.52, 130.48)

Gun Ownership W8 1.06 (.29, 3.81) 1.32 (.30, 5.77)

MH Treatment W8 3.68 (1.17, 11.54) 3.28 (.89, 12.12) 3.99 (.81, 19.61)

Anxiety W6 1.44 (.45, 4.67) 1.67 (.44, 6.40)

Depression W6 1.00 (.21, 4.65) 1.12 (.20, 6.28)

Stress W6 1.05 (.31, 3.54) 1.42 (.37, 5.41)

PTSD W6 .45 (.07, 2.76) .26 (.04, 1.97)

Hostility W6 3.52 (1.56, 7.95) 3.51 (1.27, 9.71)

Impulsivity W6 .56 (.26, 1.22) .50 (.21, 1.23)

BPD W6 1.50 (.52, 4.27) 2.12 (.71, 6.31)

Note. Results were adjusted for age, gender, race, current situation, and school cluster standard errors. AOR = adjusted odds ratio, CI = confidence interval. MH Treatment = prior year mental health treatment, BPD = borderline personality disorder, W6 = Wave 6, W8 = Wave 8.

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