Predicting Violence: A Cross-National Study of United States and Mexican Young Adults

Abstract

In this study, young adults from the United States (n = 198) and Mexico (n = 223) were surveyed regarding their violent behaviors over the past year, as well as variables related to trait aggression, empathy, individualist/collectivist views, and interest in viewing and consumption of violent media. Mexican participants reported having committed a modestly higher number of violent acts in the past 12 months than U.S. participants. Somewhat consistent with the catalyst model of antisocial behavior (Ferguson et al., 2008), for both U.S. and Mexican participants, male gender and trait aggression were the two primary predictors of violent behavior, with one exception. For Mexican participants, empathy significantly predicted (less) violent behavior. Curiously, higher levels of empathy were not associated with a reduction in violent acts among U.S. participants. Moreover, for both groups of participants, interest and pleasure in viewing violent media contributed to the prediction of violence, but exposure to (i.e., actual consumption of) violent media did not. Overall, results suggest that the array of variables predictive of violent behavior is more similar than dissimilar across national samples. Implications for the findings are provided.