Talk‐Story: Perspectives of Children, Parents, and Community Leaders on Community Violence in Rural Hawaii

Abstract

To enhance our understanding of what community violence means to a multiethnic school community in rural Hawaii and obtain people's perspectives of how to deal with and prevent violence-related behaviors among children. An exploratory design was used to collect qualitative data from a purposive sample of 150 key stakeholder participants, including 84 school children aged 5-10 years and 66 adults. Focus group methodology via Hawaiian island-style (culturally adapted techniques) of "talk-story" and a metaphor of introduction were used to elicit contextual data on the experiences, meanings, and perceptions of youth violence. Qualitative narrative analyses were used to analyze the data. Five higher order themes were found, including the need to: build a common understanding of what violence looks like; develop school-based identification, management, and prevention efforts; develop comprehensive school health services; develop state-level school health policies; and conduct outreach to make violence prevention a community affair. The findings will inform the development of a school-based culturally adapted violence-prevention program led by teachers, in partnership with parents, students, and community-cultural leaders.