Sticks, Stones and Facebook Accounts: What Violence Outreach Workers Know about Social Media and Urban-Based Gang Violence in Chicago

Background and Purpose:

In January 2016, 42 people had been killed and 210 wounded in the city of Chicago, an almost 50% spike in violence since 2015. Some community-based organizations in Chicago have adopted a violence prevention model that treats violence like a disease and uses trained outreach workers to detect potentially violent conflicts, identify and treat high risk populations and mobilize community change resources. However, rapid changes in technology, including the proliferation of social media have radically transformed society. Young people spend more time interacting and sharing personal information on social media. But as social media meets the realities of everyday life, especially for young people growing up in violent, urban neighborhoods, threats and taunts that were once hurled on street corners are also posted on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. This behavior termed internet or cyberbanging is a dangerous and complex form of computer mediated communication. Researchers note that street culture is translated on social media and identified scripts of reciprocal violence within a local network have real world consequences that mimic on the ground gang behavior.  However, no studies have examined how those who work in violence prevention use social media to reduce violence in urban communities.

Methods:

Data for this study came from the Internet Banging study, a qualitative study that explored the relationship between community violence and social media with 34 Black and Latino boys and men and 17 male and female violence prevention outreach workers and mid-level executives. This paper utilizes data from the adult, violence prevention staff interviews that were conducted from September 2014- March 2015. Using a grounded theory analysis approach, participants were asked to describe how youth use social media and the extent to which they use social media to intervene in crisis that emerge in violent Chicago neighborhoods.

Results:

Participants describe youth behavior that included taunting rival gangs, posturing and boating about violence events.  Participants suggest youth increase their risk for becoming a target of violence by posting images and words of themselves that appear tough or threatening. In addition, many outreach workers expressed concern that youth were not aware of the consequences of their use of social media. We also found evidence that social media enhanced crisis intervention work in violent neighborhoods when coupled with close, trusting relationships with youth.

Implications:

Social media plays an important role in intervening and preventing community and gang violence. However, because of the complex nature of communication, a Human-centered approached guided by strong personal ties is central to interpreting crisissituations in violent, urban neighborhoods. Future research can explore the way violence outreach workers use social media to respond to crises across multiple contexts. This research would increase our ability to determine what resources social workers and violence outreach workers need to best utilize online tools to effectively respond to potentially dangerous situations.