"Kids Need Somebody to Care": A Thematic Analysis Exploring the Impact of Black Fathers' Youth Violence Experiences and Prevention Efforts on Their Health and Children's Violence Involvement in Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Background and Purpose: Youth violence (YV) is a serious public health concern that can cause lifelong physical, psychological, behavioral, and social problems, leading to injury, disability, and premature death and costing the welfare, criminal justice, and healthcare systems billions annually. YV, defined as physical force or power used by individuals aged 10-24 to harm or threaten others intentionally, includes but is not limited to bullying, fighting, teen dating abuse to more severe acts, such as threats with a weapon and homicide. Louisiana continues to have one of the highest rates of violence nationally, with the capital city, Baton Rouge (BR), experiencing a substantial rise in youth violence. Racial-ethnic minoritized youth disproportionately experience violence and violence-related outcomes, and these disparities are significantly worse among Black youth. Black fathers and father figures, who have been crucial in curtailing community violence nonviolently, continue to uniquely serve as key change agents in safeguarding youth from violence involvement, and recently responded to the urgent call to deter YV in Louisiana. However, no known studies have qualitatively explored how fathers' history of violence impacts their health and children's experience with violence, nor their discernment about the benefits of addressing YV.

Methods: Twelve Black fathers residing in BR were recruited from local community establishments/recreational centers (i.e., parks, barbershops, etc.) and via snowball sampling to participate in a one-time Zoom interview. Semi-structured interviews occurred between April and June 2022, lasting 32-76 mins, and fathers received a $25 gift card for participating. This qualitative study sought to explore two aims: (1) fathers' personal history with youth violence, including when they were children and presently as dads, on their mental and emotional health and their children's involvement and exposure to violence; and (2) benefits of addressing youth violence on micro (i.e., themselves), mezzo (i.e., schools/their family), and macro (i.e., community) level systems. The data was analyzed using Bronfenbrenner's socio-ecological systems theory and Braun and Clarke's (2006) six-phase approach to conducting a thematic analysis.

Results: The three major themes addressing aim one were (1) self-reflexive moments on lessons learned (e.g., how their upbringing and generational factors influenced their fathering ideologies/practices); (2) the impacts of victimization and bullying (e.g., direct communication, reinforcement of avoidant behavior, and monitoring); and (3) socioemotional responses to youth violence and its subthemes of compassion, empathy, guilt, desensitization, and hyperawareness. For the second aim, the two themes were (1) the healing impacts on the neighborhood and (2) the improvement of the school community.

Conclusions and Implications: Overall, findings demonstrate that fathers are aware of how their history of violence impacts their social-emotional health, coping mechanisms, and fathering practices; moreover, they identified the benefits of their efforts regarding the betterment of youth at the micro and mezzo levels. Considering the critical role of Black fathers in addressing YV, future research, programming, and policy strategies aiming to prevent violence among youth must center fathers and leverage their perspectives and practices.