Frequency of Guns in the Households of High School Seniors

Disentangling the coping process in White rural men who carry guns

Affluent White rural men have the highest rates of gun ownership in the United States. However, few studies have specifically examined reasons and motivations for gun ownership and gun behaviors in this population. Therefore, this study sought to examine the relationship between stress variables, namely masculine gender role stress, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), and income level, and subsequent pro-gun beliefs and amount of time an individual carried a gun within this population. Results indicated that only two measures of pro-gun beliefs (i.e., believing guns keep one safe, believing guns are present in one's social sphere) were correlated with percentage of time an individual carried. Additionally, ACEs were positively correlated with believing guns influence how others perceive oneself, levels of masculine gender role stress, and income. These results suggest that White rural gun owners who have increased ACEs have decreased income and tend to believe that owning guns impacts their social status with peers. However, increased ACEs do not influence belief about guns keeping one safe, believing guns are present in one's social sphere, or gun carriage. Instead, White rural gun owners without childhood adversity may be more susceptible to believing their safety depends on guns and belongingness within their social sphere. Future research should assess reasons why affluent White rural men find it important to maintain their safety in the context of gun ownership.

Patterns in pro-gun beliefs and weapon carrying behaviors in rural White adolescent

Weapon carrying among White rural populations is understudied although evidence suggests that rural White boys have high rates of carriage. This study delineated patterns of weapon use and pro-gun beliefs using a latent class analysis on a sample of 32,916 White rural adolescents. Five groups were identified (i.e., Low Gun Risk, Naïve, Social Contagion, Independent, Unsupervised) using pro-gun beliefs, peer risk factors, and weapon carrying items. Multinomial logistic regression analyses revealed that identifying as male, age, housing instability, and victimization consistently differentiated group membership between different classes. These results suggest that rural White adolescents vary in their belief systems about guns and weapon carrying behavior and that this heterogeneity can be differentiated by lived experiences of these adolescents.

Firearm injury epidemiology in children and youth in Ontario, Canada: a population-based study

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE

Despite firearms contributing to significant morbidity and mortality globally, firearm injury epidemiology is seldom described outside of the USA. We examined firearm injuries among youth in Canada, including weapon type, and intent.

DESIGN

Population-based, pooled cross-sectional study using linked health administrative and demographic databases.

SETTING

Ontario, Canada.

PARTICIPANTS

All children and youth from birth to 24 years, residing in Ontario from 1 April 2003 to 31 March 2018.

EXPOSURE

Firearm injury intent and weapon type using the International Classification of Disease-10 CM codes with Canadian enhancements. Secondary exposures were sociodemographics including age, sex, rurality and income.

MAIN OUTCOMES

Any hospital or death record of a firearm injury with counts and rates of firearm injuries described overall and stratified by weapon type and injury intent. Multivariable Poisson regression stratified by injury intent was used to calculate rate ratios of firearm injuries by weapon type.

RESULTS

Of 5486 children and youth with a firearm injury (annual rate: 8.8/100 000 population), 90.7% survived. Most injuries occurred in males (90.1%, 15.5/100 000 population). 62.3% (3416) of injuries were unintentional (5.5/100 000 population) of which 1.9% were deaths, whereas 26.5% (1452) were assault related (2.3/100 00 population) of which 18.7% were deaths. Self-injury accounted for 3.7% (204) of cases of which 72.0% were deaths. Across all intents, adjusted regression models showed males were at an increased risk of injury. Non-powdered firearms accounted for half (48.6%, 3.9/100 000 population) of all injuries. Compared with handguns, non-powdered firearms had a higher risk of causing unintentional injuries (adjusted rate ratio (aRR) 14.75, 95% CI 12.01 to 18.12) but not assault (aRR 0.84, 95% CI 0.70 to 1.00).

CONCLUSIONS

Firearm injuries are a preventable public health problem among youth in Ontario, Canada. Unintentional injuries and those caused by non-powdered firearms were most common and assault and self-injury contributed to substantial firearm-related deaths and should be a focus of prevention efforts.

Child access prevention legislative language and pediatric firearm injury rates

Backgroud

Firearm injuries are a significant public health problem facing young people in the USA. In 2015, a total of 16 878 people under 19 years old were injured or killed by firearms. To reduce firearm injuries, 29 states and Washington, DC have enacted child access prevention (CAP) legislation. CAP legislation is intended to reduce the likelihood of a minor obtaining a weapon and subsequent injury or death. This study evaluates the impact of CAP legislation based on language of the legislation, specifically it evaluates a relationship of the legal threshold of liability and the number of firearm injuries per capita of minors.

Methods

Data were collected from the Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System for patients less than 19 years of age who presented to emergency departments with firearm injuries in 2016. The Giffords Law Center classification was used to group states into three categories (strong/weak/no CAP) based on CAP language. Differences of firearm-related injury rates per capita were assessed.

Results

When controlling for population, states with CAP legislation had a 22% decrease in firearm injuries per capita compared with states without CAP legislation. States with ‘strong’ CAP legislation had a 41% decrease in firearm injuries per capita compared with states with ‘weak’ or no CAP legislation when controlling for population.

Conclusions

States with ‘strong’ CAP legislation had lower pediatric firearm injury rates per capita, but more complete data and further studies are needed to evaluate this relationship as well as other factors that may impact firearm injury rates.

Receptiveness and Responsiveness Toward Using Social Media for Safe Firearm Storage Outreach: Mixed Methods Study

Background

Childhood and adolescent firearm injury and death rates have increased over the past decade and remain major public health concerns in the United States. Safe firearm storage has proven to be an effective measure to prevent firearm injury and death among youth. Social media has been used as an avenue to promote safe firearm storage, but perceptions of this tool remain unknown.

Objective

The aim of this study was to determine receptiveness and responsiveness in promoting firearm lock box and trigger lock giveaway events on social media, and to describe the characteristics of participants who learned of these events through social media.

Methods

We performed a mixed methods study combining a content analysis of Facebook event post comments, quantitative analysis of positive and negative feedback on social media, and a descriptive analysis of event participant characteristics. Through a qualitative content analysis approach, we thematically coded comments from each event’s social media page posting. Interrater reliability and κ statistics were calculated. We calculated the prevalence of positive and negative feedback data. Further, we calculated descriptive statistics for demographic characteristics gathered from day-of-event intake surveys. Differences between collected measures were analyzed with χ² and t tests according to how the participant found out about the event (social media vs other means). Using concurrent analysis, we synthesized the results from both the qualitative and quantitative aims.

Results

Through qualitative content analysis, 414 comments from 13 events were coded. Seven themes emerged through the comment coding process with the most common being “positive receptiveness” (294/414, 71.0%). From quantitative analysis of the social media content, we found higher levels of positive feedback compared to negative feedback. The average number of event post “likes” was 1271.3 per event, whereas the average count in which “hide post” was clicked was 72.3 times per event. Overall, 35.9% (1457/4054) of participants found out about the event through social media. The participants who learned about the event through social media were on average significantly younger than those who learned about the event through other means (–6.4 years, 95% CI –5.5 to –7.3). Among the group that learned of the event through social media, 43.9% (629/1433) identified as female, whereas 35.5% (860/2420) identified as female among the group that learned of the event through other means.

Conclusions

There was overall positive receptiveness and responsiveness toward firearm lock box and trigger lock giveaway events when promoted on social media. Compared with other promotional tools, social media has the ability to reach those who are younger and those who identify as female. Future studies should extend this research to determine whether there is a difference between rural and urban settings, and consider other social media platforms in the analysis.

Pediatric Firearm-Related Injuries in the United States

Pediatric firearm-related deaths and injuries are a national public health crisis. In this Special Review Article, we characterize the epidemiology of firearm-related injuries in the United States and discuss public health programs, the role of pediatricians, and legislative efforts to address this health crisis. Firearm-related injuries are leading causes of unintentional injury deaths in children and adolescents. Children are more likely to be victims of unintentional injuries, the majority of which occur in the home, and adolescents are more likely to suffer from intentional injuries due to either assault or suicide attempts. Guns are present in 18% to 64% of US households, with significant variability by geographic region. Almost 40% of parents erroneously believe their children are unaware of the storage location of household guns, and 22% of parents wrongly believe that their children have never handled household guns. Public health interventions to increase firearm safety have demonstrated varying results, but the most effective programs have provided free gun safety devices to families. Pediatricians should continue working to reduce gun violence by asking patients and their families about firearm access, encouraging safe storage, and supporting firearm-related injury prevention research. Pediatricians should also play a role in educating trainees about gun violence. From a legislative perspective, universal background checks have been shown to decrease firearm homicides across all ages, and child safety laws have been shown to decrease unintentional firearm deaths and suicide deaths in youth. A collective, data-driven public health approach is crucial to halt the epidemic of pediatric firearm-related injury.