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Abstract
Over many decades, Black youth and adults continue to be disproportionately impacted by HIV/AIDS in the United States. Traumatic stress experiences can have a detrimental impact on the development and mental functioning of youth. Given the need to understand the processes underlying traumatic experiences such as community violence exposure, childhood trauma and discrimination that may influence HIV risk behaviors, the aims of the dissertation were to: 1) Examine the pathway of childhood trauma to HIV risk through the change trajectories of community violence exposure and depression using longitudinal data (Waves I-IV) from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) dataset, and 2) : Examine the underlying association between community violence exposure, perceived discrimination and HIV risk through the pathways of depression and perceived stress using cross-sectional data (Wave IV) from the Add Health data set. Results from the first aim showed an indirect effect from childhood trauma to HIV risk through the change trajectories of depression and community violence exposure. Findings from the second aim showed no indirect effect from perceived discrimination and community violence exposure to HIV risk through depression and perceived stress. However, direct effects between perceived discrimination and HIV risk and community violence exposure and HIV risk were found. Study results may inform the conceptualization of culturally relevant HIV prevention strategies to simultaneously address mental health coping and safer sex practices and address social stressors stemming from perceived discrimination and community violence exposure. In the absence of evidence-based interventions, STI and HIV health disparities will remain a significant public health problem among Black adolescents.