The present study assesses the effects of demographic risk factors on children's exposure to
violence (ETV) and how these effects vary by informants. Data on exposure to violence of
9-, 12-, and 15-year-olds were collected from both child participants (N = 1880) and parents
(N = 1776), as part of the assessment of the Project on Human Development in Chicago
Neighborhoods (PHDCN). A two-level hierarchical linear model (HLM) with multivariate
outcomes was employed to analyze information obtained from these two different groups of
informants. The findings indicate that parents generally report less ETV than do their
children and that associations of age, gender, and parent education with ETV are stronger
in the self-reports than in the parent reports. The findings support a multivariate approach
when information obtained from different sources is being integrated. The application of
HLM allows an assessment of interactions between risk factors and informants and uses all
available data, including data from one informant when data from the other informant is
missing.