What Is a Protective Factor?
Research on risk factors for delinquency has prompted discussion and investigation into influences that may provide a buffer between the presence of risk factors and the onset of delinquency. These buffers are known as protective factors. Pollard, Hawkins, and Arthur (1999:146) note that “protective factors are those factors that mediate or moderate the effect of exposure to risk factors, resulting in reduced incidence of problem behavior.” Rutter (1987) believes that protective factors offset the onset of delinquency via four main processes: reducing risk, reducing negative chain reactions, establishing self-esteem and self-efficacy, and opening up opportunities. Researchers disagree about what constitutes a protective factor. Protective factors “have been viewed both as the absence of risk and something conceptually distinct from it” (Office of the Surgeon General, 2001 (chapter 4)). The former view looks at risk and protective factors as opposite ends of a continuum. For example, ex
