The current study examines factors that affect risk for life threatening situations such as aggravated assaults, rape, AIDS, and suicide among 240 homeless and runaway adolescent men and women interviewed on the streets (i.e., abandoned houses, cars, motels, by the rivers, in alleys etc.) and in shelters in Des Moines, Iowa. The results indicate that a history of childhood family abuse affects interaction and adaptation strategies that place young people at risk for aggravated assault, rape, AIDS, and suicide while on the streets. The findings suggest specific sex differences for risk factors for aggravated assault, rape, AIDS, and suicide;The results show that the likelihood of assault with a weapon directly relates to peer group and deviant survival techniques utilized to survive on the streets. Adolescent men are at more risk of being assaulted with a weapon and adolescent women, just like the rest of the women in society, are more at risk for rape. Both adolescent men and women are more likely to be involved in high risk behaviors for contracting AIDS due to abuse at home and the survival techniques they use. The only exception is that it is worse for the adolescent men the longer they are on the streets. In addition, although both adolescent men and women contemplate suicide, adolescent men do so because of being sexually assaulted at home, victimized on the streets and being depressed, while adolescent women contemplate suicide because of depression.