ALCOHOL USE AND OFFENCE TYPE IN YOUNG OFFENDERS

Abstract

This paper presents the results of a survey of alcohol use by 604young male convicted offenders. From the internal consistency of the data, and from verification from another sample, it was concluded that trainees in Young Offender Institutions were reporting on their drinking behaviour with a fair degree of accuracy. A significant association was found between drinking at the time of the current offence and offences of a violent nature. A significant association was also found between violent current offences and the consumption of excessive amounts of spirits. Drunkenness was found to be related to large and excessive consumption of beer, cider, or lager. Habitual drunkenness was associated with self-reports of all types of delinquency. Previous work by the Young Offender Psychology Unit (YOPU) of the Home Office Prison Department (Thornton et al. 1990) has shown that Young Offender Institution inmates with violent current offences are more likely to claim to have been under the influence of alcohol at the time of the offence than are inmates with acquisitive current offences. The research reported here is a continuation of the earlier work in that it attempts to explore this link further. Sample The sample consisted of604 young (17-21-year-old) convicted male offenders. A team of psychologists visited all Young Offender Institutions in England (excluding juvenile and short-term establishments) over a period of a year beginning in 1988, and interviewed twenty-four randomly selected trainees in each. These trainees, having been sentenced to detention in a custodial institution for a period of at least four months, are representative not of young offenders in general, but of those who have committed the more serious offences or who have previous convictions. In one section of the interview, trainees were asked a number of questions about consumption of alcohol at the time of the current offence, and also about their normal drinking habits. In another section they were asked how many times they had committed various types of crime. Data were also collected on each trainee's current offence and any previous convictions.