Abstract
This chapter examines life-course explanations of desistance and explores to what extent important life-course transitions are associated with reoffending rates in convicted sex offenders. It analyzes the effect of stable dynamic factors and focuses on the way marriage, divorce, and parenthood are associated with recidivism of registered sex offenders over a 25-year period. The chapter describes the sample of convicted sex offenders in terms of demographic and criminal history characteristics. It then examines general, special, and specific recidivism in this sample over the 25 year period. The chapter estimates event history models to assess the extent to which reconviction rates for different types of offenses are influenced by between individual characteristics and within individual differences in life course circumstances. Life-course research, however, indicates that institutions like school, work, and intimate relationships can act as important sources of informal social control that deter offenders from committing additional crimes.
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