Neighborhood Context, Youthful Offending, and Peer Selection

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine whether neighborhood context, as measured by maternal ratings of neighborhood disorder, predicted future offending behavior and association with antisocial peers. Putative relationships between neighborhood context, peers, and offending behavior were tested in all 1,725 adolescent members of the National Youth Survey. Consistent with the hypothesis that neighborhood context can either promote or inhibit the delinquent peer selection process, neighborhood disorder predicted peer selection (own offending → delinquent peers) but not peer influence (delinquent peers → own offending). Gender moderated this relationship such that an effect was found only for boys. These findings indicate that a negative psychological environment resulting from neighborhood disorder and weak informal social control can encourage offending behavior in neighborhood boys and facilitate the selection of antisocial peers. As with the parent–peer selection relationship observed in an earlier study on parental role modeling and youth offending, neighborhood climate has a bearing on future offending by virtue of its ability to support or block conditions known to suppress early delinquency and the formation of antisocial peer networks.