Changes In Delinquency Research Articles

The influence of strain factors, social control factors, self-control and computer use on adolescent cyber delinquency: Korean National Panel Study

This study examined how cyber delinquency changes over time and we identified how predictors influence these changes. We analyzed Korean Youth Panel data collected by the National Youth Policy Institute over five years for 2844 Korean adolescents living in 7 metropolitan cities and 8 provinces, using hierarchical linear modeling. The results are as follows. Cyber delinquency linearly increased over time. Greater computer use and perceived stress were related to more cyber delinquency, while greater self-control ability and community attachment were associated with less cyber delinquency. More computer use and offline bullying victimization were related to an acceleration of the increase of cyber delinquency over time. While, greater self-control ability was associated with a deceleration of the increase of cyber delinquency as time passed. The strongest predictor was amount of computer use, followed by self-control, and then by offline bullying victimization.

Moving in and out of Poverty: The Within-Individual Association between Socioeconomic Status and Juvenile Delinquency.

A family’s SES can be changeable over time. This study was the first to investigate if such within-individual changes in family SES are associated with parallel fluctuations in boys’ delinquent behavior from childhood to adolescence. Participants were a community sample of boys and their caregivers (N = 503) who were assessed annually for ten consecutive years spanning ages 7–18. Fixed effects models revealed that changes in familial SES were related to changes in delinquency: Youths were more likely to offend during years in which their parents’ SES was lower than during years in which their parents’ SES was higher. Contrary to expectations, we found no evidence that this association was accounted for by families moving to different neighborhoods or by changes in parenting. Since within-individual models provide a stricter test of causality than between-individual models, these findings support claims that impacting familial SES may have a direct effect on youths’ delinquency.

How is parenting related to adolescent delinquency? A between- and within-person analysis of the mediating role of self-control, delinquent attitudes, peer delinquency, and time spent in criminogenic settings

We examined how parenting is directly and indirectly associated with adolescent delinquency. We derived four possible mechanisms from major criminological theories and examined their relative contribution to explaining the relationship between parenting and delinquency: self-control theory (that is, self-control), differential association theory (that is, delinquent attitudes and peer delinquency), and routine activity theory (that is, time spent in criminogenic settings). In addition, we examined how changes in different aspects of parenting during adolescence were directly and indirectly related to changes in delinquency. Results of multilevel structural equation modeling on two waves of panel data on 603 adolescents indicated that parenting was indirectly related to delinquency through self-control, delinquent attitudes, peer delinquency, and time spent in criminogenic settings. However, only when examined together these variables, derived from major criminological theories, almost fully mediate the effects of parenting. Furthermore, changes in parenting during adolescence were indirectly related to changes in delinquency through changes in delinquent attitudes and in peer delinquency.

Minor delinquency and immigration: A longitudinal study among male adolescents.

On the basis of general theories of delinquency and the specific situation of immigrants, this longitudinal study investigated predictors of initial levels and rates of change in delinquency among 188 male ethnic German Diaspora immigrants from the former Soviet Union (FSU) in Germany, 237 male native German adolescents, and 182 male Jewish Diaspora adolescents from the FSU in Israel. The participants (15.2 years old) completed 3 annual assessments. Latent growth curve models showed that ethnic German adolescents reported higher initial levels of delinquency than native German adolescents and lower levels than the Russian Jewish adolescents. Groups did not differ in the rate of change, indicating a decrease in delinquency over time. Peer-oriented leisure related positively and parental knowledge negatively with levels and change rates in delinquency in all groups, but could not fully account for the ethnic differences in delinquency levels. School bonding was associated negatively with delinquency only among native German adolescents. Acculturation-related hassles were an additional predictor for higher levels and also associated with change rates in the immigrant groups. Thus, general theories of delinquency apply to immigrants, but may be complemented by adding acculturation-specific challenges.

Local Macroeconomic Trends and Hospital Admissions for Child Abuse, 2000–2009

To examine the relationship between local macroeconomic indicators and physical abuse admission rates to pediatric hospitals over time. Retrospective study of children admitted to 38 hospitals in the Pediatric Hospital Information System database. Hospital data were linked to unemployment, mortgage delinquency, and foreclosure data for the associated metropolitan statistical areas. Primary outcomes were admission rates for (1) physical abuse in children <6 years old, (2) non-birth, non-motor vehicle crash-related traumatic brain injury (TBI) in infants <1 year old (which carry high risk for abuse), and (3) all-cause injuries. Poisson fixed-effects regression estimated trends in admission rates and associations between those rates and trends in unemployment, mortgage delinquency, and foreclosure. Between 2000 and 2009, rates of physical abuse and high-risk TBI admissions increased by 0.79% and 3.1% per year, respectively (P ≤ .02), whereas all-cause injury rates declined by 0.80% per year (P < .001). Abuse and high-risk TBI admission rates were associated with the current mortgage delinquency rate and with the change in delinquency and foreclosure rates from the previous year (P ≤ .03). Neither abuse nor high-risk TBI rates were associated with the current unemployment rate. The all-cause injury rate was negatively associated with unemployment, delinquency, and foreclosure rates (P ≤ .007). Multicenter hospital data show an increase in pediatric admissions for physical abuse and high-risk TBI during a time of declining all-cause injury rate. Abuse and high-risk TBI admission rates increased in relationship to local mortgage delinquency and foreclosure trends.

Genetically influenced change in sensation seeking drives the rise of delinquent behavior during adolescence.

Sensation seeking is associated with an increased propensity for delinquency, and emerging research on personality change suggests that mean levels of sensation seeking increase substantially from childhood to adolescence. The current study tested whether individual differences in the rate of change of sensation seeking predicted within-person change in delinquent behavior and whether genetically influenced differences in rate of personality change accounted for this association. Sensation seeking and delinquent behavior were assessed biennially between ages 10-11 and 16-17 in a nationally representative sample of 7675 youths from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth: Children and Young Adults (CNLSY). Analyses using latent growth curve modeling found that within-person change in sensation seeking was significantly and positively correlated with within-person change in delinquency from childhood to adolescence. Furthermore, behavioral genetic analyses of a subset of 2562 sibling pairs indicated that there were substantial genetic influences on both initial levels of sensation seeking and change in sensation seeking during early adolescence, with over 80% of individual differences in change due to genetic factors. Finally, these genetically driven increases in sensation seeking were most important for predicting increases in delinquency, whereas environmental paths between sensation seeking and delinquency were not significant. These results suggest that developmental changes in delinquent behaviors during adolescence are driven by a genetically governed process of personality change.

Bidirectional links and concurrent development of parent-child relationships and boys' offending behavior.

This study examined different types of longitudinal associations (i.e., directional links and overlapping developmental changes) between children's delinquency and the quality of parent-child relationships from middle childhood to late adolescence. We used 10-wave interview data of 503 boys, their primary caregivers, and their teachers. Our first aim was to unravel the direction of effects between parent-child relationships and children's offending. Cross-lagged panel models revealed bidirectional links over time between poorer quality parent-child relationships and boys' offending across late childhood (age 7-10), early adolescence (age 10-13) and middle adolescence (age 13-16). Second, we examined the associations between mean changes in delinquency, on the one hand, and mean changes in relationship quality, on the other hand. Although parent-child relationships improved during childhood, their quality decreased in early adolescence and remained stable in middle adolescence. Delinquency increased only in middle adolescence. In five out of six models, the slope factors of relationship quality and offending were strongly correlated, indicating that stronger increases in delinquency were associated with stronger decreases in parent-child relationship quality across childhood, early adolescence, and middle adolescence. The discussion focuses on the theoretical implications of these two types of longitudinal associations.

Delinquency Balance and Time Use

McGloin (2009) recently demonstrated that an imbalance in delinquency between a subject and his or her best friend predicted within-individual changes in offending behavior. Still, the precise mechanism(s) whereby subjects moved toward delinquency balance remained unclear. It is possible that this process has little to do with the transmission of deviant values, but instead is a reflection of unstructured and unsupervised time spent with peers. The results suggest that an imbalance in time use between peers predicts an imbalance in deviance between peers, but not within-individual change in delinquency. The discussion considers the implication of these findings for theory and research on peer processes.

Don't trust anyone over 30: Parental legitimacy as a mediator between parenting style and changes in delinquent behavior over time

Both law and society scholars and developmental psychologists have focused on the legitimacy of authority figures, although in different domains (police versus parents). The purpose of the current research is to bridge these two fields by examining the relations among parenting style (i.e., authoritarian, authoritative, permissive), the perception of parental legitimacy, and changes in delinquency over time. It is hypothesized that parental legitimacy mediates the relation between parenting style and future delinquent behavior. Middle school and high school students completed questionnaires three times over a period of 18 months. Parenting style and delinquent behavior were measured at time 1, parental legitimacy at time 2, and delinquency again at time 3. The results show that authoritative parenting was positively related to parental legitimacy, while authoritarian parenting was negatively associated with parental legitimacy. Furthermore, parental legitimacy was negatively associated with future delinquency. Structural equation modeling indicated that parental legitimacy mediated the relation between parenting styles and changes in delinquency over the 18-month time period. The implications for parenting style and parental legitimacy affecting delinquent behavior are discussed.

DELINQUENT PEERS IN CONTEXT: A LONGITUDINAL NETWORK ANALYSIS OF SELECTION AND INFLUENCE EFFECTS*

In this article, longitudinal social network data are analyzed to get a better understanding of the interplay between delinquent peers and delinquent behavior. These data contain detailed information about the social networks of secondary school students from the same grade, their delinquent behavior, and many relevant correlates of network formation and delinquency. To distinguish selection and influence processes, a method (Simulation Investigation for Empirical Network Analyses, SIENA) is used in which network formation and changes in delinquency are simulated simultaneously within the context of other network processes and correlates of delinquency. The data and the method used make it possible to investigate an unusually wide array of effects on peer selection and delinquent behavior. The results indicate that similarity in delinquency has no significant effect on the selection of school friends when other network dynamics are taken into account. However, the average delinquency level of someone's friends in the school network does have a significant, although relatively small, effect on delinquent behavior of the respondents, beyond significant effects of changes in the level of self-control and morality. Another peer-related change, leaving or joining informal street-oriented youth groups, also appears to have a substantial effect on changes in delinquency.

Depression and delinquency covariation in an accelerated longitudinal sample of adolescents.

The current study tested opposing predictions stemming from the failure and acting out theories of depression-delinquency covariation. Participants included a nationwide longitudinal sample of adolescents (N = 3,604) ages 12 to 17. Competing models were tested with cohort-sequential latent growth curve modeling to determine whether depressive symptoms at age 12 (baseline) predicted concurrent and age-related changes in delinquent behavior, whether the opposite pattern was apparent (delinquency predicting depression), and whether initial levels of depression predict changes in delinquency significantly better than vice versa. Early depressive symptoms predicted age-related changes in delinquent behavior significantly better than early delinquency predicted changes in depressive symptoms. In addition, the impact of gender on age-related changes in delinquent symptoms was mediated by gender differences in depressive symptom changes, indicating that depressive symptoms are a particularly salient risk factor for delinquent behavior in girls. Early depressive symptoms represent a significant risk factor for later delinquent behavior--especially for girls--and appear to be a better predictor of later delinquency than early delinquency is of later depression. These findings provide support for the acting out theory and contradict failure theory predictions.

Loan Delinquencies and Bank Stock Returns

This paper examines the statistical relationship between bank stock returns and two fundamental banking variables: (1) changes in net interest margin (NIM), and (2) changes in the loan delinquency rate. Motivated by passage of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) in 1999, as well as the significant loan problems witnessed during 2007-09, we examine two separate time periods. For the period following passage of GLBA, bank stock returns are positively related to NIM changes, and negatively related to delinquency changes. But for the pre-2000 period, these statistically significant relationships disappear.

Delinquency after Secondary School: Exploring the Consequences of Schooling, Working and Dropout

This study focuses on delinquent behaviour after secondary school, and investigates the relationship with different educational careers. More specifically, it analyses whether delinquent behaviour increases or decreases among young people with subsequent full-time schooling (without and with educational problems), youths who are working full time or part time, and jobless youths. The sample contains 273 lower-educated youths, aged between 17 and 19 years old, who were questioned while they were still in secondary school during the NSCR School Project on one or more occasions between 2002 and 2004. A mixed-design ANOVA revealed that educational careers do affect changes in delinquency, independently from other factors. Respondents who had attention or other problems in their further education and, in particular, respondents who combined schooling and work appeared to have increased their level of delinquency most strongly. Respondents who left school for a full-time job were not significantly more involved in delinquency.

Is Unstructured Socializing a Dynamic Process? An Exploratory Analysis Using a Semiparametric Group-Based Modeling Approach

Relying on the theory of Osgood et al. of unstructured socializing (US) and using longitudinal data from the Gang Resistance Education and Training (G.R.E.A.T.) program, this study examines whether US is a dynamic process and how the changes in US may relate to changes in delinquency during adolescence for groups, who demonstrate different levels of involvement and frequency of offending over time. Results from semiparametric group-based models indicate that individuals tend to follow three distinct trajectories of US and four trajectories of delinquency. Furthermore, additional results from multinomial regressions suggest that key covariates can significantly distinguish group membership and that the covariates that distinguish US trajectories distinguish the delinquency trajectories. Finally, the results demonstrate that there is a considerable degree of overlap across trajectory groups. That is, those that follow the high-rate US trajectory also tend to follow the high-rate delinquency trajectory. Study limitations and possible theoretical implications are also discussed.

A Reinterpretation of Parental Monitoring in Longitudinal Perspective

A commonly used measure of parental monitoring is parents' knowledge of adolescents' daily activities. This measure has been criticized on the grounds that parents get more knowledge about teenagers' daily activities through willing youth disclosure than through their own active monitoring efforts, but this claim was based on cross-sectional data. In the present study, we reexamine this claim with longitudinal data over 2 years from 938 seventh and eighth graders and their parents. Youth disclosure was a significant longitudinal predictor of parental knowledge in single- and cross-rater models. Neither measure of parents' monitoring efforts—control or solicitation—was a significant predictor. In analyses involving delinquency, parental monitoring efforts did not predict changes in delinquency over time, but youth disclosure did. We conclude that because knowledge measures do not seem to represent parental monitoring efforts, the conclusions from studies using these measures should be reinterpreted.

Youth Crime, Urban Spaces, and Security in Germany since the 19th Century

In West Germany during the 1960s and the 1970s, two important changes in delinquency, in its perception and fears could be discerned. First, a twofold spatial and social dissolution of boundaries (Entgrenzung) of youth crime developed. The establishment of the transnational networks of the youth cultural underground, in which drug consumption played an important role, was instrumental in these developments. Second, in the early 1970s, as the case of the Rockers shows, youth crime had become a potentially omnipresent phenomenon of everyday urban life evoking diffuse spatial fears. Every seemingly friendly boy from the neighborhood could all of sudden turn into a juvenile violent offender. Thus, crime could potentially lurk everywhere, in every niche of (urban) society. It was against this background that the age of security dawned as it promised a safe haven against all future urban threats.

Stability and Change in Risk Seeking: Investigating the Effects of an Intervention Program

Although much is known about the consequences of low self-control, little is known about how it develops during adolescence and what types of experiences trigger important changes. This study considers this by examining a key component of low self-control—risk-seeking propensity—to determine its stability and change during early adolescence, its effects on changes in delinquency, and its responsiveness to a comprehensive delinquency-reduction program. These issues were examined with data from the Children at Risk (CAR) program, a randomly assigned intervention that targeted early adolescents. The analysis revealed substantial stability in risk seeking, but there was evidence of change as well, and these changes were associated with contemporaneous changes in delinquency. Risk-seeking changes were not, however, a result of participation in the CAR program, despite that program’s success at reducing some forms of delinquency. The theoretical and policy implications of these findings are addressed.

The Development of Delinquency and Perceived Friendship Quality in Adolescent Best Friendship Dyads

The present study examines both the unique and the combined role of best friends' delinquency and perceived friendship quality in the development of adolescent delinquency. Questionnaire data were gathered from 435 Dutch adolescent best friends (mean age at first wave = 12.97) over a period of 5 years with annual assessments. Results showed that mean levels of delinquency and perceived friendship quality increased over time. Adolescent best friends were highly similar in both mean levels and changes in delinquency over time. For boys, similarity in mean level delinquency between best friends was higher than for girls. In addition, only for boys, friends' delinquency is associated with increases in adolescent delinquency over time, and adolescents' delinquency is associated with increases in friends' delinquency over time. No bidirectional longitudinal associations were found between perceived friendship quality and adolescent delinquency. No interaction effects between friendship quality and friends' delinquency on adolescent delinquency were found. Thus, findings were more in support of the differential association theory than of the social control theory.

Drug Use and Delinquent Behavior

The continuity of self-reported heavy alcohol and marijuana use and self-reported delinquency among adolescents is examined using latent growth model analyses in a sample of 278 justice-involved juveniles completing at least one of three follow-up interviews as part of a National Institute on Drug Abuse—funded study. Latent growth models are analyzed examining (a) changes in heavy alcohol and marijuana use over time, (b) changes in delinquency over time, and (c) the contemporaneous, parallel processes of changes in substance use and delinquency over time. Results indicate that substance use increased over time, whereas delinquency decreased over time. However, the growth model examining the simultaneous influence of delinquency on substance use suggests that delinquency exacerbated substance use over time. Implications for policy and intervention service needs are discussed.

A Prospective Longitudinal Study of Teen Court's Impact on Offending Youths' Behavior

Although teen court is the fastest growing alternative processing model in juvenile justice, there has been little systematic investigation of offenders' impressions of the process and no attempt to measure changes in delinquent behavior. This study employed a prospective longitudinal design to measure several impressions of teen court using a questionnaire, and changes in self-reported delinquency using the YSR and CBCL. Impressions of teen court did not predict compliance with the teen court sentence or lower risk of recidivism once demographic and prior delinquency were taken into account, although delinquent behavior did decrease between intake and six months for boys, who reported more delinquent behavior at intake. Interpretation of these results involves teen court's location at the soft end of juvenile justice. Implications for net-widening and changing not-so-delinquent youths' behavior are central to this discussion.