SELF‐CONTROL,SOCIAL BONDS,AND DESISTANCE: A TEST OF LIFE‐COURSE INTERDEPENDENCE

Theoretical debates and empirical tests on the explanation of stability and change in offending over time have been ongoing for over a decade pitting Gottfredson and Hirschi's (1990) criminal propensity model against Sampson and Laub's (1993) life‐course model of informal social control. In 2001, Wright and his colleagues found evidence of a moderating relationship between criminal propensity, operationalized as self‐control, and prosocial ties on crime, a relationship they term life‐course interdependence. The current study extends their research by focusing on this moderating relationship and the developmental process of desistance from crime among serious juvenile delinquents. Contrary to the life‐course interdependence hypothesis, the results indicate that whereas self‐control and social bonds are strongly related to desistance from crime, there is no evidence of a moderating relationship between these two factors on desistance among this sample. The implications of this research for life‐course theories of crime, future research, and policies regarding desistance are discussed.     

Employment,peers, and life-course transitions

One of Sampson and Laub's central findings from their analysis of the Gluecks' data was that reductions in adult criminal behavior were associated with stable employment. In support of their theory of informal social control, they maintained that employment builds social capital that, in turn, bonds young adults to social institutions. Using data from the National Youth Survey we examine the effects of associating with prosocial coworkers on changing delinquent peer networks and on criminal behavior and drug use. The results demonstrate that prosocial coworkers disrupt previously established delinquent peer networks and are associated with reductions in adult criminal behavior.     

Value orientations,life transitions,and desistance: Assessing competing perspectives

Laub and Sampson (2003) and Paternoster and Bushway (2009) offered opposing explanations of desistance from crime. Yet, extant research has failed to test the key theoretical differences that distinguish these perspectives: 1) the temporal ordering of internal changes in identity/values and life transitions and 2) the impact of values/life transitions on offending conditional on key predictors from the opposing theory (e.g., whether marriage contributes to desistance among individuals who already hold prosocial values). We assess competing claims using data from the Pathways to Desistance. We find that within-person changes in prosocial value orientations are significantly related to within-person changes in one's likelihood of entering into serious romantic relationships and becoming employed. Conversely, life transitions are unrelated to changes in one's values. The results derived from fixed-effects Poisson models indicate high or increasing prosocial value orientations help explain offending patterns among those who enter into serious romantic relationships/get employed and help explain changes in offending among those who do not experience structural “turning points.” Marriage/cohabitation is unrelated to within-person changes in offending, whereas the impact of employment has an inconsistent relationship. Theoretical and policy implications are discussed.     

Adult child-parent bonds and life course criminality

Parents and parenting practices are often implicated as predictors of early childhood offending in criminological research, but little is known about the role of parents in adulthood in promoting or inhibiting criminal behavior. As juveniles mature into adult roles, parents also continue to mature and interact with their children in numerous roles throughout the life course. Unlike peers and romantic partners, parents are not easily discarded. Adults who have built a good foundation with their parents, then, possess additional social capital that has the potential to better adult life course outcomes, including criminal behavior. Social bonds formed within romantic relationships and stable employment have been the dominant factors identified within criminological literature in promoting criminal desistance, but in today's society with high rates of divorce and an unstable low-skilled job market, parents of origin may be an important stabilizing force in the lives of adults, particularly those lacking other conventional bonds. Using three waves of data from the Ohio Lifecourse Study, a project that spans some twenty-one years, the findings showed that strong relationships with parents are a significant predictor of criminal desistance for adult children, mainly through the emotional benefits these relationships have for the adult children. Furthermore, the data revealed that the adult child-parent relationship is a stronger predictor of desistance among the subjects with poor romantic relationship bonds. Implications for the life course theory are discussed.     

Predictors of desistance among sex offenders: The interaction of formal and informal social controls

Increasing attention is being given to the issue of desistance or cessation in adult criminal careers. We contribute to this research by considering how informal and formal social controls affect recidivism among 556 sex offenders placed on probation in 1992. We conduct an event history analysis of reoffense, based on the predictions of Sampson and Laub's and Gottfredson and Hirschi's control theories. We build on these perspectives by examining how informal social controls condition the effects of formal social controls generally and across offense types. We find less recidivism among offenders with stable job histories, particularly among those in court-ordered sex offender treatment. The results add both to theoretical formulations concerning desistance and recidivism and to policy formulations directed at growing prison populations.     

DIFFERENTIATING SERIOUS ADOLESCENT OFFENDERS WHO EXIT THE JUSTICE SYSTEM FROM THOSE WHO DO NOT

Numerous factors have been posited to promote desistance from criminal offending in late adolescence and early adulthood. Research in this area has generally examined these factors for their impact on offending for a period shortly after the occurrence or shifts in possible predictors. The current study takes a slightly different approach. It examines the broad relation of life changes and developmental patterns to wholesale shifts in offending behavior. The current study uses data from the Pathways to Desistance study to compare the developmental patterns of two groups of serious adolescent male offenders: those who are “system successes” with no subsequent criminal justice system involvement and a matched sample for a 7‐year period after court involvement for a felony offense. Findings from growth curve analyses indicate that patterns of change in criminal attitudes, psychosocial development, and legal employment over this extended follow‐up period are related to an absence of offending. These results support further investigation of the synergistic effects of psychological changes and entry into the job market as possible mechanisms promoting desistance during this developmental period. The policy and practice implications of these findings are discussed.     

Shifting Perspectives: Cognitive Changes Mediate the Impact of Romantic Relationships on Desistance from Crime

Although research regarding the impact of marriage on desistance is important, most romantic relationships during early adulthood, the period in the life course when involvement in criminal offending is relatively high, do not involve marriage. Using the internal moderator approach, we tested hypotheses regarding the impact of non-marital romantic relationships on desistance using longitudinal data from a sample of approximately 600 African American young adults. The results largely supported the study hypotheses. We found no significant association between simply being in a romantic relationship and desistance from offending. On the other hand, for both males and females quality of romantic relationship was rather strongly associated with desistance. Partner antisociality only influenced the offending of females. Much of the effect of quality of romantic relationship on desistance was mediated by a reduction in commitment to a criminogenic knowledge structure (a hostile view of people and relationships, concern with immediate gratification, and cynical view of conduct norms). The mediating effect of change in affiliation with deviant peers was not significant once the contribution of criminogenic knowledge structure was taken into account. The findings are discussed in terms of social control and cognitive accounts of the mechanisms whereby romantic relationships influence desistance.     

THE VICTIMIZATION–TERMINATION LINK*

The life histories of drug dealers suggest that victimizations sometimes mark turning points toward the end of criminal careers, which is a criminologically important but neglected empirical connection that we label the “victimization–termination link.” We theorize this link thusly: When serious victimizations occur in the context of crime, a break from the customary provides an opportune situation for adaptation, and when victims have social bonds and agency, when they define the event as the result of their own criminal involvement, and when they find other adaptations unattractive, criminal‐victims are likely to adapt by terminating crime. We illustrate this desistance process with qualitative data obtained through interviews with young, middle‐class drug dealers. We conclude by exploring promising avenues for future work. It takes only a minute to change one's whole life course.     

CHANGES IN CRIMINAL OFFENDING AROUND THE TIME OF JOB ENTRY: A STUDY OF EMPLOYMENT AND DESISTANCE

Does employment promote desistance from crime? Most perspectives assume that individuals who become employed are less likely to offend than those who do not. The critical issue has to do with the timing of employment transitions in the criminal trajectory. The turning point hypothesis expects reductions in offending after job entries, whereas the maturation perspective assumes desistance to have occurred ahead of successful transitions to legitimate work. Focusing on a sample of recidivist males who became employed during 2001–2006 (N = 783), smoothing spline regression techniques were used to model changes in criminal offending around the point of entry to stable employment. Consistent with the maturation perspective, the results showed that most offenders had desisted prior to the employment transition and that becoming employed was not associated with further reductions in criminal behavior. Consistent with the turning point hypothesis, we identified a subset of offenders who became employed during an active phase of the criminal career and experienced substantial reductions in criminal offending thereafter. However, this trajectory describes less than 2 percent of the sample. The patterns observed in this research suggest that transition to employment is best viewed as a consequence rather than as a cause of criminal desistance.     

Incarceration and the Legitimate Labor Market: Examining Age‐Graded Effects on Employment and Wages

Over the past 30 years, the U.S. inmate population has increased dramatically, and the penal system has acquired growing attention in accounts of recent trends in economic stratification. As the prison system has expanded, its population has aged; incarceration rates have risen sharpest among older age groups. A large body of research documents differences in criminal offending and incarceration over the life course, but little attention has been paid to how the effects of spending time in prison depend on the timing of incarceration in the life course. Using state administrative data that provide significant variance in the age of offenders, this article investigates how the timing of incarceration in the life course influences its effects on post‐release employment and wages. We do not find consistent evidence that incarceration effects vary by age at admission. Instead, incarceration appears to have important consequences for employment and wage outcomes regardless of when individuals are admitted to prison. Even the most motivated offenders suffer sizeable and significant wage penalties and, over time, decreased likelihood of employment. These findings underscore the relevance of legal and institutional shifts associated with carceral expansion and the aging of the inmate population for life course theories of criminal desistance, accounts of labor market inequality, and prisoner reentry programs.     

Confinement as a two‐stage turning point: Do changes in identity or social structure predict subsequent changes in criminal activity?*

Scholars frequently characterize incarceration as a possible turning point in criminal activity. This implies a two‐stage process: 1) change in life‐course mechanisms around confinement and reentry result in 2) subsequent change in criminal activity relative to preconfinement. Following this model, we examine change in criminal activity, criminal identity, and social/structural challenges using data from the Prison Project, a cohort of adult males with short‐term confinement in the Netherlands in 2010–2011. Results of a novel test for within‐individual change in arrests from preconfinement to post‐reentry show that most individuals are stable—yet there is a substantial group who go down meaningfully and a much smaller group who go up. Even though changes in criminal identity from the intervening period do not predict these change groups, increases in social/structural challenges predict those who go up in criminal activity. We build from prior work on desistance and reentry, contrasting our findings and highlighting the unique insight gained from, as well as challenges of, measuring individual change within our two‐stage turning point model. Although life‐course mechanisms often correspond with changes in criminal activity concurrently, identifying individual changes that are predictors of subsequent shifts in criminal offending remains elusive.     

MARRIAGE,IN‐LAWS,AND CRIME: THE CASE OF DELINQUENT BROTHERS‐IN‐LAW*

With marriage comes in‐laws, and if the in‐laws include delinquent males, their delinquency could affect the prosocial effects of the given marriage. In this article, I focus on the effect of having a convicted brother‐in‐law as a general indicator of this broader phenomenon of family‐formation processes impairing the positive impact of marriage on crime desistance. I use registry data on all men from birth cohorts 1965–1975 in Denmark (N = 69,066) to show that when a man marries, his new family ties to delinquent brother(s)‐in‐law do indeed hinder his criminal desistance. The results that take into account the characteristics of husbands, wives, their shared family‐formation process, and the criminality of male family members suggest that 1) family dynamics tend to keep criminality within family networks and 2) influences from one's broader social network through marriage are important for the protective effects of marriage. Analyses of previous conviction, co‐offending between a man and his brother‐in‐law, as well as analyses of in‐laws who reside in close proximity confirm the two mentioned main findings. In all, the findings reported in this article add to our understanding of the processes by which families are tied, and how these family‐formation processes influence men's behavior.     

Marriage and Desistance from Crime in the Netherlands: Do Gender and Socio-Historical Context Matter?

Over the last two decades, research examining desistance from crime in adulthood has steadily increased. The evidence from this body of research consistently demonstrates that salient life events—in particular, marriage—are associated with a reduction of offending across the life course. However, previous studies have been largely limited to male samples in the United States. As a result, questions regarding the universal effect of these relationships remain. Specifically, research is needed to assess whether the desistance effect of life events like marriage varies by gender and/or socio-historical context in countries other than the U.S. The present research addresses these gaps by examining the relationship between marriage and criminal offending using data from the Criminal Career and Life Course Study (CCLS). The CCLS includes criminal conviction histories spanning a large portion of the life course for nearly 5,000 men and women convicted in the Netherlands in 1977. Because we assess change over multiple observations within and between individuals, we utilize hierarchical models to estimate gender and contextual effects of marriage on criminal offending (i.e., any, violent, and property convictions). Overall, we find consistent support for the idea that marriage reduces offending across gender and socio-historical context. Notably, we find that the reduction in the odds of offending due to marriage is significantly greater for individuals in the most contemporary context. The implications of these findings are discussed.

WORK,INCOME SUPPORT,AND CRIME IN THE DUTCH WELFARE STATE: A LONGITUDINAL STUDY FOLLOWING VULNERABLE YOUTH INTO ADULTHOOD

Life‐course criminological research has consistently suggested that employment can reduce criminal behavior. However, it is unclear whether the financial aspects of employment or the social control that inheres in employment best explains the relationship between employment and reduced offending. By using longitudinal information on a sample of men and women (N = 540) who were institutionalized in a Dutch juvenile justice institution in the 1990s, this study examines the effects of employment as well as the different types of income support on crime. Random‐ and fixed‐effects models show that for men, both work and income support are associated with a reduction in the rate of offending. For women, however, although employment is correlated with a lower offending rate, receiving income support, and in particular disability benefits, is correlated with a higher offending rate. The findings support both theories that stress the financial motivation for crime as well as theories that emphasize the importance of informal social control for reducing offending.     

LIFE‐COURSE DESISTERS? TRAJECTORIES OF CRIME AMONG DELINQUENT BOYS FOLLOWED TO AGE 70*

Linking recently collected data to form what is arguably the longest longitudinal study of crime to date, this paper examines trajectories of offending over the life course of delinquent boys followed from ages 7 to 70. We assess whether there is a distinct offender group whose rates of crime remain stable with increasing age, and whether individual differences, childhood characteristics, and family background can foretell long‐term trajectories of offending. On both counts, our results come back negative. Crime declines with age sooner or later for all offender groups, whether identified prospectively according to a multitude of childhood and adolescent risk factors, or retrospectively based on latent‐class models of trajectories. We conclude that desistance processes are at work even among active offenders and predicted life‐course persisters, and that childhood prognoses account poorly for long‐term trajectories of offending.     

Race,the Economic Maturity Gap,and Criminal Offending in Young Adulthood

While research has documented that racial and ethnic groups are differentially involved in juvenile and adult crime, little research has examined whether economic and employment well‐being can explain Black and White adolescents' persistence in criminal activity into young adulthood. One potential explanation emerges from Moffitt, who posits an economic maturity gap to explain Blacks' greater persistence in offending in young adulthood. To evaluate this hypothesis, we draw on three waves of data available in the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health to examine whether economic and employment well‐being in young adulthood can account for the racial gap, and persistence in offending. Findings are consistent with Moffitt's hypothesis and indicate that economic and employment well‐being in young adulthood explain Blacks' greater involvement in criminal and violent offending in young adulthood. In addition, results indicate that the greater tendency of Blacks, compared to Whites, to persist in violent offending is also driven by the reduced economic and employment well‐being that Blacks face in young adulthood.     

LONG‐TERM CRIME DESISTANCE AND RECIDIVISM PATTERNS—EVIDENCE FROM THE ESSEX COUNTY CONVICTED FELON STUDY*

Two conflicting definitions of desistance exist in the criminology literature. The first definition is instantaneous desistance in which an offender simply chooses to end a criminal career instantaneously moving to a zero rate of offending ( Blumstein et al., 1986 ). The second definition views desistance as a process by which the offending rate declines steadily over time to zero or to a point close to zero ( Bushway et al., 2001 ; Laub and Sampson, 2001 ; Leblanc and Loeber, 1998 ). In this article, we capitalize on the underlying assumptions of several parametric survival distributions to gain a better understanding of which of these models best describes actual patterns of desistance. All models are examined using 18 years of follow‐up data on a cohort of felony convicts in Essex County, NJ. Our analysis leads us to three conclusions. First, some people have already desisted at the beginning of the follow‐up period, which is consistent with the notion of “instantaneous desistance.” Second, a three‐parameter model that allows for a turning point in the risk of recidivism followed by a long period of decline fits the data best. This conclusion suggests that for those offenders active at the start of the study period, the risk of recidivism is declining over time. However, we also find that a simpler two‐group model fits the data almost as well and gains superiority in the later years of follow‐up. This last point is particularly relevant as it suggests that the observed gradual decline in the hazard over time is a result of a compositional effect rather than of a pattern of individually declining hazards.     

THE EFFECTS OF LIFE CIRCUMSTANCES ON LONGITUDINAL TRAJECTORIES OF OFFENDING*

This study, which is based on individual criminal careers over a 60‐year period, focuses on the development of criminal behavior. It first examines the impact that life circumstances such as work and marriage have on offending, then tests whether the effects of these circumstances are different for different groups of offenders, and finally examines the extent to which the age‐crime relationship at the aggregate level can be explained by age‐graded differences in life circumstances. Official data were retrieved for a 4‐percent (N=4,615) sample of all individuals whose criminal case was tried in the Netherlands in 1977. Self‐report data were derived from a nationally representative survey administered in the Netherlands in 1996 to 2,244 individuals aged 15 years or older. In analyzing this data, we use semi‐parametric group‐based models. Results indicate that life circumstances substantially influence the chances of criminal behavior, and that the effects of these circumstances on offending differ across offender groups. Age‐graded changes in life circumstances, however, explain the aggregate age‐crime relationship only to a modest extent.     

Micro-models of criminal careers: A synthesis of the criminal careers and life course approaches via semiparametric mixed poisson regression models,with empirical applications

Much recent research and debate in criminology have centered around how to conceptualize and model longitudinal sequences of delinquent and criminal acts committed by individuals. Two approaches dominate this controversy. One originates in thecriminal careers paradigm, which emphasizes a potentialheterogeneity of offending groups in the general population—thus leading to a distinction between incidence and prevalence of criminal offending, a focus on the onset, persistence, and desistence of criminal careers, and the possibility that criminals are a distinctive group with constant high rates of offending. Another approach places criminal events within a broader context ofstudies of the life course by explicitly substituting the conceptualization of “social events” for that of “criminal careers”. With respect to analytical models, this approach emphasizes a potentialheterogeneity of offenders with respect to order of criminal events from first to second to higher orders and thus suggests an analysis of the “risks” or “hazards” of offending by order of offense. Some extant commentaries on the criminal careers and life course approaches to conceptualizing and modeling longitudinal sequences of delinquent and criminal events committed by individuals have emphasized their differences and incompatibilities. In contrast, we apply recently developed semiparametric mixed Poisson regression techniques to develop conditions under which the two conceptual/modeling approaches are formally equivalent. We also modify the semiparametric mixed Poisson regression model of criminal careers to incorporate information on order of the delinquent/criminal event and develop an empirical application. This modification demonstrates the complementarity of the criminal careers and life course approaches, even though they have somewhat different foci.     

Identities Through Time: An Exploration of Identity Change as a Cause of Desistance

Research examining desistance from crime (the process of decreasing offending over time) has increased over the last 20?years. However, many explanations of desistance remain somewhat exploratory. One theory in particular that is becoming more prominent includes the idea that desistance is caused by a change in identity (e.g. from deviant to pro-social). While qualitative support has been found for this proposition, prospective quantitative studies have not been conducted on this theory. This study addresses that gap by examining how pro-social identities change over time and whether these changes correspond to desistance from crime. The results of growth curve models indicate that pro-social identity increases over time and is a robust predictor of criminal behavior over the life course. These results offer support to identity theories of desistance and also provide important information for correctional programming.