A TEST OF LATENT TRAIT VERSUS LIFECOURSE PERSPECTIVES ON THE STABILITY OF ADOLESCENT ANTISOCIAL BEHAVIOR*

Latent trait and life-course theories provide contrasting interpretations of the well-established finding that childhood antisocial behavior often precedes adolescent conduct problems and adult crime. Longitudinal data from 179 boys and their parents were used to test hypotheses derived from the two theoretical perspectives. The findings largely supported the life-course view. Oppositional behavior during late childhood predicted reductions in quality of parenting and school commitment and increased affiliation with deviant peers. These changes, in turn, predicted conduct problems during early adolescence. Although there was a moderately strong bivariate correlation between childhood antisocial behavior and adolescent conduct problems, there was no longer an association between these constructs when the effects of parenting, school, and peers were taken into account. Further, there was evidence that improved parenting, increased school commitment, or reduced affiliation with deviant peers lowered the probability that boys who were oppositional during childhood would graduate to delinquency and drug use during adolescence. Together, these findings suggest that the correlation between childhood and adolescent deviant behavior reflects a developmental process rather than a latent antisocial trait.     

COLLECTIVE EFFICACY,AUTHORITATIVE PARENTING AND DELINQUENCY: A LONGITUDINAL TEST OF A MODEL INTEGRATING COMMUNITY‐AND FAMILY‐LEVEL PROCESSES*

In this paper, we develop and test hypotheses on how authoritative parenting and collective efficacy combine to increase a child's risk of affiliating with deviant peers and engaging in delinquent behavior. Analyses using two waves of data from a sample of several hundred African American caregivers and their children largely supported the predictions. Over time, increases in collective efficacy within a community were associated with increases in authoritative parenting. Further, both authoritative parenting and collective efficacy served to deter affiliation with deviant peers and involvement in delinquent behavior. Finally, there was evidence of an amplification process whereby the deterrent effect of authoritative parenting on affiliation with deviant peers and delinquency was enhanced when it was administered within a community with high collective efficacy.     

IDENTIFYING THE PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS THAT MEDIATE THE ASSOCIATION BETWEEN PARENTING PRACTICES AND DELINQUENCY*

Past research has largely ignored the developmental changes within the child that account for the association between parenting and risk for delinquency. We used structural equation modeling and data from a longitudinal study of several hundred African‐American families to test the contentions of various theories regarding the sociocognitive and emotional factors that mediate the impact of parental behavior on a youth's risk for delinquency. Our findings largely supported the theories. The impact of monitoring/discipline was indirect through low self‐control and acceptance of deviant norms, whereas the effect of hostility/ rejection was indirect through low self‐control, hostile view of relationships, and acceptance of deviant norms. These two dimensions of parenting were no longer related either to affiliation with deviant peers or to conduct problems once the effects of these psychological characteristics were taken into account; the impact of these parenting practices was completely mediated by these four cognitive/affective variables. Contrary to expectation, however, these psychological factors did not mediate any of the relationship between caretaker involvement in antisocial behavior and child conduct problems.     

Personality Matters: The Effect of Defiant Individualism on both Deviant Associations and Normative Behaviors among Juveniles in Rural North Carolina

The role of defiant individualism in the production of deviant behavior has not been extensively explored within Criminology. This study used data from a juvenile gang assessment of two rural counties in North Carolina to examine the effect of defiant individualism on association with deviant peers, association with gang members, school engagement and grade point average. The researchers developed a proprietary scale with which to measure defiant individualism. Additionally, an integrated defiance continuum was constructed in which to better contextualize the findings. Findings suggested that defiant individualism had positive relationships with both deviant peer associations and association with gang members. Furthermore, there were inverse relationships between defiant individualism and school engagement as well as grade point average. These statistics suggested that besides promoting deviant associations, defiant individualism also inhibited normative behaviors like school engagement and academic achievement which may actually ameliorate deviant behavior in juveniles.     

OFFENDER REACTlON, PROFESSIONAL OPINION, AND SENTENCING

The central issue of this study involves determining whether the deviant is merely a passive recipient of a deviant label or if he is able to actively influence the labeling process. It is found that sex offenders who admit at least some involvement in deviant sexual activities stand a greater chance of being recommended for probation than these who deny involvement, but only if the offense does not contain certain features, e.g., force or pregnancy of the victim, which would normally preclude considering probation. The criminal justice system contains within it some means for allowing offenders to negotiate some of the consequences of conviction.     

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.     

LEARNING TO BE BAD: ADVERSE SOCIAL CONDITIONS,SOCIAL SCHEMAS,AND CRIME*

In this article, we develop and test a new approach to explain the link between social factors and individual offending. We argue that seemingly disparate family, peer, and community conditions lead to crime because the lessons communicated by these events are similar and promote social schemas involving a hostile view of people and relationships, a preference for immediate rewards, and a cynical view of conventional norms. Furthermore, we posit that these three schemas are interconnected and combine to form a criminogenic knowledge structure that results in situational interpretations legitimating criminal behavior. Structural equation modeling with a sample of roughly 700 African American teens provided strong support for the model. The findings indicated that persistent exposure to adverse conditions such as community crime, discrimination, harsh parenting, deviant peers, and low neighborhood collective efficacy increased commitment to the three social schemas. The three schemas were highly intercorrelated and combined to form a latent construct that strongly predicted increases in crime. Furthermore, in large measure, the effect of the various adverse conditions on increases in crime was indirect through their impact on this latent construct. We discuss the extent to which the social‐schematic model presented in this article might be used to integrate concepts and findings from several major theories of criminal behavior.     

Impact of Chinese Parenting on Adolescents’ Social Bonding,Affiliation with Delinquent Peers,and Delinquent Behavior

Using data collected from 615 middle- and high-school students in rural and urban areas in China, this study examines how different parenting styles such as warmth, coercion, monitoring, and permissiveness affect children’s delinquent behavior, both directly and indirectly through bonds with conventional others (i.e., parents, school, and peers) and affiliation with delinquent peers. The results show that only parental coercion has a direct effect on delinquency. All parenting styles, except for parental monitoring, affect delinquency indirectly through mediating processes of social control and social learning in predicted directions. Despite different pathways to delinquency, variables of social control and social learning play an important role in mediating the relationship between parenting and delinquency. The implications of the results are discussed.     

A TEST OF LIFE‐COURSE EXPLANATIONS FOR STABILITY AND CHANGE IN ANTISOCIAL BEHAVIOR FROM ADOLESCENCE TO YOUNG ADULTHOOD*

Using longitudinal data from a sample of 236 young adults and their romantic partners, we tested a life‐course model that integrates social control and peer influence arguments with the idea of assortative mating. For both males and females, adolescent delinquency and affiliation with deviant peers predicted having an antisocial romantic partner as a young adult. Involvement with an antisocial romantic partner, in turn, had both a direct effect on crime as well as indirect influence through adult peer affiliations. For females, quality of the romantic relationship also predicted crime. The analyses revealed several moderating influences in addition to these mediating effects. For females, a conventional romantic partner, strong job attachment, and conventional adult friends all served to moderate the chances that a woman with a delinquent history would graduate to adult crime. In contrast, only conventional adult friends served this function for males.     

PRETREATMENT CHARACTERISTICS AND TREATMENT PERFORMANCE OF LEGALLY COERCED VERSUS VOLUNTARY METHADONE MAINTENANCE ADMISSIONS*

Analyses were conducted to determine whether addicts coerced into treatment by actions of the criminal justice system differed from voluntary entrants in terms of background characteristics, early risk factors, or drug use and criminal behavior during pretreatment, treatment, and post treatment periods. Subjects were categorized into high, moderate, and low legal coercion groups based on their official legal status, related narcotics testing requirements, and their self-reported perceptions of criminal justice system coercion. Those induced to enter the treatment program through legal channels had slightly higher rates of serious property offenses and higher proportions of time incarcerated and under legal supervision, but they did not differ from voluntary entrants in overall criminal behavior during pretreatment periods. All groups showed substantial improvement in level of narcotics use, criminal involvement, and most other behaviors during treatment, but there was some regression after treatment.     

MENTAL HEALTH AND JUVENILE ARRESTS: CRIMINALITY,CRIMINALIZATION, OR COMPASSION?*

Juveniles in secure confinement allegedly suffer from more mental health problems than their peers. This may reflect background and behavioral characteristics commonly found in clients of both mental health and juvenile justice systems. Another explanation is that mental disorders increase the risk of arrest. These interpretations were tested on a sample of Pittsburgh boys (n = 736). Findings indicate that arrested youth exhibit more attention deficit hyperactivity (ADH) problems, oppositional defiant (OD) problems, and nondelinquent externalizing symptoms prior to their first arrests compared to their never‐arrested peers. However, arrested and nonarrested youth score similarly on prior affective and anxiety problems and internalizing symptoms. Net of delinquency, substance use, and other selection factors, internalizing problems lower the risk of subsequent arrest, whereas OD problems and nondelinquent externalizing symptoms increase it. ADH problems have no effect on arrest net of delinquency and substance use. These findings lend only partial support to the criminalization hypothesis. Whereas some mental health symptoms increase the risk of arrest, others elicit more cautious or compassionate official responses.     

ASSESSING AND EXPLAINING MISPERCEPTIONS OF PEER DELINQUENCY*

Peer delinquency is a robust correlate of delinquent and criminal behavior. However, debate continues to surround the proper measurement of peer delinquency. Recent research suggests that some respondents are likely to misrepresent their peers’ involvement in delinquency when asked in survey questionnaires, drawing into question the traditional (i.e., perceptual) measurement of peer delinquency. Research also has shown that direct measures of peer delinquency (e.g., measures obtained via networking methods such as Add Health), as compared with perceptual measures, differentially correlate with key theoretical variables (e.g., respondent delinquency and respondent self‐control), raising the question of whether misperception of peer delinquency is systematic and can be predicted. Almost no research, however, has focused on this issue. This study, therefore, provides detailed information on respondents’ misperceptions of peer behavior and investigates whether individual characteristics, the amount of time spent with peers, and peer network properties predict these misperceptions. Findings indicated that 1) some individuals—to varying degrees—misperceived the delinquent behavior of their peers; 2) self‐control and self‐reported delinquency predicted misperception; 3) respondents occupying densely populated peer networks were less likely to misperceive their peers’ delinquent involvement; and 4) peers who occupy networks in which individuals spend a lot of time together were more likely to misperceive peer delinquency. Implications are discussed.     

Measuring the Contextual Effects and Mitigating Factors of Labeling Theory

Despite the longevity of labeling theory, there remains a need for further empirical validation. We examine three ways that official intervention may lead to secondary (that which occurs following the fixation of a label) deviance: self-concept, pro-social expectations, and association with deviant peers. We examine a sample of labeled and non-labeled individuals, utilizing data from the Children at Risk study. Based on our analytical view of a three-year panel of 677 randomly selected juveniles, ordinary least squares regression shows that official intervention with the criminal justice system leads to an increased delinquent self-identity, decreased pro-social expectations, and an increased association with delinquent peers, which then lead to an increased likelihood of engaging in subsequent delinquency. While validating the theory, we suggest a revised model of labeling that better depicts the complicated association between formal labeling and subsequent delinquent behavior. We conclude with policy suggestions based on less formal interventions for offenders.     

The effect of maternal incarceration on adult offspring involvement in the criminal justice system

Researchers have estimated that 63 percent of incarcerated women have one or more minor children and most reported living with their children prior to incarceration (Mumola, 2000). Unfortunately, children of incarcerated parents have been a relatively invisible population in the research on the collateral consequences of incarceration. The goal of the current study was to examine the long-term effect of maternal incarceration on adult offspring involvement in the criminal justice system using data from the mother child sample of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979. Based on existing research, it was hypothesized that the adult offspring of incarcerated mothers would be more likely to have been convicted of a crime or to be sentenced to probation. The effect of maternal incarceration on correlates of criminal behavior in adolescence and early adulthood (e.g., negative peer influences, positive home environment) was also modeled to assess possible indirect effects. The results highlighted the direct effect of incarceration on adult offspring involvement in the criminal justice system, but parental incarceration had little association with correlates of criminal behavior.     

The linkage between deviant lifestyles and victimization: an examination from a life course perspective

A small but growing body of research has demonstrated the merits of linking victimization to a life course perspective. Although cross-sectional studies have shown a strong association between deviant lifestyles and victimization, few have assessed this association from the life course perspective. Drawing data from a prospective, longitudinal study, the current study examines this association in a group of high school adolescents. Results from latent growth curve models show that (a) victimization and deviant lifestyles, measured as involvement in delinquent activities, affiliation with deviant peers, and time spent on unsupervised activities change over time; and (b) change in deviant lifestyle patterns leads to change in victimization patterns over time.     

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.     

THE INFLUENCE OF EARLY SCHOOL PUNISHMENT AND THERAPY/MEDICATION ON SOCIAL CONTROL EXPERIENCES DURING YOUNG ADULTHOOD

The use of suspensions and expulsions by American public school administrators has increased dramatically over the past 40 years. Meanwhile, a growing number of childhood misbehaviors have been diagnosed by doctors as medical conditions and are being treated with therapy or medication. As these trends develop at different rates for boys of different racial and ethnic groups, the connection between childhood and adult social control remains untested empirically. By using a prospective panel of 3,274 White, Black, and Hispanic males (15,675 person‐years) and multilevel logistic models, I examine whether and how school punishment and/or the use of therapy or medication during childhood contributes to involvement in the criminal justice or mental health systems during young adulthood. The findings suggest that school punishment is associated with greater odds of involvement in the criminal justice system but not the mental health system. The use of therapy and/or medication during childhood is associated with higher odds of involvement in the mental health system but not the criminal justice system. Finally, although the relationship between school punishment and involvement with the criminal justice system is similar for White, Black, and Hispanic men, the relationship between medicalized social control during childhood and young adulthood is stronger for Whites than for non‐Whites.     

CYNICAL STREETS: NEIGHBORHOOD SOCIAL PROCESSES AND PERCEPTIONS OF CRIMINAL INJUSTICE*

Studies have found that African Americans are more likely to perceive racial biases in the criminal justice system than are those from other racial groups. There is a limited understanding of how neighborhood social processes affect variation in these perceptions. This study formulates a series of hypotheses focused on whether perceived racial biases in the criminal justice system or perceptions of injustice vary as a function of levels of moral and legal cynicism as well as of adverse police–citizen encounters. These hypotheses are tested with multilevel regression models applied to data from a sample of 689 African Americans located in 39 neighborhoods. Findings from the regression models indicate that the positive association between structural disadvantage and perceptions of injustice is accounted for by moral and legal cynicism. Furthermore, adverse police encounters significantly increase perceptions of injustice; controlling for these encounters reduces the strength of the association between cynicism and injustice perceptions. Finally, the findings reveal that cynicism intensifies the association between adverse police encounters and perceptions of criminal injustice. The results are discussed in terms of their implications for research regarding perceived biases in the criminal justice system and neighborhood social processes.     

Contradictions, Law, and State Socialism

The relationship of law to antagonisms and contradictions within state socialism is explored from a Weberian and a Marxian perspective. Examining legislation, court decision making, legal control of economic behavior, and law enforcement reveals contradictions between (I) a radical participatory ideology versus muted or extinct civil society; (2) the ideology of comprehensive planning versus the impotence of law; (3) strategies aiming at total control of public life versus the emergence of a niche society outside the reach of the state; (4) regulatory norms versus the functional necessity of norm-breaking behavior; (5) reliance on a revolutionary sense of justice versus the cultivation of "doublethought"; (6) a program of total control of economic behavior versus the emergence of deviant, even criminal, forms of organization to fulfill functionally necessary but ideologically unapproved economic tasks; and finally, (7) two distinct practices of law, responsive or postliberal versus repressive. Yet, contradictions typically did not lead through conflict to subsequent reform during the state socialist era, as conflicts were repressed. When reforms were attempted, they furthered conflict and system breakdown.     

Designing Programming and Interventions for Women in the Criminal Justice System

Women are the fastest growing segment of the criminal justice population, yet the majority of research on criminal justice populations has been focused on men. Programming and interventions that reduce women’s involvement in the criminal justice system and ameliorate the negative consequences associated with criminal justice involvement are urgently needed. The overall aim of this paper is to provide a comprehensive framework for developing evidence-based, gender-specific programming and interventions to reduce criminal justice involvement and its associated consequences among women in the criminal justice system. The first section of the paper offers a conceptually guided review of the three primary factors that facilitate and complicate women’s involvement in the criminal justice system: victimization; mental disorders; and substance use. In the second section of the paper, findings from focus groups conducted with women on probation or parole identify strategies to engage this population in psychosocial interventions. The third and final section of the paper provides comprehensive recommendations for designing programming and interventions for women in the criminal justice system.