Rethinking Timing of First Sex and Delinquency

The relation between timing of first sex and later delinquency was examined using a genetically informed sample of 534 same-sex twin pairs from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, who were assessed at three time points over a 7-year interval. Genetic and environmental differences between families were found to account for the association between earlier age at first sex and increases in delinquency. After controlling for these genetic and environmental confounds using a quasi-experimental design, earlier age at first sex predicted lower levels of delinquency in early adulthood. The current study is contrasted with previous research with non-genetically informative samples, including Armour and Haynie (2007, Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 36, 141–152). Results suggest a more nuanced perspective on the meaning and consequences of adolescent sexuality than is commonly put forth in the literature.

Identity Formation in Early and Middle Adolescents From Various Ethnic Groups: From Three Dimensions to Five Statuses

We used three identity processes (i.e., commitment, in-depth exploration, and reconsideration of commitment) from a recently developed model of identity formation to derive empirically identity statuses in a sample of 1952 early and middle adolescents. By means of cluster analysis, we identified five statuses: achievement, foreclosure, moratorium, searching moratorium, and diffusion. Specifically, we found an intra-status differentiation within moratorium, unraveling the positive and negative facets of this status documented in prior literature. The five clusters could be meaningfully distinguished on a number of variables, such as personality features, psychosocial problems, and parental relationships. These findings indicated that a valid distinction in identity statuses could be made in early and middle adolescence. Finally, age and ethnic background strongly affected the distribution of the participants among the five identity statuses. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Alcohol: The gateway to other drug use among secondary-school students

The stepping-stone theory of progression into drug use is examined, based on the alcohol and other drug use of over 27,000 seventh-through eighth-grade students in New York State. The data show that students do not use illicit drugs unless they also use alcohol. White, black and Hispanic students all tend to initiate the use of drugs in the following order-alcohol, marijuana, pills, and hard drugs. Among blacks and Hispanics, pills are not as important a transition between marijuana and hard drugs as they are among whites. Cigarettes form an important step between alcohol and marijuana use for younger students, particularly for females. Since alcohol serves as the gateway to all other drug use, prevention approaches that control and limit alcohol use among adolescents may be warranted.He received his Ph. D. in Psychology for the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1976. His research interests are the social and psychological correlates of drinking.She received her Ph.D. in Sociology from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1983.     

Drug culture expertise and substance use

This study concerns the relationship between knowledge of drug culture and substance use. Results from a sample of 2,635 middle and high school students indicate that (1) knowledge of drug culture is positively correlated with substance use; (2) drug knowledge is more reliable and coherent in older youth; (3) drug knowledge is unrelated to other kinds of knowledge acquired in school; (4) youth exposed to peers' substance use in school have more drug knowledge; and (5) the earlier young people begin using drugs and alcohol, the more they know about the drug culture. Results suggest that knowledge of the drug culture may be an unobtrusive indicator of substance use problems.This project was made possible by a grant from the Tulsa Psychiatric Center, Tulsa, Oklahoma.Received Ph.D. from University of California at Berkeley in personality psychology. Research interests include school dropouts, substance use, delinquency, identity, narcissism, and health. To whom correspondence should be addressed.Received Ph.D. from University of California at Berkeley in personality psychology. Research interests include school dropouts, substance use, delinquency, personal commitments, identity, narcissism, and health.Received Ph.D. from University of California at Berkeley in personality psychology. Research interests include moral development and personality.     

Self-esteem and delinquency revisited

A recent investigation by Rosenberg and Rosenberg used longitudinal data from the Youth in Transition study to explore the causal relationships between delinquency and self-esteem. The present study is based on the same sample of young men in high school and extends Rosenberg and Rosenberg's analysis, first by using the same cross-lagged correlation methods applied over a longer time period, and then by employing a causal modeling approach using the LISREL computer program. Each of the analyses was carried out using the total sample as well as two subsamples, the highest and lowest quartiles in initial self-esteem. The causal modeling analyses attempted (a) to take careful account of the actual periods referenced by the measures of delinquency and self-esteem, (b) to control socioeconomic status and ability, and (c) to extend the model to demonstrate ways in which participation in teenage social life and current educational attainment might also influence and be influenced by self-esteem. The analyses suggest that self-esteem plays little part in influencing the teenage behaviors and orientations that follow in time. Consistent with Kaplan's prediction, among young men who enter high school with low self-esteem, the effects of delinquent behavior tend primarily to be self-enhancing.This research was supported by an Open University Research Grant awarded to John Bynner while a Fulbright-Hays Scholar at the Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan.Completed his first degree in Psychology at the University of Bristol and his doctorate at the University of London. Main research interests are adolescent values and research methodology.Received his Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. Main research interests are youth and social issues and developmental psychology.Received his Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. Main research interest are studies of youth and social issues.     

The “impulsivity index”: Its application to juvenile delinquency

An objective, composite index of impulsivity, made up of three measures of reactivity to color on the Rorschach and amount of discrepancy between performance and verbal IQ on the Wechsler Scales, is proposed. It was predicted that impulsiveness as measured by this index would be associated with self-perception of impulsivity. Moreover, it was predicted that impulsiveness, whether objectively or subjectively measured, would tend to be associated with a history of greater and more frequent delinquency. The major hypotheses were confirmed. In addition, the data suggested that delinquents from higher socioeconomic levels may be more impulsive than their lower class counterparts. Additional work on refining and validating the impulsivity index is indicated.This work has been supported by Grant No. A70-15 from the Illinois Law Enforcement Commission.Currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Human Development at the University of Chicago. Major research interest is in cognitive development during adolescence.Received M.D. from the University of Chicago. Major research interests are the developmental psychology of adolescence and the etiology of juvenile delinquency.Received M.D. from Marquette University. Major research interests are in juvenile delinquency and psychotherapy of adolescents.Currently a Ph.D. Candidate in Human Development at the University of Chicago. Major research interest is in juvenile delinquency.     

Status origins,youth rebellion,and delinquency: A reexamination of the class issue

This report examines the relationship between status origins and delinquency using an expanded range of status origin indicators together with both self-report and official measures of delinquency. Data were drawn from an ongoing investigation of adolescents in the Pacific Northwest. It was found that with few exceptions all four measures of status origins offer extremely low predictive utility vis-à-visdelinquent involvement. It is suggested that future efforts be directed at unraveling other more fruitful indicators of delinquency and, most especially, at examining the structure, process, and implications of differential status allocation within the educational arena.The research on which this report is based was supported by funds granted by the National Institute of Mental Health (Grant No. MH14806 Maturational Reform and Rural Delinquency).Received his Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Oregon. Currently Assistant Professor of Sociology at the State University College of New York at Geneseo. Teaches courses in juvenile delinquency, criminology, and deviance.Received his Ph.D. in educational foundations from the University of Oregon. Presently Associate Professor and Chairperson of the Department of Educational Foundations at the University of Nebraska at Omaha. Teaches classes in the Sociology of Education and Alternative Strategies in Education.     

The structure of moral reason

This paper is a brief critical review of the present state of research and theory in the area of moral development. It poses a number of questions about the theoretical basis of Kohlberg's six stages and examines the nature of the evidence to date and the limitations of knowledge in the area. The writer argues for an extension of this theoretical approach to moral development, with a greater emphasis on structure, and a reexamination of the psychological implications of the definition of moral used in this area of research.This paper is a revised version of a paper presented to the British Psychological Society Social Psychology Section Conference, Bristol, September 22, 1973.Has a master's degree in psychology and is currently working toward a Ph.D. in psychology in the field of moral development.     

Temperament and social support in adolescence: Interrelations with depressive symptoms and delinquent behaviors

This study investigated the interrelations between temperament, perceived family and friend support, and depressive symptoms and delinquent activity with a sample of 975 adolescents (¯xage=15.5 years). A difficult temperament index was devised, and manifested significant associations with depressive symptoms and delinquency, as well as with low family and friend support. Moderator and mediator variable models were specified via hierarchical multiple regression equations and path analyses, respectively. There was little support for the moderator variable models; partial support was garnered for the mediational models, indicating that part of the influence of temperamental difficulty on depression and delinquency may be attributable to reduced levels of perceived family and friend support. However, temperamental difficulty also significantly predicted depression and delinquency directly, over and above its indirect influences via perceived family and friend support. The findings were similar for males and females as indicated by simultaneous group structural equation models.This research was supported by NIAAA Grant No. 07861 awarded to the authorReceived a Ph.D. in human development and family studies from the Pennsylvania State University. Major research interests involve the identification of high-risk factors for adolescent substance use and other problem behaviors.     

Family structure,family attributes,and delinquency in a sample of low-income,minority males and females

A popular thesis in criminology links broken homes to juvenile delinquency. This thesis has been invoked to explain higher rates of delinquency among youth from low-income, minority families than among youth from mainstream backgrounds. The study reported here employs data collected at two points in time to assess the thesis that family structure is significantly associated with self-reported delinquency within a sample of black males and females from low-income families. The relationships between an array of family variables, including family structure, and each of four types of self-reported delinquency are examined in analysis conducted separately for males and females. Findings indicate that few family factors are significant for delinquency and family structure is of minimal importance for the types of delinquency examined. The results differ for males and females. These findings raise serious questions about the cogency of the broken-home thesis of delinquency to explain delinquency among nonmainstream groups in our society.Research reported here was supported in part by NIMH Grant 1 RPI MH33488-01A1 and conducted in part under the auspices of the High/Scope Educational Research Foundation, Ypsilanti, Michigan. Views expressed by the author do not represent official positions of those agencies.The author received her Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Georgia in 1981. Her research interests at present include the effects of social stratification processes on delinquency and crime, particularly the effects of such social correlates of crime as race, sex, and social class.     

Identity Orientation, Voice, and Judgments of Procedural Justice During Late Adolescence

This study focused on the relationship between voice and judgments of procedural justice in a sample of older adolescents and examined potential moderating and mediating influences of identity orientation (personal, social, and collective) and negative emotional response. Participants read 1 of 2 different family conflict scenarios (voice and no voice) asking them to imagine themselves in a disagreement with their parents over grades and financial support. In the voice condition, parents were described as making their decision after listening to the participant’s input. In the no voice condition, parents were described as making their decision without listening to the participant’s input. The adolescents then judged the fairness of the parental decisions and responded to questions concerning their identity orientation. Findings indicate that in addition to replicating the effect of voice in a novel context, the present investigation found moderating effects of personal identity orientation on procedural fairness judgments. Additionally, negative emotional response partially mediated the relationship between voice and global judgments of procedural fairness.Mark R. Fondacaro is an Associate Professor of Psychology and Associate Director of the Levin College of Law Center on Children and Families at the University of Florida. He received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from Indiana University and his J.D. from Columbia University School of Law. His major research interests are ecological jurisprudence and the conceptualization and assessment of procedural justice in legal and extra-legal contexts including the family and the juvenile justice and health care systems.Eve M. Brank is an Assistant Professor of Criminology, Law & Society at the University of Florida. She received her Ph.D. in social psychology and her J.D. from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Her major research interests are parental responsibility laws and juvenile law issues.Jennifer Stuart is a graduate student in counseling psychology at the University of Florida. Her major research interests are adolescent development and delinquency prevention.Sara Villanueva-Abraham received her Ph.D. in developmental psychology from the University of Florida. Her major research interests are adolescent development and parent-child relationships.Jennifer Luescher is a Forensic Psychology Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. She received her Ph.D. in counseling psychology from the University of Florida. Her major research interests are in the areas of procedural justice, risk assessment and risk management, and mental health and juvenile justice policy.Penny S. McNatt is a Visiting Assistant Professor at the University of North Florida. She received her Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Florida. Her major research interests are in the area of intergroup relations.     

The satisfaction with life scale: Psychometrics properties in an adolescent sample

The Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS) was developed in the United States as a multiitem scale for the overall assessment of life satisfaction as cognitive-judgmental process, rather as a measurement of specific satisfaction areas (e.g., health, energy). The present study attempted to extend the applicability of the SWLS by investigating specific aspects of reliability and validity in a different cultural context (Portugal) with adolescents. In line with previous American findings, reliability figures were found to be favourable. SWLS scores were affected by sex and sociocultural level. In addition, SWLS scores showed to be predictably associated with psychological measures: loneliness, social anxiety, shyness, self- concept, and physical attractiveness. The variables that best predicted satisfaction were overall self-concept, loneliness, and physical attractiveness.Received a Ph.D. in normal and abnormal anthropology from École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (Paris) in 1980 and a Ph.D. in Social Psychology from Faculty of Psychology (Porto) and an Aggregation in Psychology from Faculty of Psychology (Coimbra) in 1990. Research interests include migration and cross-cultural social migration.The author wishes to thank the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.     

Self-Control,Social Factors,and Delinquency: A Test of The General Theory of Crime Among Adolescents in Hong Kong

The objectives of this study were to test the predictive power of self-control theory for delinquency in a Chinese context, and to explore if social factors as predicted in social bonding theory, differential association theory, general strain theory, and labeling theory have effects on delinquency in the presence of self-control. Self-report data were collected from 1,015 Chinese secondary school students (463 boys and 552 girls) in Hong Kong aged between 14 and 19. Bivariate results showed that low self-control is correlated with delinquency in the Chinese setting. We also found that low self-control is linked to a range of negative social conditions in Chinese adolescents, including disrupted social bonds, delinquent association, deviant definition, educational under-achievement, coercive parenting, negative school experiences, negative relations with peers, stressful life events, and labeling by parents and teachers. However, contrary to self-control theory and many previous studies based on Western samples, self-control fails to predict delinquency when social variables are controlled for among Chinese adolescents. The effects of social factors on delinquency remain significant net of self-control. This suggests that it is the combination of self-control and social factors in the prediction of delinquency that might be variant across cultures. These findings from adolescents from Hong Kong only partially support the culture-free thesis of self-control theory. The implications of Chinese cultural forces on the influence of self-control merit closer attention.

Situational variation in moral judgment: In a stage or on a stage?

Two issues were examined in this study—the consistency of moral judgment across different types of dilemma and different social contexts, and the relationship between the structure (stage) of moral judgment and the content of moral decisions. Forty subjects were given two hypothetical dilemmas about business decisions and two standard Kohlberg dilemmas. Half the subjects directed their responses to a business audience, half to a philosophical audience. Responses to the moral dilemmas were scored in accordance with the Colby and Kohlberg (1987) scoring manual. Stage of moral reasoning was found to be significantly higher on the Kohlberg dilemmas than on the business dilemmas. A significant interaction between type of dilemma and audience was attributed to the tendency of subjects directing their responses to a business audience to interpret one of the business dilemmas in terms of the moral order of business, but for subjects directing their responses to a philosophy audience to treat it as a philosophical dilemma. The other business dilemma evoked uniformly low-level moral judgments. The amount of selfishness intrinsic in subjects' moral choices on the business dilemmas was significantly negatively correlated with moral maturity on the business dilemmas, but not with their moral maturity on Kohlberg's test. These results are interpreted as more consistent with models of moral development such as those advanced by C. G. Levine ([1979] Stage Acquisition and Stage Use: An Appraisal of Stage Displacement Explanations of Variation in Moral Reasoning, Human Development, Vol. 22, pp. 145–164), J. Rest ([1983] Morality, in: P. H. Mussen [ed.], J. H. Flavell and E. Markman [Vol. eds.], Handbook of Child Psychology [Vol. 3, 4th ed.], John Wiley & Sons, New York), and R. Harré ([1984]) Personal Being: A Theory for Individual Psychology, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts), which posit a relatively wide range of within-person stage use and emphasize the determining power of social situations, than with the more constructivistic model of moral development of Colby and Kohlberg (1987).This research was supported by Grant No. 410-87-1115 from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.Received B.A. and M.A from Simon Fraser University. Research interests include moral development, and the influence of social interaction and language on the development of reasoning.Received Ph.D. from Harvard University. Research interests include moral development, altruism, and self-deception.     

Juvenile Offenders’ Alcohol and Marijuana Trajectories: Risk and Protective Factor Effects in the Context of Time in a Supervised Facility

The current study modeled trajectories of substance use from ages 15 to 20 among 1,095 male serious juvenile offenders (M age = 16.54; 42% African-American, 34% Latino, 20% European-American, and 4% other ethnic/racial backgrounds) and prospectively predicted trajectories from risk and protective factors before and after controlling for time spent in a supervised setting. Results indicated that supervised time suppressed age-related growth in substance use. Trajectories of offenders with no supervised time and low levels of supervised time increased in substance use across age, whereas offenders with high levels of supervised time showed no growth. Almost all risk and protective factors had effects on initial substance use but only adolescent history of substance use, impulse control, and psychosocial maturity had an effect on change in substance use over time. Findings highlight the importance of formal sanctions and interventions superimposed on normal developmental processes in understanding trajectories of substance use among serious juvenile offenders.

Associations Between Shyness and Internalizing Behaviors,Externalizing Behaviors,and Relationships during Emerging Adulthood

Many studies have documented the ways in which shyness can be a barrier to personal well-being and social adjustment throughout childhood and adolescence; however, less is known regarding shyness in emerging adulthood. Shyness as experienced during emerging adulthood may continue to be a risk factor for successful development. The purpose of this study was to compare shy emerging adults with their non-shy peers in (a) internalizing behaviors, (b) externalizing behaviors, and (c) close relationships. Participants included 813 undergraduate students (500 women, 313 men) from a number of locations across the United States. Results showed that relatively shy emerging adults, both men and women, had more internalizing problems (e.g., anxious, depressed, low self-perceptions in multiple domains), engaged in fewer externalizing behaviors (e.g., less frequent drinking), and experienced poorer relationship quality with parents, best friends, and romantic partners than did their non-shy peers.

Procedural Justice in Family Conflict Resolution and Deviant Peer Group Involvement Among Adolescents: The Mediating Influence of Peer Conflict

The involvement of adolescents with deviant peer groups is one of the strongest proximal correlates to juvenile delinquency and stems from a variety of causes. Past research has linked ineffective parenting with peer variables, including deviant peer group involvement and peer conflict during adolescence. In this study, adolescents’ appraisals of procedural justice within the family (adolescents’ appraisals of how fairly they are treated by parents in the process of resolving family conflict) were examined as one aspect of effective parenting that may relate to deviant peer group involvement in early adolescence. Data from 1660 middle school students (ages 11–14, mean = 12.6) indicated that higher appraisals by adolescents of procedural justice during family conflict resolution were related to lower levels of both peer conflict and deviant peer group involvement. A structural model was tested in which the relationship between adolescents’ appraisals of procedural justice in the family and deviant peer group involvement was partially mediated by measures of peer conflict. This model was found to have adequate fit to the data, indicating that part of the relationship between procedural justice appraisals and deviant peer group involvement can be explained by levels of peer conflict. Implications of these findings are discussed.

“Constructive” vs. “Destructive” deviance in adolescent health-related behaviors

Previous literature suggests that the adolescent at risk to engage in substance use and other negative health-related behaviors is deviant in a negative sense (i.e., rebellious, antisocial, and alienated from traditional institutions). However, some researchers have distinguished between two types of deviance-a true autonomy and independence that is more positive and constructive, and a reactant anticonformity that is more negative and destructive. The current study assessed the roles of both constructive and destructive deviance in adolescent cigarette smoking and positive health-related behaviors. Adolescents who were constructively deviant engaged in higher levels of health-protective behaviors. Moreover, constructive deviance was an independent predictor of both cigarette smoking and positive health behaviors over and above the effects of traditional negative deviance indicators. These data suggest that constructive deviance is not a competing model to more traditional notions, but that it is an additional possible pathway into adolescent positive and negative health behaviors.This research was supported by Grant No HD13449 from ther National Institute of Child Health and Human Development to the three authors, and by Grant DA05227 from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to the first author.Received Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Columbia University Teachers College. Current research interests include adolescent substance use and health risk behaviors.Received Ph.D in Developmental Psychology from Columbia University Teachers College. Current research interests include spatial cognition and adolescent health behaviors.Received Ph.D. in Social Psychology from University of Michigan. Current interests include social cognition and adolescent health behaviors.     

Predicting Children’s Depressive Symptoms from Community and Individual Risk Factors

Community, demographic, familial, and personal risk factors of childhood depressive symptoms were examined from an ecological theoretical approach using hierarchical linear modeling. Individual-level data were collected from an ethnically diverse (73% African-American) community sample of 197 children and their parents; community-level data were obtained from the U.S. Census regarding rates of community poverty and unemployment in participants’ neighborhoods. Results indicated that high rates of community poverty and unemployment, children’s depressive attributional style, and low levels of self-perceived competence predict children’s depressive symptoms, even after accounting for demographic and familial risk factors, such as parental education and negative parenting behaviors. The effect of negative parenting behaviors on depressive symptoms was partially mediated by personal variables like children’s self-perceived competence. Recommendations for future research, intervention and prevention programs are discussed.