Criminology & Criminal Justice Theses and Dissertations

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2758

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Start date: 1992Subject: search.filters.subject.Crime

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Now showing 1 - 9 of 9
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    SEX, CRIME, AND SELF-CONTROL: COMPARING OUTCOMES OF LOW SELF-CONTROL FOR HETEROSEXUAL AND GAY/BISEXUAL MEN
    (2022) Scocca, Jacob; Dugan, Laura; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Objective: The purpose of the current thesis is to further explore Gottfredson and Hirschi’s General Theory of Crime by examining adult outcomes of low self-control in a heterosexual and gay/bisexual sample. It argues that self-control in these populations is differentially related to outcomes of violent crime and analogous behaviors, which contradicts the general nature of the theory. Methods: The current study uses self-reported measures in the Adolescent Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) for self-control (Wave 3) to examine outcomes of violent crime and risky sexual behavior (Wave 4). Risky sexual behaviors in this study are conceptualized as number of different sexual partners, sex without prophylactics, or sex with more than one person around the same time. Men are the primary focus of this thesis due to the presence of culturally and socially specific factors in the heterosexual and gay male community that could differentially affect the outcomes of interest. Hypothesis: I hypothesize that both the relationship between low self-control and violent crime and low self-control and risky sexual behavior will differ based on the sexual orientation of the respondent. To frame this hypothesis, I argue that the gay male subculture is more openly accepting of risky sexual behaviors, and therefore that this analogous behavior will be less related to self-control in gay populations. I also argue that heterosexual masculinity facilitates violent behavior/crime within heterosexual men, meaning that self-control plays a larger role in controlling urges in this group. Results: Differences in the association between self-control and risky sexual behaviors were found between heterosexual and gay/bisexual men indicating support for the hypothesis. Differences in the relationship between self-control and violent criminal activity in the two groups were not found in the tested samples. These findings provide evidence that Gottfredson & Hirschi's theory may not be generalizable for analogous behaviors in all populations, but that it still may hold for violent crime.
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    IMMIGRATION EFFECTS ON FAMILY STRUCTURE AND HOMICIDE VICTIMIZATION FOR GROUPS WITH DIFFERENT RACE AND ETHNICITY STATUS
    (2019) Luna, Mathew; Xie, Min; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Guided by the immigrant revitalization theory, this paper will argue that improvements in family structure play a role in the immigration-crime relationship. The data used in this study were obtained from the National Vital Statistics System, the American Community Survey, and the decennial census. This paper uses cross-sectional and longitudinal models to investigate whether family structure plays a role in the immigration-crime relationship. The longitudinal models will look at changes in homicide data from 2007 and 2017. Findings from the longitudinal models show no support to indicate that family structure plays a role in the immigration-crime relationship. However, findings from Black and White non-Hispanic cross-sectional models do show some support for the argument that family structure does play a role in the immigration-crime relationship.
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    INTEGRATING OFFENDING VERSATILITY INTO THE BALANCE PERSPECTIVE OF PEER INFLUENCE
    (2019) Pheasant, Benjamin; McGloin, Jean M; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    The balance perspective advocates for scholars to consider peer influence as both reciprocal and relative, asserting that adolescents will alter their behavior when there is an imbalance in delinquency with a peer. McGloin (2009) found support for balance when applied to frequency of offending. There is reason to suspect that this drive for behavioral homeostasis should emerge with regard to an adolescent’s offending versatility, as well. This thesis uses the AddHealth data to explore whether adolescent alter their offending versatility to achieve behavioral “balance” with a best friend, and friendship stability moderates this relationship. The results provide support for the balance perspective and suggest that respondents alter their offending versatility to become more similar to their best friend over time.
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    ONE FOOT IN, ONE FOOT OUT: TOWARDS UNDERSTANDING THE LEGAL AND ILLEGAL WORK OVERLAP
    (2015) Nguyen, Holly; Loughran, Thomas A; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Extant literature investigating the relationship between legal and illegal work is expansive, spanning various disciplines using a wide array of methodological specifications. Despite this expansiveness legal and illegal work has traditionally been viewed as tradeoffs whereby legal work is seen as a catalyst to moving away from illegal work. However, bifurcation of legal and illegal work captures only one facet of the relationship between the two. For example, participating in legal and illegal work contemporaneously has been discussed by a number of scholars and has been observed in empirical studies. But detailed investigation into the legal and illegal overlap has been scant. By using the Pathways to Desistance Study, there were three main goals of the current study. The first goal was to document the heterogeneous patterns of legal and illegal work and how they overlap over time. Second, I examined if legal economic opportunities were associated with membership in illegal work trajectories, conditional on membership in legal work trajectories. The third goal was to consider if the legal and illegal overlap was associated with key criminal career dimensions: frequency of offending and offending variety. Results showed that there are heterogeneous patterns in both legal work and illegal work and the way in which they were linked. There was some support for the relationship between legal economic opportunities and membership in a higher illegal work group. The legal and illegal overlap was associated with a lower frequency of offending and endorsement of fewer types of instrumental crimes. Results were discussed in terms of implications for theory and future research.
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    DESISTANCE FROM CRIME AND SUBSTANCE USE: A UNIVERSAL PROCESS OR BEHAVIOR-SPECIFIC?
    (2014) Weiss, Douglas Brian; Paternoster, Ray; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Several prominent criminologists have suggested desistance from crime is in many ways similar to desistance from substance use. While a review of this literature supports this proposition in general, most of this research has focused on desistance from either crime or substance use rather than considering change across both behaviors. Indeed, those few studies that consider both behaviors often find individuals persist in substance use despite desistance from crime. Despite this discrepancy, there has yet to be a systematic comparison between desistance from these two behaviors. This dissertation seeks to address this gap by asking (1) whether the same set of social and psychological factors that distinguish crime desisters from persisters also differentiate heavy substance use desisters from persisters and (2) to what extent individuals who are desisting from crime are also desisting from heavy substance use. In addition to addressing these two primary research questions, a set of substance specific and subgroup analyses were performed to assess whether the results differ across substance type (alcohol, marijuana, and hard drugs) or along the demographics of race and gender. These analyses were performed using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 cohort. Desisters were identified using group-based trajectory modeling while multinomial logistic regression was used to examine the factors associated with desistance from each of these behaviors. The results of the analyses indicate that desistance from crime is associated with differences in social bonds and reduced levels of strain, while desistance from substance use is primarily associated with reduced levels of strain and individual personality differences. The substance specific analyses suggest different factors are associated with desistance from the use of different substances, while the race- and gender-specific analyses suggest differences across these demographics. The implications of these results for theories of desistance from crime and substance use are discussed as are the limitations of this dissertation and suggestions for future research.
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    The Ecology of the Reentry Process: A Gendered Analysis of Community Influences
    (2014) Alper, Mariel; Simpson, Sally S; Nakamura, Kiminori; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Utilizing original data on a large sample of male and female first-time parolees in Pennsylvania (N=10,579), this dissertation examines parole violations and police arrest recidivism outcomes to assess how community characteristics influence men and women's recidivism during parole. It adds to the literature by examining specific types of technical violations and arrests, including those that do not result in revocation, as they can serve as indicators of the difficulties parolees encounter after prison such as substance abuse and employment difficulties. Additionally, this dissertation adds to the literature by examining whether community effects vary by gender and by race/gender. The findings support the importance of several community characteristics that have been implicated in prior research and uncover previously unexamined gender and gender/race differences. Additionally, the effect of community characteristics varies by the type of recidivism that is examined, suggesting that the way recidivism is conceptualized and measured matters. Disadvantage in the community was associated with higher odds of arrests for men, but lower odds of technical violations. While the availability of service providers increased the odds of monetary violations for both men and women, they were associated with higher odds of employment violations for women and lower odds for men. Offender concentration in the community was associated with higher odds of several types of technical violations for men, including treatment violations, and lower odds of treatment violations for women. On the other hand, offender concentration was also associated with lower odds of drug violations and police arrests for men. For both men and women, lower informal social ties were associated with higher odds of most types of technical violations. Several race-specific effects for men and women were also found. Policy and theoretical implications of these findings are discussed. For example, community effects may be more nuanced than previous theories have suggested and theoretical explanations should incorporate gendered experiences and intersectionality. Additionally, investing in parolees' communities can aid offender reintegration and reduce recidivism and risk assessments should more systematically incorporate community characteristics. Further, findings from this project suggest the need to avoid practices that unintentionally increase recidivism and punitiveness for parolees.
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    The Moderating Role of Negative Emotionality, Positive Emotionality, and Low Constraint on the Relationship between Strain and Criminal Behavior
    (2013) Foriest, Whytnee; Gottfredson, Denise C; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    General strain theory (GST) posits that strain causes crime (Agnew et al., 1992). Individuals who fail to achieve positively valued goals, lose positively valued stimuli, or are presented with negative stimuli are more likely to engage in criminal behavior. GST, however, acknowledges that individuals vary in their responses to strain and not all strained individuals turn to crime. Agnew et al. (2002) proposed a number of factors that may increase the likelihood of a criminogenic response to strain. Of these, he considers personality traits to be among the most important (Agnew, 2006). This study examines the moderating role of negative emotionality, low constraint, and positive emotionality on the relationship between strain and criminal behavior. Findings reveal a direct, positive association between strain and crime, but there was no support for the conditioning hypotheses proposed in this study.
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    The Link Between Impulsivity, Suicide Ideation, and Illegal Behavior in College Students
    (2011) Freeland, Rachel Miriam; Dugan, Laura; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Michael Gottfredson and Travis Hirschi's general theory of crime posits that persons with low self-control are more likely to engage in criminal, as well as, analogous behaviors. This thesis attempts to explore the relationship between low self-control, as measured by impulsivity, illegal behavior, and suicide ideation, an analogous behavior, in a college student population. Data are taken from the College Life Study, a longitudinal study that examines the health behaviors of one cohort of first-year college students. Using multinomial logistic regression, the results indicate that the more impulsive students are also those who show signs of suicide ideation and illegal behavior or just illegal behavior without suicide ideation. However, when examining suicide ideation alone, there is not a statistically significant relationship with impulsivity. Thus, Gottfredson and Hirschi's theory is only partially supported by this thesis.
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    Are Immigrants Crime Prone? A Multifaceted Investigation of the Relationship between Immigration and Crime in Two Eras
    (2010) Bersani, Bianca; Laub, John H.; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
    Are immigrants crime prone? In America, this question has been posed since the turn of the 20th century and more than 100 years of research has shown that immigration is not linked to increasing crime rates. Nevertheless, as was true more than a century ago, the myth of the criminal immigrant continues to permeate public debate. In part this continued focus on immigrants as crime prone is the result of significant methodological and theoretical gaps in the extant literature. Five key limitations are identified and addressed in this research including: (1) a general reliance on aggregate level analyses, (2) the treatment of immigrants as a homogeneous entity, (3) a general dependence on official data, (4) the utilization of cross-sectional analyses, and (5) nominal theoretical attention. Two broad questions motivate this research. First, how do the patterns of offending over the life course differ across immigrant and native-born groups? Second, what factors explain variation in offending over time for immigrants and does the influence of these predictors vary across immigrant and native-born individuals? These questions are examined using two separate datasets capturing information on immigration and crime during two distinct waves of immigration in the United States. Specifically, I use the Unraveling Juvenile Delinquency data and subsequent follow-ups to capture early 20th century immigration and crime, while contemporary data come from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1997. Three particularly salient conclusions are drawn from this research. First, patterns of offending (i.e., prevalence, frequency, persistence and desistance) are remarkably similar for native-born and immigrant individuals. Second, although differences are observed when examining predictors of offending for native-born and immigrant individuals, they tend to be differences in degree rather than kind. That is, immigrants and native-born individuals are influenced similarly by family, peer, and school factors. Finally, these findings are robust and held when taking into account socio-historical context, immigrant generation, immigration nationality group, and crime type. In sum, based on the evidence from this research, the simple answer to the question of whether immigrants are crime prone is no.