Criminology & Criminal Justice
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2227
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Item Disorder, Dissatisfaction with the Neighborhood, and Delinquency(2018) Goodier, Michael; Porter, Lauren; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This study examines the association between neighborhood dissatisfaction and adolescent delinquency. The objectives of this project are to determine (1) whether neighborhood disorder is related to delinquency among adolescents (2) whether adolescents who report increased levels of neighborhood dissatisfaction are relatively more involved in delinquency than their peers, (3) if neighborhood dissatisfaction is especially related to two types of delinquency implicated by strain theory, violence and substance abuse, and (4) if neighborhood dissatisfaction weakens any of the association between neighborhood disorder and crime. Applying stepwise logistical regression, I find little support for the association between disorder and adolescent offending and no association between neighborhood dissatisfaction with either violence or substance abuse when compared to the likelihood of engaging in instrumental crime. These findings raise questions regarding the relationship between disorder and individual levels of delinquency as well as the relationship between disorder and neighborhood dissatisfaction among adolescents.Item REVISITING THE ROLE OF DELINQUENT ATTITUDES ON CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR(2015) Thomas, Kyle J.; McGloin, Jean; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)By employing global attitude measures, which ask respondents to evaluate the abstract idea of a behavior absent of context, rather than specific measures that inquire about the appropriateness of a behavior under various circumstances, prior work has failed to capture the complexity of delinquent attitudes. As a result, research has: 1) not adequately assessed the dimensionality of the attitude construct; 2) potentially mis-specified the attitude-delinquency relationship and; 3) been unable to investigate the intersection between attitudes and situational contexts in the emergence of delinquent behavior. This dissertation seeks to address these gaps using two sources of data. The first comes from a sample of 11th graders (n = 223) from a large public high school in the Pacific Northwest and the second comes from four waves of the Gang Resistance Education and Training (G.R.E.A.T.) Evaluation, a longitudinal study of around 1,400 adolescents from six cities across the United States. The results raise questions about the conclusions that have been made from studies using global attitude items. First, in both data sets attitudes form multidimensional, crime-specific constructs (e.g., attitudes towards fighting and attitudes towards theft). Second, for most models, the factors constructed using specific attitude items have a larger standardized effect on behavior and behavioral intentions and lead to better model fit than do the global items. Third, specific attitudes towards fighting demonstrate discriminating effects on behavioral intentions, indicating that behavior in context is related to the attitude toward that behavior, in that specific context. There was minimal evidence for discriminating effects with theft attitudes, however. Collectively, these results call for a renewed focus on the complex relationship between attitudes, situations, and delinquent behavior.Item Immigrant Assimilation, Family Functioning and Delinquency: A Test of Mediating and Moderating Influences(2010) DiPietro, Stephanie; LaFree, Gary; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Since the earliest writings on immigrant adaptation scholars have speculated that assimilation may relate to delinquency through its effects on the family. Despite this longstanding line of inquiry, empirical research on family processes across immigrant generations has yielded equivocal findings, with some studies offering support for the mediating influence of the family on the assimilation-crime link, while others finding little variation across immigrant generations with respect to family functioning or its implication for behavior. Further, while research on immigrant adaptation has proliferated in recent years, consideration of how immigration relates to crime at the individual level has all but ignored the salient role of gender. The purpose of this research is to contribute to the growing literature on the individual level mechanisms linking immigrant status to offending behaviors in two important ways: First, using a diverse sample of youth from the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods, I test the mediating role of five interstitial family processes--monitoring, attachment, support, harsh discipline and conflict--to determine whether generational differences in maladaptive behaviors are indeed attributable to differences in family characteristics. Second, I address a glaring gap in the immigrant-crime literature by examining the moderating influence of gender on the linkages among generational status, family processes and delinquency. Results of OLS and negative binomial regression analyses offer, at best, limited support for the hypothesized mediating role of family processes in the assimilation-crime link. For only one family process--family conflict--is generational status a significant correlate, net of controls. Sobel tests indicate that family conflict--which is higher among more assimilated youth--partially mediates the relationship between generational status and violence, but not substance use. Notably, however, I find important gender differences in the influence of assimilatory status on both family functioning and problem behaviors. Collectively, girls appear to be better "protected" by their immigrant status than boys. I discuss the implications of these findings and my proposed directions for future research.Item An Experimental Evaluation of After School Program Participation on Problem Behavior Outcomes: Does Pre-Existing Risk Moderate the Effects of Program Participation?(2009) Cross, Amanda Brown; Gottfredson, Denise C; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Background: Some prevention programs negatively affect participants. Previous research indicates that peers can cause these negative effects. However, little is known about which students may be most vulnerable to negative peer effects in prevention interventions. Purpose: This study tests the effect of participation in an after-school program (ASP) on student outcomes of peer delinquency, problem behavior and antisocial attitudes and beliefs for students of differing pre-test levels of risk for those outcomes. Drawing on social learning theory, this study examines whether low- and moderate- risk students in the intervention are more likely to acquire delinquent behaviors and beliefs in the ASP than their already-delinquent counterparts. Participants: 447 middle school students attending underperforming schools in Baltimore County, Maryland. Intervention: The data are drawn from an experimental evaluation of an after school program which operated in five middle schools in Baltimore County during the 2006-2007 academic year. The overall evaluation of the program found null effects on the wide range of measured outcomes (including academic achievement and delinquency). I explore whether the lack of beneficial program effects is partially attributable to negative effects among low and moderate risk participants who absorbed negative beliefs and behaviors from high-risk peers in the ASP. Research Design: Randomized, controlled field trial. Findings: Results indicate that low- and moderate- risk youth are not more likely to experience negative outcomes than high-risk youths. On the contrary, low-risk participants are less likely to experience negative effects than high-risk participants. Students who began the program with elevated negative peer influences grew in this characteristic if they often participated in the ASP but declined in negative peer influences if they less often attended the program. Implications for universal prevention are discussed.Item Predictors of In-School Weapon-Carrying(2009) Stickle, Wendy Povitsky; Gottfredson, Denise; Criminology and Criminal Justice; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Delinquent and violent behaviors have become a major concern of parents, teachers, and school administrations across the country as media images of school violence permeate perceptions of school safety. Although national surveys show a slight decline in school delinquency, schools continue to search for ways to improve safety. This investigation seeks to understand the predictors of weapon-use in schools. Literature related to school shootings, disorder, and weapon-carrying as well as various theories, including control, social disorganization, and subculture, guide hypotheses that explore the school characteristics related to in-school weapon-carrying as well as the interaction effects between school and student characteristics. Using a large, national sample, this unprecedented investigation explores whether school characteristics predict weapon-carrying net of individuals' propensity to carry weapons. The study also investigates whether school characteristics condition the relationships between student characteristics and weapon-carrying. Findings indicate that school characteristics, specifically those related to school location and violent environments, are important in explaining recent in-school weapon-carrying even when controlling for past weapon-carrying. Further, results suggest that school-level predictors are more important in explaining student weapon-carrying in urban schools than in non-urban schools. Implications and directions for future research will be discussed.