2001 Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime_early findings age 12-13 (original) (raw)

The Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime: Key Findings at Ages 12 and 13 www

2001

The rise in crime is one of the most striking social changes since the Second World War. Police recorded crime rose dramatically between 1950 and the mid 1990s in all developed countries (except Japan) and, because of the shape of the age-crime curve, this is to a large extent the result of an increase in misconduct and ordinary crimes committed by young people . This increase in problem behaviour among young people has also been paralleled by post-war increases in other psychosocial disorders during the teenage years, such as suicide, eating disorders and personality dysfunctions . These major societal changes have meant that youth crime, and indeed issues in relation to young people in general, have become a salient political issue

The Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime

2011

Change in population size (%)-0.4% +4.4% +28.2% +0.7% Parental consent Given the age of the cohort members, it was necessary to contact parents in advance of fieldwork to inform them about the study and seek their consent. There was concern that an opt-in method would yield a low response rate, particularly among certain sections of the population, which would significantly skew the characteristics of the cohort and undermine the validity of any survey results. As it was crucial that the cohort should comprise as complete and representative population of young people as possible, the various agencies involved in the study agreed that an opt-out consent method should be adopted. However, assurances had to be given that the Education Department child protection guidelines would be stringently followed and that participation would not be detrimental to the cohort members. Prior to sweep one fieldwork, a letter was issued to all parents explaining the objectives and coverage of the study, the implications of participation and stating that their child could be opted-out of the study by returning a tear-off slip to the school. It was not considered necessary to repeat this exercise each year. However, an updated letter was sent to the parents of all new pupils who joined the cohort in sweep two. Cohort members also had the opportunity to opt out of the study during fieldwork and, in a few rare cases, school staff took the decision to opt pupils out if participation at that time was not felt to be in their best interests. * All 5 were unable to comprehend the questionnaire. ** 8 of the 11 were unable to comprehend the questionnaire. CHAPTER 2: CHARACTERISTICS OF THE COHORT CHAPTER 3: DELINQUENCY AND RISK BEHAVIOURS 1 The remaining 53.3 per cent said they had never had a whole drink, a much higher proportion than the 22.6 per cent who had never tried. 2 At sweep 2, the comparison is between those who had a drink at least once a week, and those who had not had a drink in the past year (as opposed to those who had never tried alcohol at sweep 1). 3 The ordering of the frequency items makes a difference to the result. To obtain the closest correlation, 'special occasions' is treated as the least frequent item, below 'hardly ever'. 4 A rare behaviour cannot powerfully predict a more common one. 1. 'All' is those answering the introductory question 'Have you ever tried an illegal drug?'. 2. 'Drug users' are those answering 'yes' to this question.

Youth crime and justice: Key messages from the Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime

Criminology & Criminal Justice, 2010

Based on findings from the Edinburgh Study of Youth Transitions and Crime, this paper challenges the evidence-base which policy-makers have drawn on to justify the evolving models of youth justice across the UK (both in Scotland and England/Wales). It argues that to deliver justice, systems require to address four key facts about youth crime: serious offending is linked to a broad range of vulnerabilities and social adversity; early identification of at-risk children is not an exact science and runs the risk of labelling and stigmatising; pathways out of offending are facilitated or impeded by critical moments in the early teenage years, in particular school exclusion; and diversionary strategies facilitate the desistance process. The paper concludes that the Scottish system should be better placed than most other western systems to deliver justice for children (due to its founding commitment to decriminalisation and destigmatisation). However, as currently implemented, it appears to be failing many young people. 1 Here we are adapting Braithwaite's famous phrase regarding ' facts about crime' which any criminological theory 'ought to fit' .

Criminal careers and life success: new findings from the Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development

The Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development is a prospective longitudinal survey of the development of offending and antisocial behaviour in 411 males first studied at age 8 in 1961at that time they were all living in a working-class deprived inner-city area of South London. This Findings describes their criminal careers up to age 50, looking at both officially recorded convictions and self-reported offending. It also examines life success up to age 48 based on nine criteria which were also measured on a comparable basis at age 32. The main aims were to investigate the development of offending and antisocial behaviour from age 10 to age 50 and the adult life adjustment of 'persisters', 'desisters' and 'late-onset' offenders at age 48.

Childhood and Adolescent Predictors of Late Onset Criminal Careers

Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 2008

This study explores the emergence of a criminal career in adulthood. The main hypothesis tested is that late criminal onset (at age 21 or later) is influenced by early factors that delay antisocial manifestations. The Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development (CSDD) was used to examine early determinants of criminal behavior. 400 Inner London males were followed from ages 8-10 to 48-50, and were classified as follows: 35 late onsetters who were first convicted at age 21 or later, and did not have high self-reported delinquency at ages 10-14 and 15-18; 129 early onsetters first convicted between ages 10 and 20; and 236 unconvicted males. Odds ratios and logistic regression analyses revealed that the best predictors of late onset offenders compared with early onset offenders included nervousness, having few friends at ages 8-10, and not having sexual intercourse by age 18. The best predictors of late onset offenders compared with nonoffenders included teacher-rated anxiousness at ages 12-14 and high neuroticism at age 16. It is concluded that being nervous and withdrawn protected boys against offending in adolescence but that these protective effects tended to wear off after age 21. These findings show that adult offending can be predicted from childhood, and suggest that early intervention might prevent a variety of maladjustment problems and difficulties in adult life.

Young people and crime: Findings from the 2006 offending, crime and justice survey

PsycEXTRA Dataset, 2008

Many people have been involved in the 2006 Offending, Crime and Justice Survey, from its design through to the production of this report. The efforts of everyone involved are appreciated by the authors. Special thanks are due to John Flatley and Alison Walker who provided advice throughout the production of this report, and to Sian Moley, Rachel Murphy and Alison Patterson, who provided invaluable assistance in data checking. We are also grateful to all the research teams and interviewers at the National Centre for Social Research and BMRB Social Research, and to the members of the public who kindly agreed to take part in this survey. Finally, we would like to thank colleagues in the Communication Development Section who assisted in preparing this report for publication.

Early onset of crime and delinquency among Australian children

2015

Early involvement in crime and delinquency (i.e., in late childhood and/or early adolescence) is a significant risk factor for a range of problems throughout the life course. The origins of much antisocial and criminal behaviour in adolescence and adulthood can be traced back to early childhood (Vassallo, Smart, Sanson, Dussuyer, & Victoria, 2002). As teenagers, early-onset offenders are at greater risk of school failure, drug and alcohol abuse, unsafe sexual behaviour, unwanted pregnancy and dangerous driving compared to late-onset offenders. In addition, earlyonset offenders are thought to play an important role in promoting antisocial behaviour among their same-age peers in the middle and later stages of adolescence by providing examples for others to imitate and encouraging others within their peer groups to offend (Moffitt, 1993). Early-onset offending is also an important risk factor for life-course-persistent offending (Farrington, Lambert, & West, 1998; Loeber & Farrington, ...

Youth offending and youth transitions: the power of capital in influencing change

Critical Criminology, 2007

Neither the literature on offending nor that on desistance adequately explains the short-term nature of youth offending, young people's propensity to desist from offending as they reach early adulthood and the importance of youth transitions in helping or hindering young people's access to legitimate and conventional opportunities and responsibilities. It is suggested in this article that the three phases of offending-onset, maintenance and desistance-run parallel courses with the three phases of youth transitions-childhood, youth and adulthood and that both these processes are influenced by discrepancies in levels of capital for young people at each stage. In a recent Scottish study of desistance, Bourdieu's concepts of capital are used to demonstrate the commonalities between youth offending and youth transitions and to better understand young people's search for integration and recognition-whether this be through offending or conventionality. The article concludes that the concepts of capital and youth transitions could both be employed more usefully in the field of criminology to explain the transient nature of offending in youth and the greater likelihood of desistance once legitimate and sustainable opportunities are found to spend as well as to accumulate capital in early adulthood.