The Many Faces of Youth Crime

The Many Faces of Youth Crime
Author: Josine Junger-Tas
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 359
Release: 2011-09-18
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1441994556

This book presents the first comprehensive analysis of the second International Self-Report Delinquency study (ISRD-2). An earlier volume, Juvenile Delinquency in Europe and Beyond (Springer, 2010) focused mainly on the findings with regard to delinquency, victimization and substance use in each of the individual participating ISRD-2 countries. The Many Faces of Youth Crime is based on analysis of the merged data set and has a number of unique features:  The analyses are based on an unusually large number of respondents (about 67,000 7th, 8th and 9th graders) collected by researchers from 31 countries;  It includes reports on the characteristics, experiences and behaviour of first and second generation migrant youth from a variety of cultures;  It is one of the first large-scale international studies asking 12-16 year olds about their victimization experiences (bullying, assault, robbery, theft);  It describes both intriguing differences between young people from different countries and country clusters in the nature and extent of delinquency, victimization and substance use, as well as remarkable cross-national uniformities in delinquency, victimization, and substance use patterns;  A careful comparative analysis of the social responses to offending and victimization adds to our limited knowledge on this important issue;  Detailed chapters on the family, school, neighbourhood, lifestyle and peers provide a rich comparative description of these institutions and their impact on delinquency;  It tests a number of theoretical perspectives (social control, self-control, social disorganization, routine activities/opportunity theory) on a large international sample from a variety of national contexts;  It combines a theoretical focus with a thoughtful consideration of the policy implications of the findings;  An extensive discussion of the ISRD methodology of ‘flexible standardization’ details the challenges of comparative research. The book consists of 12 chapters, which also may be read individually by those interested in particular special topics (for instance, the last chapter should be of special interest to policy makers). The material is presented in such a way that it is accessible to more advanced students, researchers and scholars in a variety of fields, such as criminology, sociology, deviance, social work, comparative methodology, youth studies, substance use studies, and victimology.

Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice

Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice
Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
Total Pages: 405
Release: 2001-06-05
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0309172357

Even though youth crime rates have fallen since the mid-1990s, public fear and political rhetoric over the issue have heightened. The Columbine shootings and other sensational incidents add to the furor. Often overlooked are the underlying problems of child poverty, social disadvantage, and the pitfalls inherent to adolescent decisionmaking that contribute to youth crime. From a policy standpoint, adolescent offenders are caught in the crossfire between nurturance of youth and punishment of criminals, between rehabilitation and "get tough" pronouncements. In the midst of this emotional debate, the National Research Council's Panel on Juvenile Crime steps forward with an authoritative review of the best available data and analysis. Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice presents recommendations for addressing the many aspects of America's youth crime problem. This timely release discusses patterns and trends in crimes by children and adolescentsâ€"trends revealed by arrest data, victim reports, and other sources; youth crime within general crime; and race and sex disparities. The book explores desistanceâ€"the probability that delinquency or criminal activities decrease with ageâ€"and evaluates different approaches to predicting future crime rates. Why do young people turn to delinquency? Juvenile Crime, Juvenile Justice presents what we know and what we urgently need to find out about contributing factors, ranging from prenatal care, differences in temperament, and family influences to the role of peer relationships, the impact of the school policies toward delinquency, and the broader influences of the neighborhood and community. Equally important, this book examines a range of solutions: Prevention and intervention efforts directed to individuals, peer groups, and families, as well as day care-, school- and community-based initiatives. Intervention within the juvenile justice system. Role of the police. Processing and detention of youth offenders. Transferring youths to the adult judicial system. Residential placement of juveniles. The book includes background on the American juvenile court system, useful comparisons with the juvenile justice systems of other nations, and other important information for assessing this problem.

Cross-National Research in Self-Reported Crime and Delinquency

Cross-National Research in Self-Reported Crime and Delinquency
Author: Malcolm Klein
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 435
Release: 2012-12-06
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9400910010

Malcolm W. Klein Center for Research on Crime and Social Control University of Southern California 1. BACKGROUND In June of 1988, approximately forty scholars and researchers met for four days in the Leeuwenborst Congres Center in Noordwijkerhout, The Netherlands, to participate in a workshop entitled Self-Report Metho dology in Criminological Research. The participants represented 15 nations and 30 universities and research centers, a diversity that was matched by the experiences and focal interests in self-report methods among the participants. This volume is the result of the workshop process and in particular of the invitations to participants to prepare pre-conference papers for distribution prior to the workshop. The chapters in the volume were selected from the larger set of pre conference papers. As workshop conv~ner and volume editor, it falls on me to set some of the context for this enterprise. Self-report crime is "admitted" crime, derived from interview and questionnaire responses obtained from adults and juveniles (regardless of whether or not they have been arrested) concerning their own illegal behaviors. Growing awareness of the limitations of official crime statistics has led to the development of self-report procedures.

Juvenile Delinquency in Europe and Beyond

Juvenile Delinquency in Europe and Beyond
Author: Josine Junger-Tas
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 429
Release: 2009-12-15
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0387959823

Juvenile Delinquency in Europe and Beyond: Results of the Second International Self-Report Delinquency Study presents the status of juvenile crime and delinquency and its backgrounds in many of the European Union member states as well as in the United States, Canada, Venezuela and Surinam. The book includes information on key issues in juvenile delinquency such as victimization of young people, alcohol and drug use and its relation to juvenile crime, involvement in youth gangs, immigration, family and school and neighborhood situations. It provides insight into different views on what can be considered juvenile crime; what acts are subsumed in its definition and when we can speak about structural delinquent behavior. These insights are based on self-reported information systematically and simultaneously collected from about 70,000 12-15 year old youths in 28 countries. Until recently, the self-report methodology has not been applied on such a large scale in an international context. The results of this survey provide new and unexpected data about those young people who structurally commit criminal acts, as well as on the frequency of the behavior and the conditions that have an impact on offending. The wealth of descriptions and insights in delinquency of all these countries will be of great interest to scholars, students and practitioners because of the special character of the publication; it is a book of reference to everyone interested in the backgrounds of juvenile delinquency.