Same or different

Recent theoretical and empirical work in criminology supports the classification of individuals in criminal groups, where groups differ in the determinants of antisocial behavior and resulting trajectories of offending over time. This article presents methods for finding distinctions between offender groups in key time-varying factors: measures of social control, negative parent labels, delinquent peers, and family structure. The authors use self-report data on 835 males from the National Youth Survey and apply group-based modeling to estimate three age-crime trajectories, corresponding to three offender groups. Emerging from the analysis is a view of offender groups, as defined by age-crime trajectories, that combines elements of typological and general theories of crime. Individuals in the sample, although widely dissimilar in their offending patterns, share common fundamental processes that influence their criminal behavior. However, the nature of that influence appears to differ according to the pattern of offending, that is, according to offender group.

[1]  K. Land,et al.  AGE, CRIMINAL CAREERS, AND POPULATION HETEROGENEITY: SPECIFICATION AND ESTIMATION OF A NONPARAMETRIC, MIXED POISSON MODEL* , 1993 .

[2]  K. Land,et al.  A Comparison of Poisson, Negative Binomial, and Semiparametric Mixed Poisson Regression Models , 1996 .

[3]  G R Patterson,et al.  A developmental perspective on antisocial behavior. , 1989, The American psychologist.

[4]  K. Roeder,et al.  A SAS Procedure Based on Mixture Models for Estimating Developmental Trajectories , 2001 .

[5]  Robert L. Akers,et al.  A Differential Association-Reinforcement Theory of Criminal Behavior , 1966 .

[6]  T. Moffitt,et al.  LIFE-COURSE TRAJECTORIES OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF OFFENDERS* , 1995 .

[7]  Kathryn Roeder,et al.  Modeling Uncertainty in Latent Class Membership: A Case Study in Criminology , 1999 .

[8]  Daniel S. Nagin,et al.  Analyzing developmental trajectories: A semiparametric, group-based approach , 1999 .

[9]  K. Land,et al.  How Many Latent Classes of Delinquent/ Criminal Careers? Results from Mixed Poisson Regression Analyses1 , 1998, American Journal of Sociology.

[10]  Robert Brame,et al.  ON THE INITIATION AND CONTINUATION OF DELINQUENCY , 1994 .

[11]  D. Nagin,et al.  Trajectories of boys' physical aggression, opposition, and hyperactivity on the path to physically violent and nonviolent juvenile delinquency. , 1999, Child development.

[12]  T. Moffitt Adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent antisocial behavior: a developmental taxonomy. , 1993, Psychological review.

[13]  R. Matsueda Reflected Appraisals, Parental Labeling, and Delinquency: Specifying a Symbolic Interactionist Theory , 1992, American Journal of Sociology.