Life-course perspective

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Life-course perspective

1. Moffitts Taxonomy
2. Age-graded theory of crime
3. Thornberrys Model

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Age-graded Theory
8-9 years
15-24 years
45-55 years
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Moffitts taxonomy

• Many people behave antisocially, but their
  antisocial behavior is temporary and situational
  (common in among adolescents)
• In contrast, the antisocial behavior of some
  people is very stable and persistent ( found
  among a small number of males whose behavior
  problems are also quite extreme
• Moffitt suggests that juvenile delinquency
  conceals
• two qualitatively distinct categories of
  individuals, each in need of its own distinct
  theoretical explanation

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Life-Course-Persistent Antisocial Behavior

• Across the life course, these individuals exhibit
  changing manifestations of antisocial behavior
  biting and hitting at age 4, shoplifting and
  truancy at age 10, selling drugs and stealing
  cars at age 16, robbery and rape at age 22, and
  fraud and child abuse at age 30.
• The underlying disposition remains the same, but
  its expression changes form as new social
  opportunities arise at different points in
  development.

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Etiology of Life-Course-Persistent Antisocial
Behavior

• If some individuals' antisocial behavior is
  stable from preschool to adulthood as the data
  imply, then investigators are compelled to look
  for its roots early in life, in factors that are
  present before or soon after birth
• Neuropsychological variations in the fetal brain
• Neural development may be disrupted by maternal
  drug abuse, poor prenatal nutrition, or pre or
  postnatal exposure to toxic agents

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Etiology of Life-Course-Persistent Antisocial
Behavior

• After birth, neural development may be disrupted
  by neonatal deprivation of nutrition, injuries,
  child abuse
• Two sorts of deficits are empirically associated
  with antisocial behavior verbal and "executive"
  functions
• The verbal deficits affect receptive listening
  and reading, problem solving, expressive speech
  and writing, and memory.
• Executive deficits affect inattention and
  impulsivity.

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Child-environment co-variation

• Unfortunately, children with cognitive and
  temperamental disadvantages are not generally
  born into supportive environments
• Indeed, because some characteristics of parents
  and children tend to be correlated, parents of
  children who are at risk for antisocial behavior
  often inadvertently provide their children with
  criminogenic environments

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Problem child-problem parent interactions

• Children with neuropsychological problems evoke a
  challenge to even the most resourceful, loving,
  and patient families
• Numerous studies have shown that a toddler's
  problem behaviors may affect the parents'
  disciplinary strategies as well as subsequent
  interactions with adults and peers

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Problem child-problem parent interactions

• Over time parent of difficult toddlers reduce
  their efforts to actively guide and direct their
  children's behavior and become increasingly less
  involved in the teaching process

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Maintenance and Elaboration Over the Life Course

• Children with poor self-control and aggressive
  behavior are often rejected by peers and adults
• In turn, children who have learned to expect
  rejection are likely in later settings to
  withdraw or strike out preemptively, precluding
  opportunities to affiliate with pro-social peers

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Maintenance and Elaboration Over the Life Course

• Behavior problems at school and failure to attain
  basic math and reading skills place a limit on
  the variety of job skills
• Teenaged parenthood, addiction to drugs or
  alcohol, school dropout, patchy work histories,
  and time spent incarcerated are snares that
  diminish the probabilities of later success

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Maintenance and Elaboration Over the Life Course

• Similarly, labels accrued early in life can
  foreclose later opportunities an early arrest
  record or a "bad" reputation may rule out
  lucrative jobs, higher education, or an
  advantageous marriage
• In short, the behavior of life-course-persistent
  antisocial persons is increasingly maintained and
  supported by narrowing options for conventional
  behavior.

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LATENT TRAIT THEORY

• Master Trait Personal attributes present at
  birth or established early in life, and it
  remains stable over time, i.e., personality,
  intelligence, and genetic traits
• Personal traits do not change
• Criminal opportunities change
• Maturity brings less opportunity
• Early social control and proper parenting can
  reduce criminal propensity

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Adolescence-Limited Antisocial Behavior

• Compared with the life-course-persistent type,
  adolescence-limited delinquents show relatively
  little continuity in their antisocial behavior

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Beginnings Motivation, Mimicry, and Reinforcement

• Social mimicry
• Healthy adolescents are capable of noticing that
  life-course- persistent youths are able to obtain
  possessions by theft or vice that are otherwise
  inaccessible to teens who have no independent
  incomes (e.g., cars, clothes, drugs, or entry
  into adults-only leisure settings).
• Life-course-persistent boys are more sexually
  experienced and have already initiated
  relationships with the opposite sex.
• Life-course-persistent boys appear relatively
  free of their families they seem to go their own
  way, making their own rules.
• Viewed from within contemporary adolescent
  culture, the antisocial precocity of
  life-course-persistent youths becomes a coveted
  social asset

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Reinforcement

• For teens who become adolescence-limited
  delinquents, antisocial behavior is an effective
  means of knifing-off childhood apron strings and
  of proving that they can act independently to
  conquer new challenges (Erikson, 1960).
• Every curfew violated, car stolen, drug taken,
  and baby conceived is a statement of personal
  independence and thus a reinforcer for delinquent
  involvement

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Desistence From Crime Adolescence-Limited

• The availability of alternatives to crime may
  explain why some adolescence-limited delinquents
  desist later than others
• At the crossroads of young adulthood,
  adolescence-limited and life-course-persistent
  delinquents go different ways.
• This happens because the developmental histories
  and personal traits of adolescence-limited allow
  them the option of exploring new life pathways

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Age-graded life course theory

• The age-graded life course was introduced by
  Robert Sampson and John Laub in the early 90s
• This theory attempts to explain the trajectories
  and transitions of criminal behavior over the
  life course
• Trajectories are pathways or lines of development
  over the life span such as work life, marriage,
  parenthood, self-esteem, and criminal behavior

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Transitions

• Transitions are marked by specific life events
  (e.g. first job or first marriage) that are
  embedded in trajectories and evolve over short
  time spans. (Sampson and Laub 1992)

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The life-course perspective

• The life-course perspective focuses on the role
  that stability and change in behavior play in
  development over the life-course
• Life-course theory implies there is a connection
  from childhood into adulthood and transitions or
  turning points can redirect the life-course

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Life course theory
Life is a dynamic process. As people travel
through the life course they are bombarded by
changing perceptions and experiences and as a
result their behavior will change directions
(sometimes for better and sometimes for worse)
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Life course theory
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Age-graded theory of crime

• Certain life events allow previously deviant
  youth to give up a life of crime
• Childhood delinquency is linked to adult crime,
  alcohol abuse, general deviance, economic
  dependency, educational failure, unemployment,
  divorce, and even charges in the military
• Despite this continuity, job stability and strong
  marital attachment in adulthood inhibit adult
  criminal and deviant behavior

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Age-graded theory of crime

• Sampson and Laub identify two transitions (career
  and marriage) that decrease or even eliminate
  recidivism

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Age-Graded Life-Course Theory
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Role of career

• Work is important - because workers are likely to
  experience close and frequent contact with
  conventional others and the informal social
  controls of the workplace encourage conformity
• At-risk youth can turn away from crime and lead
  normal non-criminal lives if they can maintain
  steady employment

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Role of Marriage

• Marriage creates positive social bonds and builds
  trust
• Successful marriages have been shown to in crease
  stature and self-worth while promoting conformity
  to societal norms/roles
• (1990) Mark Warr states For many individuals,
  it seems, marriage marks a transition from heavy
  peer involvement to a preoccupation with ones
  spouse. That transition is likely to reduce
  interaction with former friends and accomplices
  and thereby reduce the opportunities as well as
  the motivation to engage in crime

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Empirical Support

• Christopher Uggen completed a study to test
  Sampson and Laubs age-graded theory on the
  effects of employment and recidivism
• The study examined over 3,000 people with an
  official arrest history drawn from nine U.S.
  cities and they were randomly assigned to the
  control or treatment program
• Those in the treatment group were offered minimum
  wage jobs
• Members of both groups reported work, crime, and
  arrest information at nine-month intervals for up
  to three years. (Uggen 2000)

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Empirical Support

• The findings show that those that were given jobs
  had a slightly lower rate of recidivism then
  those in the control
• When examining the treatment group by age the
  over 27 group showed the lowest rate of
  recidivism
• The findings of Uggens study give validation and
  cast doubt onto Sampson and Laubs theory
• Uggens study does show that there is a
  relationship to employment and recidivism however
  it does not show the early life affect that
  Sampson and Laub would lead a reader to believe

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Interactional Theory

• Terence Thornberry (1987)
• Interactions are very important in shaping the
  behavior
• Attachment to parents, peers, social institutions
  change over time
• Further, delinquents not only are influenced by
  their social surroundings but also have an impact
  on others through their behavior

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Thornberrys Model

• Interactive or reciprocal
• The base for the model came from control theory
  and social learning theory
• Fundamental cause of delinquency lies in the
  weakening of social constrains over the conduct
  of the individuals
• Next step is association with delinquent peers
• This association foster delinquent values and
  delinquent behavior

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Thornberrys Model
1
3
Weak parental attachment
Delinquent association
Delinquent behavior
2
4
5
6
This model answers the contradiction between
Social Learning theory and Control theory about
what goes first deviant behavior or association
with delinquent peers.
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Thornberrys Model

• Interactional process creates a behavioral
  trajectory that predicts increasing involvement
  in delinquency and crime
• Initial weak bonds lead to high delinquency, the
  high delinquency further weakens the conventional
  bonds
• Combination of these effects make it difficult to
  reestablish bonds to conventional society at
  later age

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Thornberrys Model

• What about effect of employment, college,
  military, and marriage?
• These variables play an important role in
  determining whether delinquency will continue or
  desist