Paternal Incarceration and Adolescent Social Network Disadvantage

• In Event: 033 - Section on Crime, Law, and Deviance Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 05. Children, Youth and Violence 1

Abstract

Parental incarceration has become an increasingly common event in the lives of American children over the last 40 years. Recent studies have explored the implications of parental incarceration for children’s behavioral problems, academic achievement, health, and housing stability, but none have yet examined the social networks of children affected by parental incarceration. A separate line of research suggests that the composition of adolescents’ social networks is important for exposing them to, or insulating them from, disadvantageous peers and providing social support during a critical developmental period. I bring together these two strands of research to examine the social networks of adolescents who experience paternal incarceration. Using network data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, I explore the relationship between biological father incarceration during childhood and the size of adolescents’ friend groups, their social location within their schools, and their friends’ characteristics. I find that children of recently incarcerated fathers have more disadvantaged social networks than other adolescents. On average, children who have experienced paternal incarceration have fewer friends, are more socially isolated within their schools, and have friends who are less advantaged, less academically successful, and more delinquent than other adolescents’ friends. These observed differences are robust to a variety of specifications and are generally consistent across race and gender subgroups. These findings suggest that the disadvantage experienced by children of incarcerated parents in America extends beyond the behavioral and household-level problems identified in previous research, infiltrating even their childhood friendships.

Author

• Brielle Eileen Bryan, Harvard University