Searching for Conceptual Clarity: Protective Factors and Gang Joining

• In Event: Joining and Leaving Gangs

Abstract

The past 15 years have witnessed a resurgence in gang research, including the role of risk factors in predicting gang membership. Far less, however, is known about protective factors that may prevent gang joining and subsequent delinquency/violence. Although protective factors inhibiting gang joining have been proposed, definitional and conceptual issues surrounding protective factor research remain. The current paper contributes to the literature by investigating whether protective factors are at the other end of a continuum from risk factors (as maintained by some criminologists) or if, as suggested in the developmental psychology and psychopathology literature, protective factors represent a unique and different construct.

Author

• Saundra Trujillo, University of Missouri - St. Louis