Life Course Changes in Emotions and Crime from Adolescence to Emerging Adulthood

• In Event: Theoretical Approaches to the Development of Offending

Abstract

While several theorists point to the influence of emotions on crime, Giordano et al. (2007) develop a Neo-Meadian perspective explicitly hypothesizing how life course changes in emotions may lead to desistance from crime. With growing maturity, more effective personal choices, and exposure to new role-taking opportunities, individuals may experience a reduction in the negative emotions linked with crime, a reduction in the positive emotions or thrills from offending, and an improved ability to regulate their emotions. However, there is very limited research testing these hypotheses. We utilize the Pathways to Desistance Study including a sample of 1354 adolescents, aged 14-17, who are followed for seven years into emerging adulthood. We perform latent growth curve modeling examining the trajectories of three types of emotions (anger/aggression, thrills/kicks from crime, empathy), emotional regulation, and self-reported offending to test these hypotheses. Our results have implications for research on desistance from crime and life course changes in emotions more broadly.

Authors

• Joanne M. Kaufman, University at Albany, SUNY

• Jody Clay-Warner, University of Georgia

• Natasha Morgan Ganem, University of Georgia