Delinquent Consequences of Family Instability by Sex of Youth

• In Event: Gender in a Criminological Context: Understanding Gender Differences in Behaviors, Attitudes, and Identity

Abstract

Adolescents in the United States are experiencing family instability (movement from one type of family structure to a different type of family structure) more than in previous decades. One of the most salient consequences for youth in unstable families is increased delinquency. However, a large gap in the literature is how the sex of youth who experience family instability influences externalizing and internalizing problem behaviors. As research indicates the sex of the youth can determine how the youth cope with the same risk factors. Furthermore, evidence from family instability literature suggests that family instability and whether the youth is male or female could influence the types of delinquency youth commit. This study employs longitudinal, adolescent self-reported data from the second National Evaluation of G.R.E.A.T. to examine whether the effect of family instability interacts with sex of the youth to influence specific types of delinquency.

Author

• Walter Shelley, University at Albany, SUNY