Disentangling the Forces of Selection in the Aggregate Age-Crime Relationship

• In Event: Perspectives on Life Course and Genetic Issues in Crime and Substance Use

Abstract

Literature addressing the age-crime relationship using aggregate level age-specific crime data often ignores individuals’ life course experience. The current study suggests that we should view the age-crime relationship from a cohort perspective acknowledging incarceration and mortality that remove cohort members from the population at risk. Since longitudinal data with incarceration and mortality information of multiple cohorts are not available, we propose using computer simulation methods to tease out the selection effects from the desistance effect in the decline of the age-crime curve. By simulating the criminal justice contact experiences and mortality experiences of each individual in the population from age 18 to 54 and altering the simulation parameters to compare across different simulation scenarios, the current study examines the potential changes of the aggregate age crime curve: (1) if people who have been incarcerated are not subjected to excess mortality risks, and, (2) if the incarceration parameters change (i.e. increase or decrease of the sentencing length). Limitations of the model and our future plan for model improvements will be discussed at the end.

Authors

• Yunmei Lu, Pennsylvania State University

• Jason Thomas, Pennsylvania State University