Understanding the Effect of Adverse Childhood Experience on Juvenile Offending in South Korea: A Growth Mixture Modeling Examination of General Strain Theory

• In Event: Examination of Juvenile Offendings and Successful Reentry in South Korea

Abstract

A growing body of studies has revealed that Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) plays a significant role in explaining longitudinal trajectories of juvenile offendings. These studies postulate that ACE determines juveniles’ offending patterns through their negative emotions and have found that the degree of exposure to ACE differentiates unique patterns such as early-onset and chronic offending from other patterns of offending. This study aims to add clarification to previous literature by examining the causalities between ACE and juvenile offending trajectories in South Korea, where juvenile offending has emerged as a critical concern. The National Youth Policy Institution panel data from 2010 to 2016 is analyzed, and the growth mixture modeling analysis is employed for the trajectory analysis.

Authors

• Seong-min Park, University of Nevada, Las Vegas

• Sujung Cho, Southern Illinois University Carbondale

• Young Oh Hong, Korean Institute of Criminology