On the Implications of Mental Health for Romantic Relationship Outcomes Among Serious Adolescent Offenders

• In Event: Advances in Research on Romantic Relationships, Crime, & Victimization

Abstract

Attention to the implications of romantic involvement for crime and desistance has held an important place in the life-course criminological literature over the past thirty years. This research has attended to the implications of romantic relationship quality (i.e., "good" or "bad), type (i.e., marriage or cohabitation), and, most recently, stability (i.e., divorce or breakup). Importantly, this literature now confronts the challenge of better understanding the mechanisms and contexts that account for the romantic partner-desistance association. In an attempt to meet this challenges, the current study uses data from the Pathways to Desistance Study to explore the implications of mental health for romantic relationship outcomes among a sample of serious adolescent offenders. In particular it focuses attention to the influence of mental health on romantic involvement, relationship health, and relationship instability among this sample. Findings of this study and its policy/programming implications will be discussed.

Author

• Matthew Larson, Wayne State University