NCJ Number
218901
Journal
Criminology Volume: 45 Issue: 2 Dated: May 2007 Pages: 415-444
Date Published
May 2007
Length
30 pages
Annotation
This study examined the effects of community structural characteristics on adolescent delinquency in Iceland, focusing on how individual-level mechanisms mediated these effects.
Abstract
The study found that certain community structural characteristics had an impact on adolescent delinquency, namely, residential mobility and family disruption. Specific individual-level social control mechanisms explained part of this effect. The lack of community-based social ties that facilitated parent-child interactions were related. This undermined channels for reinforcing and communicating conventional values and norms. Another community-based mechanism related to delinquency was the absence of youth activities supervised by adults, leading to unsupervised youth activities. The findings lend cross-societal support to prior research inspired by social disorganization theory. The next step in research might be to compare the effects of community characteristics on indicators of social organization and delinquency across societies that have different characteristics. The sample of adolescents (n=6,458) was drawn from Icelandic students born in 1981 and 1982 (ages 15 and 16) who were attending 9th and 10th grades in public secondary schools. Anonymous questionnaires were administered to all students present in class on a day in March 1997. Delinquency was measured with six questions about how many times in the last 12 months respondents had committed six serious offenses. Community characteristics were measured with questions related to residential mobility (moving to a new community in the past 12 months); family disruption (not living with both parents); parents' educational attainment; and parents' occupational status. Other questions pertained to the mediating role of three variables: "embeddedness in social ties," "normlessness," and "unsupervised peer activity." 5 tables and 48 references