IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jcjust/v37yi2p123-132.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The contextual nature of the family structure/delinquency relationship

Author

Listed:
  • Kierkus, Christopher A.
  • Hewitt, John D.

Abstract

It is well established that growing up in a nontraditional family represents a risk factor for delinquent behavior; however, the understanding of whether this effect is universal remains imperfect. The present study examined whether the link between nontraditional family structure and delinquency varies according to six distinct circumstances: gender, race, age, SES, family size, and place of residence. Regression analysis of a nationally representative sample of adolescents between the ages of twelve and seventeen (n = 3,499) suggests that gender, race, SES, and place of residence do not condition the family structure/delinquency relationship. Significant interactions, however, were discovered with respect to age and family size. Generally, living in a nontraditional family is more criminogenic for older adolescents, and for those from larger families. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Kierkus, Christopher A. & Hewitt, John D., 2009. "The contextual nature of the family structure/delinquency relationship," Journal of Criminal Justice, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 123-132, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jcjust:v:37:y::i:2:p:123-132
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047-2352(09)00014-2
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Zenaida Ravaneral & Hwa Young & Fernando Rajulton & Byung-Yup Cho, 1999. "Should a Second Demographic Transition Follow the First? Demographic Contrasts: Canada and South Korea," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 47(1), pages 99-118, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Johanna Peterson & Dana DeHart & Emily Wright, 2019. "Examining the Impact of Victimization on Girls’ Delinquency: A Study of Direct and Indirect Effects," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(11), pages 1-13, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.

      More about this item

      Statistics

      Access and download statistics

      Corrections

      All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jcjust:v:37:y::i:2:p:123-132. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

      If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

      If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

      If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

      For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jcrimjus .

      Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

      IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.