Suchergebnisse

Few criminologists have directly examined whether the importance of family, school, and peers in the etiology of delinquency changes over the developmental period of adolescence. This study tests hypotheses, derived from Thornberry's (1987) interactional theory, about the age‐varying effects of attachment to parents, commitment to school, and association with delinquent peers on delinquency by applying Bryk and Raudenbush's (1992) hierarchical linear models to analyze the first five waves of data from the National Youth Survey. Results show that the direct as well as total effects of delinquent peers and school on delinquency tend to increase from early to middle adolescence, reach a peak at the age of mid‐13 and mid‐15, respectively, and then decline. This curvilinear pattern of change is interpreted as reflective of the process of adolescent development and the age‐delinquency relationship. On the other hand, both direct and total effects of family on delinquency are found to be significant throughout the period of adolescence, but the effects do not systematically vary as hypothesized. Theoretical, methodological, and policy implications of the findings are also discussed.

This study tests Agnew's general strain theory (GST) for African Americans, a population neglected in GST research. Specifically, we examined (a) the differential effects of inner-and outer-directed negative emotions on withdrawing behavior and (b) the conditioning effects of social support on the understudied, deviant coping behavior. OLS regression analyses of data from a national survey of African American adults provide empirical evidence that depression and anxiety have larger effects on withdrawing behavior than anger. Findings also provide some support for the hypothesis that social support tends to weaken or buffer the effects of nonangry emotions on withdrawing behavior.

Offender-led religious movements: Why we should have faith in prisoner-led reform
Byron R. Johnson and Sung Joon Jang, both from Baylor University and Pepperdine University, suggest that the solution to criminal justice reform could lie in the prisoner-led faith programmes, which provide positive, cost-efficient rehabilitation. An emerging body of evidence documents the ways in which religious involvement is linked to different types of physical and mental health outcomes.(1) A growing subset of this research demonstrates how religious involvement helps to decrease crime,(2) promote prosocial behaviour among offenders,(3, 9) and help to foster sobriety among addicts.(4) Moreover, research shows the effectiveness of faith-based programmes in reducing recidivism among former prisoners.(1, 2, 9) In sum, there is increasing evidence religiosity can help change an offender's identity, and be linked to other important prosocial outcomes.(5, 17)

The relevance of human flourishing to offender rehabilitation
Sung Joon Jang and Byron R. Johnson, both from Baylor University, turn the spotlight on the relevance of human flourishing to offender rehabilitation in Colombia and South Africa. Humans are born with fundamental needs for survival (e.g., food, clothing, and shelter) and flourishing, which concerns happiness and life satisfaction, physical and mental health, meaning and purpose, character and virtue, and close social relationships (VanderWeele, 2017). Survival needs are essential to human existence, but flourishing needs are not meant to be secondary or less important. While the sustenance of life is necessary for human flourishing, both types of innate needs should be seen as primary concerns from a holistic point of view. This is evident because even when physical and material needs are fully met, people may still decline mentally or relationally. They may experience "diseases of excess" or "deaths of despair" (Clifton, 2022).

The prison seminary movement and the impact of faith-based programmes
Challenges facing US prisons are increasing. With issues of overcrowding, widespread mental illness, high levels of post-traumatic stress disorder, violence, and more, prisons are failing to correctly rehabilitate inmates. Unfortunately, policymakers largely ignore decades of criminological research documenting how faith-based programmes reduce social isolation and shame among prisoners and offer emotional and network pathways that support fresh starts, which is what Byron R. Johnson and Sung Joon Jang from Baylor University share their expertise in now, regarding the key challenges affecting America's prison system, the prison seminary movement and the positive impact that faith-based programmes can have. Looking at Angola's unique prison seminary, and the impact of faith-based programmes, Byron R. Johnson and Sung Joon Jang analyse the work of faith-based organisations and faith-motivated volunteers in prisons, and find through empirical evidence that by embracing religious faith, inmates can and do transform their lives in meaningful ways.

AbstractObjectiveTo examine whether fathers who attend TYRO Dads class report greater satisfaction in their relationship with their child and increased engagement in activities with their child than nonparticipants and, if so, whether parenting efficacy, parenting role identity, and coparenting relationship with the child's mother account for differences in father involvement between the intervention and control groups.BackgroundDespite the growing number of fatherhood intervention programs, limited experimental research has been conducted to evaluate their effectiveness.MethodA randomized controlled trial was conducted with a sample of 252 fathers randomly assigned to intervention and control groups. Both groups completed a pretest survey and were followed up at the end of intervention (posttest) and 3 months after the intervention (follow‐up). Latent growth curve models were used to estimate both intervention and dosage effects.ResultsThe intervention group fathers reported significant improvement over time in the level of satisfaction of the relationship with their child. This finding may be partly because program participants became more confident in their parenting role, had their parenting role identity enhanced, or felt better about their relationship with their child's mother. These results were more pronounced among those who attended eight out of 10 sessions.ConclusionIn this study, the TYRO Dads program was an effective intervention helping low‐income fathers boost their confidence as a father and enhancing fathers' perception of their relationship with the child's mother.ImplicationsResponsible fatherhood programs should make an intentional effort to incentivize participation to increase attendance and the likelihood of completing the program.

Despite methodological advances in studying the relationship between religious attendance and volunteering, its dynamic nature still needs to be elucidated. We apply growth curve modeling to examine whether trajectories of religious attendance and volunteering are related to each other over a 15-year period in a nationally representative sample from the Americans' Changing Lives data (1986-2002). Multivariate results showed that the rates of change in religious attendance and volunteering were positively related, and excluding religious volunteering did not alter the finding. It was also found that the initial level of religious attendance was positively associated with the rate of increase in volunteer hours over the period. Mediation analyses revealed that participation in voluntary associations explained the dynamic relationships between religious attendance and volunteering. These results provide evidence that involvement in organized religion and volunteering are dual activities that change together over the adult life course.

Although prior research has had a tendency to confirm a negative association between religiousness and crime, criminologists have been slow to incorporate new concepts and emergent issues from the scientific study of religion into their own research. The self‐identity phrase "spiritual but not religious" is one of them, which has been increasingly used by individuals who claim to be "spiritual" but disassociate themselves from organized religion. This study first examines differences in crime between "spiritual‐but‐not‐religious" individuals and their "religious‐and‐spiritual," "religious‐but‐not‐spiritual," and "neither‐religious‐nor‐spiritual" peers in emerging adulthood. Specifically, we hypothesize that the spiritual‐but‐not‐religious young adults are more prone to crime than their "religious" counterparts, while expecting them to be different from the "neither" group without specifying whether they are more or less crime prone. Second, the expected group differences in crime are hypothesized to be explained by the microcriminological theories of self‐control, social bonding, and general strain. Latent‐variable structural equation models were estimated separately for violent and property crimes using the third wave of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. The overall results tend to provide a partial support for the hypotheses. Implications for criminology and future research are discussed.