Purpose

In recent years, criminology has seen an increase in the number of three-generation, prospective studies of offending. The most fundamental question posed by these studies is whether, and to what extent, parental involvement in adolescent delinquency increases the risk of offending by their offspring. There are several important substantive and methodological challenges that need to be confronted in assessing the intergenerational effect, including the examination of moderating influences that can change the level of intergenerational continuity and methodological issues as such definitional elasticity—the impact on the level of intergenerational continuity that is likely to be observed based on (a) how offending is defined and (b) how the inherent heterogeneity in offending is taken into accounted.

Methods

To examine these issues, I use data from the Rochester Intergenerational Study (RIGS), an extension of the original Rochester Youth Development Study (RYDS). RYDS began data collection in 1988 with a sample of 1000 adolescents and one of their parents. The intergenerational study began in 1999 by adding a third generation member―the oldest biological child of the initial adolescent participants―and following them over time with 19 annual assessments.

Results

Overall, there is a significant positive association between a parent’s involvement in adolescent delinquency and the likelihood that their offspring will also be involved in delinquency. That overall relationship, however, masks substantial internal variability. The significance and size of the intergenerational effect vary by such factors as the level of ongoing contact between fathers and their children and the child’s gender. It is also influenced by methodological considerations such as definitional elasticity. Under some definitions of delinquent behavior, a robust relationship between the parent’s delinquency and the child’s is observed, while under other definitions, there is no significant relationship.

Conclusion

There is, as of now, no clear and consistent answer to the question of whether or not children follow in the footsteps of their parents with respect to delinquency. The field of intergenerational study, which is still relatively new, needs to confront more directly and systematically how both substantive and methodological issues that can influence estimates of the intergenerational effect.

中文翻译：

---

代际犯罪模式：罗彻斯特代际研究的经验教训——ASC 发展和生命历程犯罪学分部 David P. Farrington 讲座，2019 年

目的

近年来，犯罪学对三代犯罪的前瞻性研究数量有所增加。这些研究提出的最基本的问题是，父母参与青少年犯罪是否以及在多大程度上增加了其后代犯罪的风险。在评估代际效应时需要面对几个重要的实质性和方法论挑战，包括检查可以改变代际连续性水平的调节影响和方法问题，例如定义弹性——对代际连续性水平的影响可能基于（a）如何定义冒犯和（b）如何考虑冒犯中的内在异质性来观察。

方法

为检验这些问题，我使用了罗切斯特代际研究 (RIGS) 的数据，该研究是原始罗切斯特青年发展研究 (RYDS) 的延伸。RYDS 于 1988 年开始收集 1000 名青少年及其父母之一的样本数据。代际研究始于 1999 年，增加了第三代成员——最初的青少年参与者中年龄最大的亲生孩子——并随着时间的推移对他们进行 19 次年度评估。

结果

总的来说，父母参与青少年犯罪与其后代也参与犯罪的可能性之间存在显着的正相关。然而，这种整体关系掩盖了巨大的内部可变性。代际效应的重要性和大小因父亲与子女之间持续接触的程度以及孩子的性别等因素而异。它还受到定义弹性等方法论因素的影响。根据某些违法行为的定义，观察到父母的违法行为与孩子的违法行为之间存在稳固的关系，而根据其他定义，则没有显着关系。

结论

到目前为止，对于孩子是否会在犯罪方面跟随父母的脚步这个问题没有明确和一致的答案。代际研究领域仍然相对较新，需要更直接、更系统地面对如何影响代际效应估计的实质性和方法论问题。