Abstract
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.
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Notes
The percent varies somewhat from article to article depending on the final sample size in the particular analysis.
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Funding
Support for the Rochester Youth Development Study has been provided by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (R01DA020195, R01DA005512), the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (86-JN-CX-0007, 96-MU-FX-0014, 2004-MU-FX-0062), the National Science Foundation (SBR-9123299), and the National Institute of Mental Health (R01MH56486, R01MH63386). Technical assistance for this project was also provided by an NICHD grant (R24HD044943) to The Center for Social and Demographic Analysis at the University at Albany.
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Forthcoming Journal of Developmental and Life-Course Criminology
Third annual David P. Farrington Lecture. A prior version was delivered at the annual meeting of the American Society of Criminology, November 14, 2019, San Francisco, CA. I would like to thank Megan Bears Augustyn, PhD, for her assistance with the data analysis reported below and Pamela K. Porter for comments on earlier drafts.
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Thornberry, T.P. Intergenerational Patterns in Offending: Lessons from the Rochester Intergenerational Study—ASC Division of Developmental and Life Course Criminology David P. Farrington Lecture, 2019. J Dev Life Course Criminology 6, 381–397 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40865-020-00150-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40865-020-00150-8