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METHODS: Self-reported arrest history data (excluding arrests for minor traffic violations) from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (N = 7335) were examined from 1997 to 2008.

RESULTS: By age 18, the in-sample cumulative arrest prevalence rate lies between 15.9% and 26.8%; at age 23, it lies between 25.3% and 41.4%. These bounds make no assumptions at all about missing cases. If we assume that the missing cases are at least as likely to have been arrested as the observed cases, the in-sample age-23 prevalence rate must lie between 30.2% and 41.4%. The greatest growth in the cumulative prevalence of arrest occurs during late adolescence and the period of early or emerging adulthood.

CONCLUSIONS: Since the last nationally defensible estimate based on data from 1965, the cumulative prevalence of arrest for American youth (particularly in the period of late adolescence and early adulthood) has increased substantially. At a minimum, being arrested for criminal activity signifies increased risk of unhealthy lifestyle, violence involvement, and violent victimization. Incorporating this insight into regular clinical assessment could yield significant benefits for patients and the larger community.

METHODS: This study uses data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (N = 7335), a population-based longitudinal study of individuals who were age 12 to 16 at the study outset. A typological measure was created where individuals were categorized as: (1) non-victims, (2) childhood victims (victims below the age of 12), (3) adolescent victims (victims between the age of 12 and 18), and (4) chronic victims (victims before age 12 and between age 12 and 18). The repeat bully victimization variable was then associated with several offending and victimization legal outcome measures experienced in late adolescence and adulthood.

RESULTS: Experiencing repeat bully victimizations was associated with an increase in respondent’s likelihood of engaging in substance use, delinquency, arrest, conviction, and incarceration. Experiencing repeat bully victimizations was also associated with an increase in respondent’s perceptions and experiences with violent victimizations. The association between these measures was consistently stronger for females while there were few differences across categories of race.

CONCLUSIONS: Being the victim of a bully during childhood and adolescence serves as a marker for subsequent legal problems and victimization in adolescence and adulthood. Prevention and intervention programs aimed at reducing involvement in delinquency, crime, and victimization would benefit by targeting bully victimizations as a risk factor.

Methods: Using a subsample of the National Longitudinal Study of Youth (N = 542), we provide a comprehensive investigation of the variety of sources of self-control to include both individual and environmental covariates.

Results: Results indicate that maternal smoking during pregnancy significantly impacts the development of self-control net of parental, neighborhood, and school socialization. We also found that individual sources of self-control significantly vary across race and neighborhood context.

Conclusions: The sources of self-control are more complex than socialization from parents, schools, and within neighborhoods occurring in childhood and adolescence.

The development of self-control, or the ability to manage one's behavior to comply with normative behavioral expectations, is generally recognized as a significant factor in preventing antisocial behavior and crime. Although extensive research has focused on the link between an individual's self-control and involvement in crime and/or problem behaviors, much less research has identified and examined the potential sources of an individual's self-control. The current study considers the school context as a potential resource for the development of self-control. One source of data was the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY), which was a multistage, stratified cluster sample of 12,686 individuals between the ages of 14 and 21 in 1979. Since 1979, yearly interviews have been conducted with the sample to examine experiences when the youth s completed high school and entered the workforce. The second source of data was the NLSY Child-Mother, which was a separate biennial data collection that began in 1986. It included detailed assessments of each child born to the females in the original NLSY data cohort. The two surveys provided information on the following variables related to the cultivation of self-control: poor parental supervision, parental discipline, neighborhood socialization, and school socialization. The behavioral measures of self-control were based on an individual's total score on portions of the Behavioral Problem Index measured when individuals were age 10. The study found that although school socialization was a significant contributor to self-control in less disadvantaged neighborhoods, it failed to enhance self-control in more disadvantaged neighborhoods. [NCJRS]