Juvenile delinquency is a serious societal issue in the United States today. This is because of juvenile delinquency serious impacts the lives of the victims and perpetrators (Wittenborn, 2002). In addition, juvenile delinquency is linked to criminal offending in later life (Wittenborn, 2002). Therefore, it is vital to establish the root cause of juvenile delinquency. This will not only help solve the issue of delinquent behaviour among minor but also help curtail adult crime. This study delves into investigating if bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency.
The findings of this research study will help establish the root causes of juvenile delinquency. The study is pertinent because the findings will be used to establish the root causes of juvenile delinquency as pertaining to bad parenting. This will, in turn, open opportunities for addressing the issue. More to this, the significance of this study lies in the way a solution to this issue of juvenile delinquency would help address criminality in adult life. Many research studies indicate that juvenile delinquency significantly continues into adulthood. According to a study done by the National Institute of Justice (2015), roughly 52 percent to 57 percent of juvenile delinquents continue to commit crimes or offend past adolescent.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
The research question of this research is derived from the purpose of the study, which is to investigate if bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. With this in mind, the research question of this study is: Does bad parenting cause juvenile delinquency? In this case, the independent variable is bad parenting, while the dependent variable is juvenile delinquency. The hypotheses of this study, as stated below:
Literature Review
Theoretical Development
Social Bonding Theory
The social bond theory was developed in 1969 by Travis Hirschi, and it emerged from the social control theory (Hirschi, 2017). This theory explains how individuals can be prevented from committing delinquent acts. According to this theory, delinquent acts can be prevented through positive bonding to the society (family, school, church and norms and traditions). More specifically, the theory states that minors are likely to commit delinquent acts if they have a weaker bonding to society.
Hirschi’s social bonding theory is composed of four elements, namely, “attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief in societal norms and laws” (Hirschi, 2017). The degree to which a minor is attached to society, such as the family strongly determines if he or she will commit delinquent acts. According to Hirschi’s social bonding theory, the stronger the attachment of a child to the society, the less likely the child to engage in delinquent behaviors (Hirschi, 2017). Conversely, the weaker the attachment, the more likely the child to engage in antisocial behaviors. More to this is that a child’s commitment to conventional activities, such as education, improves his or her interest to work towards the goals he or she wants to achieve in their lives. If a child devotes a lot of time to important activities, such as doing homework, the child could conform to these activities as the child would believe in the laws, norms and traditions of the land.
This study seeks to determine how bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. It is vital to note that poor parenting results from a number of factors, such as broken home, poverty and unfavourable parenting style. Previous research studies consider family (parents) as the primary agency (agents) of socialization. As a result, the way parents socialize or associate with their children could determine the behavioral outcomes of their children. For this reason, I argue that bad parenting or weak parent-child attachment could affect other elements of the social boding theory. These “other” elements are commitment, involvement and belief. Based on Hirschi’s social bonding theory, through attachment, children learn the values, norms and laws expected of them by society. In addition, they learn the behaviours expected of them by society. I also argue that bad parenting poor parent-child attachment denies children the opportunity to not only learn but also internalize societal norms. This could affect them to commit delinquent acts. In addition, this may negatively affect their involvement in activities that were meant to prepare them for a better future. As a result, this would compel the children to start developing their own belief systems that contradict societal norms. This may, in turn, increase the risk of the children to become delinquent.
Hirschi argues that a strong parent-child attachment is effective for effective parenting. This is because it provides parents with the motivation to discipline as well as punish their children appropriately. Parenting affects delinquency through their effect on self-control. In short, Hirschi content that children raised in unstructured environments or families characterized by poor parenting fails to develop the ability to control their behavior. As a result, the children are prone to engage in delinquent behaviours.
Social Learning Theory
Social learning theory focuses on the same dimensions of bad parenting as Hirschi’s social bonding theory. However, according to the social learning theory, crimes or juvenile delinquency not only results from bad parenting; parents may model as well as reinforce deviant behaviour in their children in order to teach them how to engage in delinquent acts (Unnever et al., 2006). According to this theory, parents may model delinquent behaviour in their children when they coercively punish their children. In addition, parent reinforces this aggressive behaviour when they give their children everything they ask for because the child antagonistically demands it. These parent variables increase crime because they teach the child that crime is an appropriate form of behaviour in certain circumstances.
Hirschi’s social bonding theory and the social learning theory is applicable to studies related to family and traditional socio-cultural background. A number of studies have highlighted the applicability of these two theories in these areas. These two theories have been predominantly in use in the United States to study crime and juvenile delinquency. For this reason, the current study will use the social bonding theory to ascertain how poor parenting causes or contribute to juvenile delinquency in the United States. The study will delve into investigating if bad parenting contributes to juvenile delinquency.
The current study will review prior studies related to bad parenting and juvenile delinquency to investigate if bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. The independent variable in this study is parenting, a variable entailing poor parenting. The dependent variable of this study is juvenile delinquency. The researcher will operationalize the independent variable through classifying the literature reviews into two categories, namely, “bad parenting” and “non-bad parenting.” Once the literature has been categorized, juvenile delinquency will be measured by investigating the behaviours of children raised by these two types of parents.
Empirical Evidence
Numerous studies have sought to investigate the effect of parenting on juvenile delinquency. Many of the studies have employed different approaches as well as emphasized in different areas. As a result, some studies arrived at similar conclusions, while others have arrived at varied conclusions. In this section, literature from previous studies will be reviewed.
Crosby (2017) undertook a study to investigate the factors that contribute to juvenile delinquency. The author examined “Los Angeles Risk and Resiliency Checkup” (LARCC) to determine risk factors regarding juvenile delinquency. The study used a sample of 40 LARRC records of juveniles on probation at a probation facility located in Los Angeles –Los Angeles Probation South Central Gang Unit. The author found that there is a number of factors that contribute to delinquency. These factors ranged from absentee of parents, gang affiliation, crime in the neighbouring surroundings and substance abuse. The findings of this study are pertinent because it addressed one of the factors investigated in the current study, parenting. Crosby found that bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. The small sample employed by the author makes the findings of this study not generalizable and unreliable. In addition, the author used a sample from a single probation facility.
In another study, Meldrum et al. (2016) examined the association of low parental self-control, family environments and juvenile delinquency. The authors used a sample of 101 juveniles from a juvenile justice assessment located in the Southern United States. The authors found that low parental self-control is correlated with juvenile delinquency. More to this, the authors found that family environments mediate the link between parental low self-control and juvenile. Based on supplementary analyses, the authors state that this relationship may be reciprocal. The approach and large sample employed by the authors make the findings of this study are pertinent and generalizable.
Hoeve et al. (2011) undertook a study with the aim to evaluate the cross-sectional and longitudinal links between parenting, both paternal and maternal, and juvenile delinquency in male and female. In their study, Hoeve and his colleagues sampled 330 families that had children in their mid or late adolescent and aged between 14 and 22. The study was conducted in two measurement waves separated by a 5-year interval. The authors found that there is a link between parenting and juvenile delinquency. More specifically, the authors found that neglectful parenting led to higher delinquency levels in males. On the other hand, permissive parenting led to more delinquency in females. Basically, the authors found that parenting style has a significant effect on juvenile delinquency. From this study, we can draw the conclusion that poor parenting can cause juvenile delinquency. The large sample size employed by the study as well as the combination of cross-sectional and longitudinal methods makes the findings of this study generalizable and reliable.
In another study, Picket (2017) examined pubic views about whether maternal employment as a cause of juvenile delinquency. The author used a sample 10,144, which was comprised of registered voters. The examined how maternal employments promote juvenile delinquency. The author found that a small percentage of citizens blame working mothers for youth crime. According to the findings of the study, the criminogenic consequences of working mothers in the delinquent behaviors of their children is linked with gendered self-interest. The large sample and approach employed by the author make the findings of the study generalizable and reliable.
In another study, Unnever et al. (2006) surveyed 2400 children, both boys and girls, from a socioeconomically diverse population to investigate if bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. The participants were drawn from different schools. The authors tested low self-control and social learning theories in explaining the link between parenting and juvenile delinquency. The authors found the effect of various parental aspects on aggressive attitudes and low self-control. Some of the parental aspects that were measured are monitoring, care, and parental reinforcement. More to this is that the authors found aggressive attitudes and low self-control partially mediated the impact of parenting measures on delinquency. According to the authors, bad or ineffective parenting is likely to result in aggressive attitudes and low self-control through both direct control effects such as monitoring and punishment and indirectly through modelling. The authors’ findings are generalizable and reliable due to the sample size used and also due to the diversity of the study. Further, the study confirms the negative effect of bad parenting on juvenile delinquency.
Ingram et al. (2007) undertook a study to investigate the impact of family on delinquency. The authors employed a path analysis model and sampled pre-adolescent youth to test the impact of family structure, parental attachment and parental supervision on delinquent behaviour. The findings of the study were that parenting variables such as attachment and supervision indirectly causes juvenile delinquency. The findings of this study support the hypothesis that bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. Although the findings of this study apply to the pre-adolescent population that was sampled, it adds to the discussion bad parenting causes delinquency in children.
Hoeve et al. (2009) undertook a meta-analytic study to investigate the existence of a relationship between bad parenting and juvenile delinquency. The authors reviewed scholarly sources, both published and unpublished, covering this topic. From their review, the authors found that parenting aspects, for example, monitoring, psychological control, rejection and hostility, causes juvenile delinquency. More to this, the study revealed that the extent to which parenting influenced juvenile delinquency was moderated by a number of factors, which include the age of the child and gender of the child and parent. The meta-analytic approach employed by these authors allows exhaustiveness in the review of previous literature. The study adds to the discussion as it outlines the importance of contextual factors such as age and gender as moderating factors in the link between parenting and delinquency.
Shong et al. (2019) conducted a qualitative case study to examine the effects of poverty on juvenile delinquency. The authors undertook this study based on three major crime-enhancing themes –“miserable family conditions; school failure; and association with deviant peers.” The authors recruited six young offenders aged 13 to 17 years. The participants of the study were from Sekolah Tunas Bakti Sungasi Besi, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The authors found that the three themes were strongly related to delinquency. The approach and the sample used makes the findings of this study not generalizable and unreliable.
However, it is vital to note that some research studies arrived at different conclusions on the impact of poor parenting on juvenile delinquency. One such study is the study taken by Gault-Sherman in 2012. Gault-Sherman felt that the social control model seeking to establish a relationship between parenting and juvenile delinquency failed to consider the reverse effect of delinquency behaviour of children on parental behaviour. Gault-Sherman undertook the study by analysing 18 models of the bidirectional relationship between parental aspects, such as attachment, monitoring and involvement, and delinquency. More to this is that the author examined data from 12,505 youth aged 12 to 17 years in order to evaluate the magnitude of child and parent effect. The author drew his data from the Add Health Study. Using cross-lag regressions, the author found that while bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency, a child’s delinquent behaviour also affected parental attachment. In addition, the author found that no significant parental monitoring was linked to any type of delinquency. Based on his findings, the author concluded that there exists a reciprocal relationship between parenting and juvenile delinquency, given that the observed juvenile delinquency caused by ineffective parenting may be interpreted as such parenting being a reaction to the delinquent acts of the child.
Another study that arrived at a varied conclusion is the study done by Perrone et al. in 2004. Perrone et al. (2004) evaluated the proposition that parenting determines the self-control of a child, which in turn impact a child’s delinquency tendencies. According to the authors, most of the previous studies were based on small and non-random samples. For this reason, the authors employed data from the “National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (NLSAH).” This helped the authors base their study on a nationally representative sample of adolescents. From their study, the authors found that parental efficacy was an essential precursor to self-control. But, the authors also found that the relationship between parental efficacy and juvenile delinquency is not mediated completely by self-control. Thus, the findings of this study contract other findings in which self-control is considered as the main mediators of the link between parenting and delinquency. The fact that low self-control is used in many studies to explain why bad parenting leads to juvenile delinquency, the findings of this study creates contentions and gaps in the literature on the subject.
In another study, Wright et al. (2008) investigated the link between parenting behaviours and children delinquent behaviours. In their study, the authors used a sample of 20,745 students. The authors derived their samples from the original 90,118 students that took part in the NLSAH. The study restricted data to a sample of twins that are monozygotic and dizygotic. The authors estimated a number of variances, including variance in low self-control, delinquent peers, as well as delinquency that can be attributed to genetic influences and measured parenting practices. The authors found that parenting practices do not have a significant impact on low self-control, acquisition of delinquent peers and delinquent involvement. The findings were subject to controlling genetic influences and shared environment. Such observations suggest that previous literature reporting that bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency many have failed to consider the shared genetic linkages between people within a shared environment. Because of this, the role of parenting is systematically overestimated. The findings of this study are pertinent because the sample used is reliable. In addition, the study employs a twin model.
Limitations
Some of the scholarly articles that were reviewed in this study had short time intervals or were cross-sectional. As a result, it was challenging to obtain a clear picture of the longer-term effects of poor parenting on juvenile delinquency. For instance, the cross-sectional and longitudinal study conducted by Hoeve et al. (2011) had a short term interval (5 years). It is vital to note that although bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency, the influence of parents weakens over time (Hoeve et al. 2008). The need to test typological theories of delinquencies is another reason for the need to conduct longitudinal studies that include longer time intervals. Future studies should include long term interval of at least ten years to investigate this relationship.
The second limitation is that most of the studies focused on adolescents. This is despite the fact that many models emphasize the influence of parents or the role of parents during childhood. Two such studies which focused on adolescent when investigating the links between parenting and delinquency are the study conducted by Hoeve et al. (2011) and the study conducted by Ingra et al. (2007). Given that many models emphasize the role of parenting during childhood, studies ought to focus on the links between bad parenting and juvenile delinquency rather than bad parenting and delinquent behaviour in adolescents.
The third limitation is that some of the studies that were reviewed focused on one parent or both parent without differentiating the sex of parents. It is very vital to compare research on mothers with research on fathers and their children. This will help understand the gender that has the most significant impact when investigating the link between bad parenting and juvenile delinquency. For this reason, future studies should address this limitation by involving both genders of parents in their investigations and more clearly differentiate between mother’s and father’s reports on parenting when investigating the relationship between bad parenting and juvenile delinquency.
Most of the scholarly articles reviewed in this study hypothesized that poor parenting caused juvenile delinquency. However, it is vital to note that children also influence their parents. Some of the studies which ignored this fact is the study conducted by Hoeve et al. (2011), Unnever et al. (2006), Ingram et al. (2007), and Hoeve et al. (2009). Most parents tend to change the way they discipline their children once they notice that their child is involved in a delinquent act. Although these studies showed that bad parenting practices preceded delinquent behaviour, we cannot reject the bidirectional view on parent-child relationships. This relationship is acknowledged in the study conducted by Gault-Sherman in 2012, Perrone et al. (2004), and Wright et al. (2008). Therefore, we ought not to rule out the fact that the relationship between bad parenting and juvenile delinquency may be as a result of delinquency on parenting.
Conclusion
The findings of the study have highlighted one of the factors that cause juvenile delinquency, bad parenting. Juvenile delinquency is a serious societal issue. This issue is very prevalent in the United States, and it negatively affects the development of a child as well as the development of a nation as a whole. The development of a nation in the future largely depends on the way its children are prepared in order to take over the roles of the adults when they grow up. Nevertheless, high rates of juvenile delinquency in a nation tend to hamper that transition. This is because it leaves children to spend the development stages of the lives in correctional homes.
Children tend to spend their early lives with their parents or caregivers. The family, which comprises of the father, mother, and close relatives, is one of the primary agencies of socialization. This agency is usually tasked with the role of socializing its members to become good citizens. Given this, bad parenting negatively affects the conducts of children. This is because bad parenting makes children behave contrary to the norms and laws of the land. This study aimed to investigate if bad parenting causes juvenile delinquency. According to the findings of the study, poor parenting, which results from single parenting, child abuse, weak parental attachment, minimum supervision or lack of supervision and weak socialization, leads to weak parent-child attachment, which, in turn, juvenile delinquency. Weak attachments negatively affect the parent-child relationship. This negatively impacts children’s commitment to conventional activities as well as their involvement in socially accepted activities. As a result, the children start to behave centrally to the norms and the laws of the country.
Based on the findings of the study, we recommend nations to implement strategies or to put measures in place that would mitigate the factors that contribute to bad parenting. One such strategy is to support single parents and low-income household. Governments should support these families in the upkeep of their children. This strategy will help lessen the burden on single and poor parents. More to this is that it will limit the number of children deployed to sell on the streets in order to support their upkeep. To add to this, social workers, when exercising their roles as advocators, educators, and brokers, they ought to advocate for policy interventions that are aimed at ensuring children that are abused and neglected are sheltered as well as protected by the state. More to this is that they should educate parents and caregivers on the need to ensure effective supervision and socialization of their children. In order to achieve this, social workers can employ various platforms, such as religious sites, such as churches and mosques and social media. In addition, parents should be equipped to exhibit the best parenting styles. Through this, parents will ensure they develop a strong attachment or a good relationship with their children. Lastly, parents and incorrigible children should be linked to institutions for help.
References
Crosby, O. (2017). Factors that Contribute to Juvenile Delinquency (Doctoral dissertation).
Gault-Sherman, M. (2012). It’s a two-way street: The bidirectional relationship between parenting and delinquency. Journal of Youth and Adolescence , 41(2), 121-145.
Hirschi, T. (2017). Causes and prevention of juvenile delinquency. In The Craft of Criminology (pp. 105-120). Routledge.
Hoeve, M., Blokland, A., Dubas, J. S., Loeber, R., Gerris, J. R., & Van der Laan, P. H. (2008). Trajectories of delinquency and parenting styles. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology , 36(2), 223-235.
Hoeve, M., Dubas, J. S., Eichelsheim, V. I., Van der Laan, P. H., Smeenk, W., & Gerris, J. R. (2009). The relationship between parenting and delinquency: A meta-analysis. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology , 37(6), 749-775.
Hoeve, M., Dubas, J. S., Gerris, J. R., Van der Laan, P. H., & Smeenk, W. (2011). Maternal and paternal parenting styles: Unique and combined links to adolescent and early adult delinquency. Journal of Adolescence , 34(5), 813-827.
Ingram, J. R., Patchin, J. W., Huebner, B. M., McCluskey, J. D., & Bynum, T. S. (2007). Parents, friends, and serious delinquency: An examination of direct and indirect effects among at-risk early adolescents. Criminal Justice Review , 32(4), 380-400.
Meldrum, R. C., Connolly, G. M., Flexon, J., & Guerette, R. T. (2016). Parental low self-control, family environments, and juvenile delinquency. International journal of offender therapy and comparative criminology, 60(14), 1623-1644.
National Institute of Justice. (2015). From juvenile delinquency to young adult offending. Office of Justice Programs . Retrieved from http://www.nij.gov/topics/crime/Pages/delinquency-to-adult-offending.aspx
Perrone, D., Sullivan, C. J., Pratt, T. C., & Margaryan, S. (2004). Parental efficacy, self-control, and delinquency: A test of a general theory of crime on a nationally representative sample of youth. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology , 48(3), 298-312.
Pickett, J. T. (2017). Blame their mothers: Public opinion about maternal employment as a cause of juvenile delinquency. Feminist Criminology, 12(4), 361-383.
Shong, T. S., Abu Bakar, S. H., & Islam, M. R. (2019). Poverty and delinquency: A qualitative study on selected juvenile offenders in Malaysia. International social work, 62(2), 965-979.
Unnever, J. D., Cullen, F. T., & Agnew, R. (2006). Why is “bad” parenting criminogenic? Implications from rival theories. Youth Violence and Juvenile Justice , 4 (1), 3-33.
Wittenborn, M. (2002). The relations between parenting styles and juvenile delinquency. Southern Illinois University Carbondale OpenSIUC , 266, 1-22.
Wright, J., Beaver, K., Delisi, M., & Vaughn, M. (2008). Evidence of negligible parenting influences on self‐control, delinquent peers, and delinquency in a sample of twins. Justice Quarterly , 25(3), 544-569.
