Crime & Delinquency 56(4)

Manipulating Public Opinion About Trying Juveniles as Adults: An Experimental Study
Laurence Steinberg and Alex R. Piquero

Public attitudes about juvenile crime play a significant role in fashioning juvenile justice policy; variations in the wording of public opinion surveys can produce very different responses and can result in inaccurate and unreliable assessments of public sentiment. Surveys that ask about policy alternatives in vague terms are especially problematic. The authors conducted an experiment in which a large sample of respondents were presented with a crime scenario in which the offender’s age and prior record, the type of crime, and the inclusiveness of the policy in question were varied. Respondents were asked about the extent to which they support trying juveniles in adult court. Responses varied significantly as a function of the offender’s age, criminal record, and offense but not as a function of inclusiveness. For legislators using public opinion polls to guide their decisions, blanket statements describing the results of vaguely worded surveys items can be misleading and can lead to poorly informed policy making.

The Recidivism Patterns of Previously Deported Aliens Released From a Local Jail: Are They High-Risk Offenders?
Laura J. Hickman and Marika J. Suttorp

Previously deported aliens are a group about which numerous claims are made but very few facts are known. Using data on male deportable aliens released from a local jail, the study sought to test the ubiquitous claim that they pose a high risk of recidivism. Using multiple measures of recidivism and propensity score weighting to account for preexisting group differences, the authors find consistent support for the assertion that previously deported aliens are a high recidivism risk. Relative to similarly situated deportable aliens with no record of deportation, previously deported aliens are more likely to be rearrested, to be rearrested more quickly, and to be rearrested more frequently in a 1-year follow-up period.

Practitioner Views of Priorities, Policies, and Practices in Juvenile Justice
Daniel P. Mears, Tracey L. Shollenberger, Janeen B. Willison, Colleen E. Owens, and Jeffrey A. Butts

Dramatic changes in juvenile justice have occurred in recent decades. One result has been the emergence of new policies and practices, many of which remain largely unexamined. One avenue for gaining insight into whether such policies and practices are needed or effective, as well as into how the juvenile justice system might be improved, is to tap into the perceptions of people who work within this system. Drawing on a national survey of juvenile court practitioners, the authors investigate key questions about the effectiveness of juvenile justice and discuss the implications of the study’s findings for research, policy, and practice.

Understanding Community Policing as an Innovation: Patterns of Adoption
Melissa Schaefer Morabito

In the 1980s and 1990s, community policing was viewed by many as a radical innovation in the field of policing, with the vast majority of police agencies reporting to have adopted the approach. Despite its overwhelming popularity, most police agencies did not adopt the central elements of community policing. This study examines patterns of community policing adoption of 474 police departments across the United States. Using an innovations framework, a model was developed that measures the extent to which community characteristics, organizational complexity, and organizational commitment can explain differences in the adoption of community policing. Findings suggest that the innovations approach can explain some variation in the adoption of community policing and should be considered in future police research.

Social Support and Feelings of Hostility Among Released Inmates
Andy Hochstetler, Matt DeLisi, and Travis C. Pratt

There is broad consensus that the strains of imprisonment and unsupported release affect offenders’ mental health and operate to the detriment of their chances of successful reintegration. Drawing on data from 208 male inmates, the authors examine the mediating and moderating influences of social support on the links between inmates’ perceptions of prison conditions and other background variables on parolees’ feelings of hostility—a factor theoretically linked to reoffending—upon release. The results demonstrate that social support partially or completely mediates background characteristics and conditions the influence of prison perceptions on released inmates’ levels of hostility.

Is a Risky Lifestyle Always "Risky"? The Interaction Between Individual Propensity and Lifestyle Risk in Adolescent Offending: A Test in Two Urban Samples
Robert Svensson and Lieven Pauwels

This study examines the effects on adolescent offending of lifestyle risk and the individual propensity to offend. It is assumed that lifestyle risk will have a more important effect on offending for those individuals with high levels of individual propensity, whereas for individuals with low levels of individual propensity it is assumed that a risky lifestyle will not, or will only marginally, influence their involvement in offending. The data are drawn from two different samples of young adolescents in Antwerp, Belgium (N = 2,486), and Halmstad, Sweden (N = 1,003). The data provide strong support for the hypothesis that the effect of lifestyle risk is dependent on the strength or weakness of individual propensity, indicating that lifestyle risk has a stronger effect on delinquency for individuals with a high propensity to offend. The similarity of the results across two independent samples suggests the findings are stable.

Completely Out of Control or the Desire to Be in Complete Control? How Low Self-Control and the Desire for Control Relate to Corporate Offending
Nicole Leeper Piquero, Andrea Schoepfer, and Lynn Langton

Whereas Gottfredson and Hirschi’s general theory of crime asserts that individuals with low self-control are more likely to engage in all types of crime as well as analogous acts, some research has recently questioned the generality of the theory, particularly with regard to its explanation of corporate crime. In addition, recent research has shown that another individual characteristic—the desire for control, or the general wish to be in control over everyday life events—may help shed greater light on understanding corporate criminality. Based on data from a factorial survey administered to working adults enrolled in business classes, the relationship between these two concepts was examined, with attention paid to the ability of each to explain corporate crime. Results indicate that neither an attitudinal nor a behavioral measure of low self-control relates to corporate offending but that the desire for control does. Theoretical implications and future directions are discussed.

Crime & Delinquency, October 2010: Volume 56, Issue 4