Does contact with the justice system deter or promote future delinquency? Results from a longitudinal study of British adolescent twins

Deterrence vs. Labeling Theory: A Longitudinal Study of British Adolescent Twins

Introduction

• The study investigates whether contact with the justice system deters or promotes future delinquency in British adolescent twins.

• Contrasting perspectives exist: labeling theory suggests that formal punishments promote future misbehavior, while deterrence theory posits that punishment deters future misbehavior.

• The study uses a nationally representative sample of British adolescent twins from the Environmental Risk (E-Risk) Longitudinal Twin Study.

• A powerful research design is employed where twins serve as the counterfactual for their co-twin, controlling for confounding factors.

Key Concepts

• Deterrence Theory: Contact with the justice system reduces future offending by teaching offenders that the costs of crime outweigh the benefits.

• Labeling Theory: Contact with the justice system increases the chances of later offending by initiating a self-fulfilling prophecy where the individual perceives themselves as a "bad apple."

• Parens Patriae: The doctrine that juvenile justice systems were established to embrace, emphasizing treatment and rehabilitation of wayward youth.

• Family Fixed-Effects Design: A methodological approach used to adjust for potential confounds at the family level, such as early rearing environment, neighborhood effects, and genetic inheritance.

• ASBO (Anti-Social Behaviour Order): A civil order in the United Kingdom given to individuals deemed to have acted in an antisocial manner, intended to deter future antisocial behavior.

Historical Context

• In the 1960s and 1970s, skepticism grew regarding the legitimacy of social institutions like the justice system due to a lack of faith in correctional programming.

• Martinson (1974) and Brody (1976) presented critiques questioning the ability of correctional programming to rehabilitate offenders and reduce recidivism.

• Martinson (1974, p. 25) stated, "[T]he rehabilitative efforts that have been reported so far have had no appreciable effect on recidivism."

• Brody (1976, p. 37) similarly stated, "Reviewers of research … have unanimously agreed that the results have so far offered little hope that a reliable and simple remedy for recidivism can be easily found."

• These critiques led to reductions in rehabilitative programming and the rise of the "get tough" era in the United States and the neo-correctionalist model in the United Kingdom.

• The pendulum is swinging back toward rehabilitation with reduced punitive actions against delinquent youth and increased discomfort with deterrence theory.

Theoretical Framework

Deterrence Theory

• Rooted in the philosophies of Beccaria (1963/1764) and Bentham (1948/1789), assuming humans are rational, hedonistic, and willing to express free will.

• Individuals weigh the benefits of offending against the costs of apprehension.

• Justice system punishments that are swift, certain, and severe demonstrate that crime does not pay because the expected utility loss outweighs the expected utility gains.

• General Deterrence: Knowledge of potential punishment discourages society from engaging in criminal acts.

• Specific/Individual Deterrence: The pains of punishments experienced by an active offender will discourage that individual from future criminal activity.

Labeling Theory

• State intervention and labeling lead to the "dramatization of evil" (Tannenbaum, 1938, pp. 19-20).

• The process of making the criminal involves tagging, defining, identifying, segregating, describing, emphasizing, making conscious and self-conscious, stimulating, suggesting, emphasizing, and evoking the very traits that are complained of.

• Official responses to deviant behavior by the justice system increase the likelihood of future criminal involvement.

• Contemporary labeling theories suggest that an increase in deviancy after justice system contact arises from:

  • Structural impediments to conventional life as a direct result of the label (e.g., difficulty finding employment or housing).

  • Transformation of one's identity such that the new identity accepts a criminal lifestyle, leading to a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Hypotheses

• Deterrence Hypothesis: Spending time in jail or prison, receiving an ASBO, or having an official crime record will decrease later delinquency.

• Labeling Hypothesis: Spending time in jail or prison, receiving an ASBO, or having an official crime record will increase later delinquency.

Addressing Individual Differences

• Mixed results in prior studies are partly due to the failure to account for preexisting individual differences that may cause some individuals to have a higher risk of coming into contact with the justice system.

• Scholars have sought to test deterrence and labeling but have struggled to disentangle causal effects from selection effects due to their reliance on observable variables.

• Unobserved selection bias may confound estimates of the causal impact of justice system contact on subsequent antisocial behavior.

Methodology: Family Fixed-Effects Design

• This study leverages a unique sample and a powerful methodological design to account for the confounding influences of selection bias.

• The family fixed-effects design adjusts for potential confounds at the family level, such as early rearing environment, neighborhood effects, and genetic inheritance (Becker & Tomes, 1986; Heckman & Mosso, 2014).

• Family confounds capture factors that make members of the same family similar to one another, offering "a natural solution" to ruling out sources of confounding in criminological research (Moffitt & Beckley, 2015, p. 123).

Twin Studies

• Twins can be monozygotic (MZ) sharing 100% of their DNA or dizygotic (DZ) sharing, on average, 50%.

• Twins tend to share much of their rearing environment.

• Kohler, Behrman, and Schnittker (2011, p. 91) noted that twins have been extensively used to control for genetic and other background, unobserved, confounding factors.

• When there is discordance on justice system contact, it can be used to estimate the impact of justice system contact on later misbehavior.

• The twin who has come into contact with the justice system can be considered the "treated case," and his or her co-twin can be used to estimate the counterfactual.

Data and Sample

• Data from the Environmental Risk (E-Risk) Longitudinal Twin Study, a longitudinal and nationally representative study of 2,232 same-sex British twins born in England and Wales from 1994 through 1995 (Trouton, Spinath, & Plomin, 2002).

• The sample was constructed in 1999 to 2000 when 1,116 families (93% of those eligible) with same-sex 5-year-old twins participated in home-visit assessments (Moffitt & E-Risk Study Team, 2002).

• The sample was evenly distributed across sex (49% male) and comprised 56% monozygotic (MZ; identical) and 44% dizygotic (DZ; fraternal) twin pairs.

• Follow-up home visits were conducted when the participants were aged 7 (98% participation), 10 (96%), 12 (96%), and 18 (93%).

• The final analytical sample was $n = 1,903$ individuals (comprising 901 twin pairs).

Measures

Dependent Variable: Delinquency at Age 18

• A variety index of delinquent behaviors taken from the age-18 interview.

• Self-reported involvement in delinquency was assessed through a computer questionnaire.

• The specific delinquent offenses included fighting (10%), bullying (13%), being cruel to others (9%), being cruel to animals (2%), using weapons (2%), vandalism (19%), lying (42%), robbery (1%), shoplifting (26%), breaking into homes or cars to steal (6%), running away (10%), and truancy (35%).

• Responses were coded no = 0 and yes = 1, such that summing across the 13 items created a variety index.

• The resulting index had a mean of 2.05, a standard deviation of 2.25, and ranged between 0 and 11.

Key Independent Variables

• Jail/Prison: Whether the participant had ever spent a night in police custody, jail, or prison (5%).

• Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO): Whether the participant had ever been issued an ASBO (1.4%).

• Crime Record: Whether the participant had been cautioned or convicted before age 17 (7%).

Covariates

• Self-reported delinquency at age 12.

• A composite scale of mother- and teacher-reported externalizing problems at age 12.

• A multi-occasion/multi-informant factor tapping into low self-control during the twin's first decade of life.

• Cognitive ability at age 12 measured via the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (2003).

• Educational achievement based on their performance on the General Certificate of Secondary Education.

• A parent-reported indicator of which twin was born first within the pair (twin identifier).

Analysis Plan

The analysis proceeded in three interrelated steps:

1. Association between contact with the justice system and delinquency at age 18.

2. Family fixed-effects model using the full sample (MZ and DZ twin pairs).

3. Family fixed-effects model restricted to MZ twin pairs.

The family fixed-effects model can be expressed algebraically as:

$Y<em>{id} - Y</em>{2j} = \alpha + b<em>1(x</em>{1i} - x<em>{2i}) + b</em>2(c<em>{1i} - c</em>{2i}) + (e<em>{1j} - e</em>{2j})$

Where:

• $Y<em>{id} - Y</em>{2j}$ captures the within-twin pair difference in delinquency between twin 1 and twin 2 in family j.

• $\alpha$ represents the mean within-twin pair difference observed in the sample.

• $b_1$ reflects the effect of within-twin pair differences in the key independent variable on the outcome.

• $b_2$ represents the collective influence of the covariates.

• $e<em>{1j} - e</em>{2j}$ estimates the impact of unmeasured within-twin pair differences on the outcome.

Results

Spending a Night in Jail or Prison

• Consistent with labeling theory, spending a night in jail/prison was associated with higher levels of delinquency at age 18.

• The effect was statistically significant (p < .001).

• The effect size estimate was $b = 3.648$, indicating that youth who reported spending a night in jail/prison self-reported more than 3.5 more acts of delinquency on average compared with youth who had not spent a night in jail/prison.

• Positive associations support the labeling hypothesis.

Being Issued an Anti-Social Behaviour Order (ASBO)

• Consistent with the labeling hypothesis, being issued an ASBO was associated with an increase in delinquency at age 18.

• Twins who had been issued an ASBO, on average, increased in delinquency from age 12 to age 18 by 2.990 points (p < .001).

• Positive associations support the labeling hypothesis.

Having an Official Crime Record

• Consistent with the labeling hypothesis, having a crime record was associated with an increase in delinquency at age 18.

• Twins who had a crime record on average, increased in delinquency from age 12 to age 18 by 0.681 points (p < .05).

• Positive associations support the labeling hypothesis.

Discussion and Conclusion

• The study found that contact with the justice system through spending a night in jail/prison, being issued an ASBO, or having an official crime record promotes misbehavior, supporting the labeling hypothesis.

• This study provides rigorous nonexperimental methodological designs capable of accounting for a wide range of selection effects and confounding influences.

• The pattern of findings was substantively consistent across specifications of justice system contact, providing robust support for the labeling hypothesis.

• Analyzing broad-spectrum delinquency rather than an official outcome allowed the study to observe changes in behavior not biased by the actions of justice system actors.

• Relying on a sample of individuals within the primary age range for engaging in antisocial behavior (i.e., 18-year-olds) captures the impact of justice system contact for those peaking in their criminal careers.

Limitations

• Participants were asked whether they had ever been in jail/prison or had ever been issued an ASBO during the age-18 interviews without specifying the exact age when these events occurred.

• The study was focused on one cohort of twins from the United Kingdom, requiring replication using twins (or siblings) from other countries and potentially from other birth cohorts.

Broader Considerations

• With evidence that the impact of contact with the justice system is negative, the system may not be motivating individuals to conform to societal norms but rather leading them to doubt their ability to change.

• Findings suggest that the justice system is for justice and retribution, with specific deterrence being unlikely.

• Policy recommendations include diverting low-risk offenders from official justice system channels and implementing strategies to prevent labeling effects if arrest rates remain at their current levels.