Crime Causation and the Linkage Between Past and Future Criminal Offending

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Among the best documented empirical regularities in criminology is the positive association between past and future criminality. One interpretation of this association (termed state dependence) is that prior criminal involvement actually increases future criminal propensity. Another (termed population heterogeneity) is that the association is not a reflection of a causal relationship but rather is attributable to persistent differences across individuals in their propensity to engage in crime. One or the other of these interpretations is suggested by many competing general theories of crime. Yet there has been little research attempting to distinguish these two fundamentally different explanations. This project will statistically distinguish the relative importance of the two explanations for the observed positive correlation between past and future criminality. Two widely known panel data sets will be used for the research--the National Youth Survey of U.S. youths and the Farrington and West longitudinal survey of English males. Not only will this research address the relative contributions of state dependence and heterogeneity in explaining the positive association of past to future delinquency/criminality, but also it will illuminate the nature of the association of a variety of individual, familial, and behavioral factors to criminal involvement. Thus, the research will make important contributions to extant general theories of crime.