Delinquency and Depression in the Transition to Adulthood: Toward a Theory of Deviant Adolescent Role Exits to Adult Disadvantage

社会科学家和公众人物普遍推测，社会和心理压力的感觉，通常被描述为绝望或沮丧，是青少年犯罪的主要来源，包括贫民区街道和社区暴力事件的增加，以及特权郊区学校走廊和教室里零星的暴力事件。然而，很少有研究同时考虑青少年时期的犯罪、暴力和抑郁问题。对年轻“气馁”工人失业的猜测同样缺乏衡量青春期和成年早期抑郁情绪的研究基础。来自国家青少年健康纵向研究（Add Health）的数据和本调查的第三波后续调查将用于测试一个模型，该模型考虑了犯罪和抑郁之间的因果关系，以及它们在青春期和成年期早期问题之间的联系。提出的模型推翻了传统的压力理论，认为犯罪行为是抑郁的因果前提，因为犯罪行为增加了暴力、适得其反的同伴网络、药物滥用和法律污名化的暴露。由此产生的抑郁反过来又导致青春期的越轨角色退出，包括辍学、离家出走、少女怀孕、自杀的想法和企图，所有这些都预示着成年后的不利结果，如失业、无家可归、单亲、发病率和死亡率。Add健康调查的初步工作侧重于衡量和测试青少年时期犯罪与抑郁之间的联系，以及接触暴力所起的中介作用。研究结果表明，在预测方向上，从犯罪到抑郁的影响大于反之，幂曲线改善了这些变量之间关系的拟合，并且在线性和半对数模型中，暴力暴露对犯罪对抑郁的影响起中介作用。研究计划的第一年是围绕第一波和第二波增加健康数据建立的，将个人层面的分析扩展到包括同伴网络、脱离学校和药物滥用，并推进到考虑社区、学校、社会网络和汇总个人层面因素的环境影响的多层次模型。研究计划的第二年侧重于2000年新的第三波调查数据，这些数据将提供关于从青春期过渡到成年期的重要信息。大多数受访者届时将在18至22岁之间。那些注定要脱离青少年角色进入成年期的人，从定义上说，这是不成熟的，现在他们已经这样做了。这些人现在将经历成年的最初阶段，我们的理论预测，许多人将经历成年早期的不利因素，这可以与早期的犯罪和抑郁以及随之而来的风险和青春期退出的问题联系起来分析。除了之前的第一波和第二波调查测量涉及暴力、同伴、学校和物质问题的中介风险暴露之外，2000年新的第三波调查将回顾性地测量法律标签和由此产生的污名化的风险。这些项目追踪被告与警方和法院的联系。这些接触的潜在污名化后果将通过早期犯罪自我报告对随后的抑郁、角色退出和成人劣势进行探讨。

John HaganSES-0001753It is common for social scientists and public figures to speculate that feelings of social and psychological strain, usually described as despair or depression, are primary sources of youth crime, including elevated violence in ghetto streets and neighborhoods and sporadic violence in the hallways and classrooms of privileged suburban school. Yet there is little research that simultaneously considers problems of delinquency, violence and depression during adolescence. Speculation about unemployment among young "discouraged" workers similarly lacks a foundation in research that measures depressed feelings during adolescence and early adulthood. Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) and follow-up third wave of this survey that will be used to test a model that considers the causal relationship between delinquency and depression and their linkage through troubled exits from adolescence to early problems in adulthood. The proposed model reverses conventional strain theory in asserting that delinquency acts as a causal antecedent to depression by increasing exposure to violence, counter-productive peer networks, substance abuse and legal stigmatization. The resulting depression leads in turn to deviant role exits from adolescence, including dropping out of school, running away from home, teen pregnancy, and thoughts about and attempts at suicide, all of which anticipate disadvantaged adult outcomes, such as joblessness, homelessness, single parenthood, morbidity and mortality. Preliminary work with the Add Health Survey has focused on measuring and testing the link between delinquency and depression during adolescence, and on the mediating role played by exposure to violence. Findings indicates that this influence is greater in the predicted direction from delinquency to depression than vice versa, with a power curve improving the fit of the relationship between these variables, and exposure to violence acting to mediate the effect of delinquency on depression in both linear and semi-logarithmic models. The first year of the research plan is built around the Wave I and II Add Health data, expanding the individual level analyses to include peer networks, disengagement from school and substance abuse, and advancing to multi-level model that consider the contextual effects of neighborhood, school, social network and aggregated individual level factors. The second year of the research plan focuses on the new Wave III Survey 2000 data which will provide crucial information about transitions from adolescence into adulthood. Most respondents will by this time be between 18 and 22 years of age. Those who were destined to make deviant adolescent role exits to adulthood, which are by definition premature, will now have done so. These individuals now will be moving though the initial stages of adulthood and our theory predicts that many will be experiencing resulting early adult disadvantages, which can be analyzed in relation to earlier delinquency and depression and ensuing risks and problematic exits from adolescence. In addition to the previous Wave I and II measures of exposure to mediating risks involving violence, peer, school and substance problems, the new Wave III Survey 2000 will retrospectively measure risks of legal labeling and resulting stigmatization. These items track contacts of respondents with the police and courts. The potential stigmatizing consequences of these contacts will be explored net of earlier self-reports of delinquency on subsequent depression, role exits and adult disadvantage.