Arrest Patterns Among Youth in Mental Health Systems

描述(由申请人提供)：尽管公共儿童精神卫生系统(CMH人群)的长期使用者在青春期的逮捕率极高，但人们对这一违法行为的细节知之甚少。对这一群体进行有针对性的预防犯罪工作将是有益的，因为他们的逮捕率很高，而且由于他们的系统参与，他们可以进行预防工作。这项研究将考察CMH人群中个体内的终生纵向逮捕模式(犯罪生涯)至25岁。这项研究将描述这些犯罪职业及其相关因素，考察标准MH治疗对他们的影响，并直接比较CMH和非CMH普通罪犯的犯罪职业生涯，所有这些都在性别上。这将为政策制定者提供关于谁以及何时冒犯引导年轻人转向或远离做法的知识，并提供一个基础，以决定基于普通人群犯罪学文献的做法是否适用于CMH人群。以下是本研究的具体目的。1.在一项全州范围的研究中，描述不同的个人内部纵向逮捕模式，并确定其在CMH人群中的个人、家庭和社会环境相关性。2.研究标准卫生保健服务对社区卫生服务人群中25岁以下的司法系统参与模式的影响。3.比较儿童心理健康系统中的青少年与一般犯罪人口中的青少年之间25岁以下的逮捕模式。在拟议的研究中，这些领域将使用一个数据库进行调查，该数据库结合了两个全州行政数据库和人口普查区域信息，以生成个人的人口统计、临床、家庭和邻里特征、完整的终生逮捕史，以及为马萨诸塞州精神卫生部门的青少年病例管理客户使用关键心理健康服务的情况。它还将包含人口统计和社区特征，以及匹配的一般罪犯样本的终身逮捕史。我们的方法融合了犯罪学和精神健康服务研究的方法和视角，为了解CMH青少年的犯罪生涯提供了一个坚实的平台，并指导这一备受忽视的领域的未来研究。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Despite extremely high arrest rates into young adulthood among chronic users of public child mental health systems (CMH population) little is known about the details of this offending. Targeted crime prevention efforts with this population would be beneficial because their arrest rate is high and they are accessible for prevention efforts by virtue of their system involvement. This study will examine lifetime within-individual longitudinal arrest patterns (criminal careers) to age 25 in the CMH population. This study will describe these criminal careers and their correlates, examine the impact of standard MH treatments on them, and directly compare criminal careers of CMH and non-CMH general offenders, all within gender. This will provide policymakers with knowledge about who offends, and when, practices to steer youth towards or away from, and a basis from which to decide whether practices based in the criminology literature of the general population applies well to the CMH population. The following are the Specific Aims of this study. 1. In a statewide study, describe different within-individual longitudinal arrest patterns and identify their individual, family, and socio-environmental correlates within the CMH population. 2. Examine the impact of standard MH services on justice system involvement patterns to the age of 25 among those in the CMH population. 3. Compare arrest patterns to the age of 25, between youth in the Child Mental Health System and youth in the general offending population. These areas will be investigated in the proposed study using a database that combines two statewide administrative data bases and Census tract information to generate individuals' demographic, clinical, family, and neighborhood characteristics, full lifetime arrest histories, and use of key mental health services for adolescent case management clients of the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health. It will also contain demographic and neighborhood characteristics, and lifetime arrest histories of a matched sample of general offenders. Our approach, which mixes the methods and perspectives of criminology and mental health services research, provides a solid platform for learning about the criminal careers of CMH youth, and guiding future research in this much-neglected area.