Derek A. Kreager

Deterring Delinquents: A Rational Choice Model of Theft and Violence

This article examines criminal behavior from a rational choice perspective, the set of behavioral principles underlying our legal institution. The authors use a subjective utility approach and specify experiential learning models of the formation of risk perceptions and rational choice models of theft and violence. They estimate the models using panel data on high risk youth from the Denver Youth Survey. Using random effects Tobit models of perceived risk and negative binomial models of counts of criminal acts, the authors find support for a rational choice model. Perceived risk follows a Bayesian updating model in which current risk perceptions are a function of prior risk perceptions plus new information based on experience with crime and arrest and observations of peers. Theft and violence are a function of the perceived risk of arrest, subjective psychic rewards (including excitement and social status), and perceived opportunities.

Too Cool for School? Violence, Peer Status and High School Dropout

Research shows that peer status in adolescence is positively associated with school achievement and adjustment. However, subculture theories of juvenile delinquency and school-based ethnographies suggest that (1. disadvantaged boys are often able to gain some forms of peer status through violence and (2. membership in violent groups undermines educational attainment. Building on these ideas, we use peer network data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to examine whether peer status within highly violent groups increases male risks of high school dropout. Consistent with the subcultural argument, we find that disadvantaged boys with high status in violent groups are at much greater risks of high school dropout than other students.

Dangerous liaisons? Dating and drinking diffusion in adolescent peer networks

The onset and escalation of alcohol consumption and romantic relationships are hallmarks of adolescence. Yet only recently have these domains jointly been the focus of sociological inquiry. We extend this literature by connecting alcohol use, dating, and peers to understand the diffusion of drinking behavior in school-based friendship networks. Drawing on Granovetter’s classic concept of weak ties, we argue that adolescent romantic partners are likely to be network bridges, or liaisons, connecting daters to new peer contexts that, in turn, promote changes in individual drinking behaviors and allow these behaviors to spread across peer networks. Using longitudinal data of 449 couples from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health, we estimate Actor–Partner Interdependence Models and identify unique contributions of partners’ drinking, friends’ drinking, and friends-of-partners’ drinking to daters’ own future binge drinking and drinking frequency. Findings support the liaison hypothesis and suggest that friends-of-partners’ drinking have net associations with adolescent drinking patterns. Moreover, the coefficient for friends-of-partners’ drinking is larger than the coefficient for one’s own peers and generally immune to prior selection. Our findings suggest that romantic relationships are important mechanisms for understanding the diffusion of emergent problem behaviors in adolescent peer networks.

Strangers in the Halls: Isolation and Delinquency in School Networks

Although criminologists have long recognized the strong correlation between a persons delinquency and the delinquency of his or her friends, the mechanisms underlying this relationship remain elusive. The current study adds to research on peers and delinquency by exploring the behaviors of adolescents isolated from school friendship networks. Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health) allow me to identify an isolated population and test theoretically derived hypotheses. Results suggest that low peer attachment in and of itself fails to increase future delinquency. However, isolation in conjunction with problematic peer encounters at school was found to significantly increase delinquency and delinquent peer associations. The theoretical implications of this interaction are discussed.

A Theory of the Value of Grandchildren

As innovations in medical technology extend average longevity, grandparents become increasingly present during the lives of their grandchildren. We propose a theory that seeks to explain differential investment in grandchildren. The theory relies on a fundamental assumption of uncertainty reduction to explain why grandparents in post-industrial societies might find it rational to invest in at least one of their grandchildren. We advance numerous illustrative hypotheses about end of life uncertainty, as well as proportional and differential investments in grandchildren, and discuss the relevance of existing empirical literature.

Toward a Criminology of Inmate Networks

The mid-twentieth century witnessed a surge of American prison ethnographies focused on inmate society and the social structures that guide inmate life. Ironically, this literature virtually froze in the 1980s just as the country entered a period of unprecedented prison expansion, and has only recently begun to thaw. In this manuscript, we develop a rationale for returning inmate society to the forefront of criminological inquiry, and suggest that network science provides an ideal framework for achieving this end. In so doing, we show that a network perspective extends prison ethnographies by allowing quantitative assessment of prison culture and illuminating basic characteristics of prison social structure that are essential for improving inmate safety, health, and community reentry outcomes. We conclude by demonstrating the feasibility and promise of inmate network research with findings from a recent small-scale study of a maximum-security prison work unit.

Guarded Borders: Adolescent Interracial Romance and Peer Trouble at School

Assimilation theorists have long viewed inter-group romantic partnerships as indicators of racial equality. Although the past half-century has witnessed the erosion of anti-miscegenation laws and subsequent increases in the frequency of interracial marriages, these unions remain relatively infrequent. Low intermarriage rates may be partially explained by the informal sanctions leveled at young interracial romances. This study tests whether adolescents who interracially date are at greater risks of peer difficulties than intra-racially dating youth. Results demonstrate a positive relationship between adolescent interracial dating and peer trouble at school. As hypothesized from ethnographic research and theories of inter-group relations, results suggest that interracial romances activate peer sanctions and that these reactions are strongest when romances involve black students.

Where “Old Heads” Prevail: Inmate Hierarchy in a Men’s Prison Unit

Research on inmate social order, a once-vibrant area, receded just as U.S. incarceration rates climbed and the country’s carceral contexts dramatically changed. This study returns to inmate society with an abductive mixed-methods investigation of informal status within a contemporary men’s prison unit. We collected narrative and social network data from 133 male inmates housed in a unit of a Pennsylvania medium-security prison. Analyses of inmate narratives suggest that unit “old heads” provide collective goods in the form of mentoring and role modeling that foster a positive and stable peer environment. We test this hypothesis with Exponential Random Graph Models (ERGMs) of peer nomination data. The ERGM results complement the qualitative analysis and suggest that older inmates and inmates who have been on the unit longer are perceived by their peers as powerful and influential. Both analytic strategies point to the maturity of aging and the acquisition of local knowledge as important for attaining informal status in the unit. In summary, this mixed-methods case study extends theoretical insights of classic prison ethnographies, adds quantifiable results capable of future replication, and points to a growing population of older inmates as important for contemporary prison social organization.

Delinquency and Peer Acceptance in Adolescence: A Within-Person Test of Moffitt's Hypotheses.

We tested 2 hypotheses derived from Moffitts (1993) taxonomic theory of antisocial behavior, both of which are central to her explanation for the rise in delinquency during adolescence. We tested whether persistently delinquent individuals become more accepted by their peers during adolescence and whether individuals who abstain from delinquent behavior become less accepted. Participants were 4,359 adolescents from 14 communities in the PROSPER study, which assessed friendship networks and delinquency from 6th (M = 11.8 years) to 9th (M = 15.3 years) grade. We operationalized peer acceptance as number of nominations received (indegree centrality), attractiveness as a friend (adjusted indegree centrality), and network bridging potential (betweenness centrality) and tested the hypotheses with multilevel modeling. Contrary to Moffitts hypothesis, persistently delinquent youths did not become more accepted between early and middle adolescence, and although abstainers were less accepted in early adolescence, they became more accepted over time. Results were similar for boys and girls; when differences occurred, they provided no support for Moffitts hypotheses for boys and were opposite of her hypotheses for girls. Sensitivity analyses in which alternative strategies and additional data were used to identify persistently delinquent adolescents produced similar results. We explore the implications of these results for Moffitts assertions that social mimicry of persistently antisocial adolescents leads to increases in delinquency and that social isolation leads to abstention. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved).

Group Differences in Delinquency What Is There to Explain

Race and ethnic difference in delinquency are examined using the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. We argue that crime theories that attempt to explain race and ethnic differences imply consistent effects for different offenses and common mediating processes. Analyses suggest some degree of group consistency in delinquent behaviors for Mexican Americans, Puerto Ricans, Native Americans, and some Asian groups, but not for African Americans. Black youth have higher rates of violent offenses than White youth, lower rates of substance use, and similar rates of property offending. Some variables are consistent mediators while others are not. Crime theories can account for the low rates of delinquency among Asian Americans while theories of violence and substance use are needed to understand differences between Black and White youth. The findings are inconsistent with the idea that group differences among youth are due to the socioeconomic status of their families or neighborhoods. The race patterns are also inconsistent with the stereotype of high crime rates in Black communities.