Download Social Control Theory and Delinquency: An Analysis of Hirschi's Four Bond Elements and more Study notes Social Theory in PDF only on Docsity!
SOCUL CONTROL THEORY AND DELINQUENCY*
MICHAEL D. WIATROWSKI DAVID B. GRISWOLD Florida Atlantic University
MARY K. ROBERTS University of Florida
Hirschi's social control theory proposes that delinquents fail to form or maintain a bond to society consisting of attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief. Using data from the Youth in Transition Study, the present report develops and tests multivariate models of social control theory which simultaneously consider how the four bond elements operate in relation to delinquency. Factor analysis and communality analysis examine the uniqueness of the four bond elements, and revised and additional measures are suggested. Background factors-measures of social class and ability-are added to the model, and a revised formulation of social control is suggested.
Hirschi's (1969) Causes of Delinquency is a benchmark for theory construction and research in the delinquency field. The theory rests on the Hobbesian assumption that human behavior is not inherently conforming, "but that we are all animals and thus naturally capable of committing criminal acts" (Hirschi, 1%9:3I). Since delinquency is intrinsic to human nature, it is conformity that must be explained. Conformity is achieved through socializa- tion, the formation of a bond between in- dividual and society comprised of four major elements: attachment, commit- ment, involvement, and belief. The stronger each element of the social bond, the less likely delinquent behavior.
- Direct all correspondence to Michael D. Wia- trowski. Department of Criminal Justice, Florida At- lantic University, Boca Raton, FL 33431. Special thanks to Dr. Gary Gottfredson and Dr. Don C. Gibbons for their assistance with this manu- script. Thanks also to Dr. Jerald Bachman, Dr. Travis Hirschi, and the reviewers for their comments on earlier drafts. The data used, originally collected by Jerald Bachman, were made available by the Inter- University Consortium for Political and Social Re- search. The responsibility for the analyses or in- terpretations presented here is mine alone. Prepara- tion of this report was supported by grants NIE-G- 78-0210 and NIE-G-80-0113 to the Center for Social Organization of Schools, The Johns Hopkins Uni- versity. The opinions expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the positioti or policy of the Na- tional Institute of Education, and no official en- dorsement by the Institute should be inferred.
Attachment corresponds to the affec- tive ties which the youth forms to signifi- cant others. The family environment is the source of attachment because parents act as role models and teach their children socially acceptable behavior. Commitment is related to the aspiration of going to college and attaining a high- status job. This is an investment in con- ventional behavior which the youth risks should he become delinquent. In contrast to youths with well-defined goals, adoles- cents engaged in drinking, smoking, dat- ing, and other behavior not oriented toward future goals are much more likely to get involved in delinquent behavior. Involvement refers to participation in conventional activities which lead toward socially valued success and status objec- tives. The quality of a youth's activities and their relationship to future goals and objectives are important in preventing de- linquency. Time spent on homework, for example, is viewed as antecedent to suc- cess in attaining educational goals which are prerequisites to high-status occu- pations. Belief is acceptance of the moral va- lidity of the central social-vaJue system (Hirschi, 1969:203). This variation in the acceptance of social rules is central to so- cial control theory, because the less rule- bound people feel, the more likely they are to break rules (Hirschi, 1969:26). Hirschi (1969:26) argues that there is one
American Sociological Review 1981, Vo!. 46 (October.525-341) 525
526 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
dominant set of values and that even de- linquents may recognize the validity of those values, although they may not feel bound by them because of weakened ties to the dominant social order.
HIRSCHI'S DATA ANALYSIS
Although Hirschi's theory fares better than subcultural and differential associa- tion theory, Empey (1978:239) implies that the theory's empirical support falls short of complete explanation, Hirschi does not consider how his four elements might act simultaneously to affect the likelihood of delinquent behavior. In addition, instead of empirically analyzing the relationships among the elements of the bond, he sim- ply hypothesizes relationships between attachment and commitment, commit- ment and involvement, and attachment and belief. Consequently, Hirschfs theory construction and data analysis raise three related questions. First, the extent to which Hirschi's four elements represent empirically distinct components of so- cialization is unclear. If most of the vari- ance explained in the criterion is shared by the four elements, they would not con- stitute analytically distinct elements of the bond. Second, why are only four elements of the bond identified? The modest pre- dictive power of Hirschi's constructs sug- gests that additional elements of the bond should be considered. Third, although educational and occupational aspirations are central to Hirschi's theory, he fails to incorporate constructs—such as family socioeconomic level, ability, and significant-others' influence—that re- search has determined to be important in the development of these aspirations (Haller and Portes, 1973; Sewell, Haller, and Portes, 1969). Hirschi worries about this, but his examination of the zero-order correlations of delinquency and social class finds that there is no important re- lationship between social class and delin- quency (1969:75). Nevertheless, Hirschi (1969:73) suggests that this relationship may be suppressed by some third, inter- vening variable.
The present research addresses the foregoing three issues. First, we create measures of each of Hirschfs four ele-
ments and estimate how much each ele- ment contributes over and above the others to the explanation of delinquent behavior. Second, we examine more closely the structure of the social bond, using factor analysis to discover and de- fine new elements. Finally, we perform two multivariate analyses, incorporating measures of social class, ability, and grades as well as elements of the social bond. The first analysis, using Hirschfs four elements, is intended to replicate and extend, rather than extensively reformu- late, his study. Finally, we develop and evaluate a revised model, based on the factor analysis, which is somewhat more p a r s i m o n i o u s and complete than Hirschi's.
DATA AND MEASURES Data were obtained from the Youth in Transition Study (Bachman, 1975). This is a longitudinal study of 2213 tenth-grade boys from 87 schools who were surveye_d in 1966 in five waves of data collection. The use of concurrent measures parallels Hirschi's (1969) research, A multistage probability sample was used to provide an essentially unbiased representation of tenth-grade boys in public high schools throughout the United States (Bachman, O'Malley, and Johnston, 1978:3).' The selection of information was guided by Hirschi's (1969) discussion and re- search. Since the exact items used in Hirschi's study were not available, equally weighted composite scales were con- structed from items which coincided with Hirschi's constructs. The selection of dis- similar items creates the possibility that differences in results are attributable to
' Originally 88 schools selected from the Univer- sity of Michigan's Survey Research Center's primary sampling units were invited to participate in the study and 71 consented. Replacement schools were found in the same geographic area for all but one school. Approximately 25 males were selected from each school, and of the 2,277 boys who were invited to be members of the survey group, 2,213 (over 97%) chose to participate. This would indicate that nonrespondents and dropouts were not a serious problem (Bachman, O'Malley, and Johnston, 1978: 2-4). Participation rates for waves 2 through 5 were 85.2, 81.3, 73.2, and 73.5%.
items were not made available. While it would have been desirable to restrict the items to criminal offenses and exclude tri- vial offenses, this was not possible. How- ever, the items included in the index have a high alpha coefficient of .85, which demonstrates their internal consistency. Hirschi's study used two items from Nye and Short's (1957) seven-item delin- quency scale and four items from Dentler and Monroe's (1961) five-item "theft scale." Nye and Short's research has been criticized for including trivial items (Hin- delang et al., 1979) as have other early self-report instruments (Elliott and Age- ton, 1979). Differences in the findings of this study and those of Hirschi may be due to the different measures of the dependent variables. In the Youth in Transition study report there was no direct validation of delin- quency measures against official police reports. There is evidence, however, con- cerning the validity of the scale items (Bachman, et al., 1978:172) and the self- report method in general (Elliott and Ageton, 1980:96; Hardt and Hardt, 1977). These include the concurrence of the Youth in Transition findings with other studies, the stability of responses over an eight-year period, the internal consistency of attitudinal and behavioral data, and methodological studies that indicate in- frequent affirmative responses to the use of fictitious drugs. The authors conclude that the validity of a variable is a matter of individual judgment and that their "... measures are basically valid" (Bachman, O'Malley, and Johnston, 1978:173). Socioeconomic level was measured with a scale of five items that were equally weighted to form an index: father's occu- pational status, parent's education, pos- sessions in the home, number of books in the home, and the number of rooms per person in the home. Mental ability was measured using scores on the General Aptitude Test Battery for verbal and math ability.
COMMUNALITY ANALYSIS
Hirschi theorizes that there are four sepa- rate elements of the social bond. In statis- tical terms this means that the four mea-
AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
sures are independent of each other—that each makes at least some unique contri- bution to predicting delinquency. The ex- tent to which the elements do make unique contributions is examined in this section. First, the extent to which delin- quency is predictable using all the mea- sures assumed to tap some element of the bond is estimated. Then composite mea- sures, constructed on the basis of Hirschi's (1969) theory, are used to predict delinquency, and the unique contribution of each composite is examined. Tables 1 and 2 summarize the first part of these results. The proportion of the variance of delinquency explained by all 23 individual indicators of the bond was .318. The unique variance attributable to each element of the bond was obtained by subtracting the squared multiple correla- tion of all bond elements except those as- sumed related to the element under con-
Table 1. Regression of Delinquency on Individual Measures Assumed to be Associated with the Element6 of the Bond Bond element and variable Attachment CLOSMOM CLOSFATH HOWIMPF TIMWFRN POSSCHI NEGSCHI ACAACHI ABILCON TCHINTR Commitment DUNASPI CLAROCPL RCVOJT COMPHS RCVMILT RCVVOC ATNDCOL MADECOLP DATEIND Involve TIMEHW DSCHWFR XTRASCH Belief HONESTI GUILTIN R' -.
r
-.261* -.243* -. .
-. 3 1 3 ' .302« -.256* -.102* -.163* -. 0 8 5 ' . . -. 1 3 7 ' . . -.158* . .372*
-.155« -.160*
-. 1 8 1 '
-.319* -.155*
Beta
-.120* -.101* . -.
-. 0 8 3 ' .104' -. . -. 0 4 5 "
.060" -. -. -. . -. -. . .332'
-.082* -. -.050««
-.136* .069*
- p S .05. " pS .01.
SOCIAL CONTROL THEORY AND DELINQUENCY 529
Table 2. Total Association and Unique Contribu- tion of Each Category of Predictors
Set of predictors Attachment Commitment Involvement Belief All Predictors
Number of measures tn the set 9 9 3 2 23
Total associa- tion . . . . .
Unique contri- bution . . . . — NOTE: Total association is the squared multiple correlation of a set of predictors with delinquency. The unique contribution of a set of predictors is the incremental validity of the set. That is, it is the gain in R^ achievement when that set is added to the regression equation after all other predictors have already been used in a regression equation.
sideration from the squared multiple cor- relation obtained when all bond elements are used to predict delinquency. In Table 3 the variances for each element of the bond are indicated along with the ex- plained variance for an element operating by itself. The unique variances for each element are quite low, ranging from. for involvement items to .109 for com- mitment. An alternative interpretation of the low amount of uniqueness is that un- derlying these measures of the bond there exists a general factor called socialization, and that these elements along with other undefined elements of the bond are nega- tively correlated with delinquency be- cause delinquency is negatively correlated with the larger construct of socialization. One criticism of the communality analysis presented above is that categories of bond measures containing a larger number of measures may be expected to be associated with more variance in the criterion because of their number alone.
In addition, the use of multiple indicators of each bond element does not allow for a simple presentation of control theory. To deal with these problems, scales were formed for each bond element and the communality analysis was again per- formed. Scales were constructed by examining the correlation matrix and determining which items within an element such as attachment or commitment were posi- tively correlated with each other. Appen- dix B describes the measures used in Ta- bles 3, 4, 5, and 6. The correlation matrix and alpha reliability coefficients for each scale are presented in Table 3. The com- mitment and belief scales were difficult to construct because the items which were initially chosen to operationally represent an element formed scales with unac- ceptably low alphas. Only scales with ac- ceptable reliabilities are reported here. For the commitment scale the dating item did not form a scale with the occupational and educational aspiration items. The proportion of variance of delinquency in- volvement explained by a scale formed from all three items was less than that explained by dating alone. One interpre- tation of this is that involvement in dating may represent a dimension of the bond which is independent of the other parts of commitment, as the low communality of dating in the factor analysis in the follow- ing section would indicate.
The honesty and guilt indices formed a scale with an alpha of .22. Despite the allusions to the relationship of conscience and superego development to belief (Hirschi, 1969:87, 200), the data did not support combining these measures into a
Table 3. Correlation Matrix and Alpha Coefficients for Scaled Bond Measures -— _ _ (^3 4) Alpha^
- Attachment
- Commitment
- Involvement
- Belief
- Delinquency
1 .32I« .403* .435* -.360*
1 .205* .193* -.137*
1 . -.
1 -.319*
. . . . .
- p s .01. " This is an approximation based on code book data for item means and standard deviations, and the total scale mean and standard deviation, using an adaptation of the formula for KR20. Estimates of the reliability of several subscaies made by Patrick O'Maliey (personal communication, August 30. 1979), assuming that measurement error is equal at each time (i.e., each data collection) and that errors are uncorrelated, range from .85 for a scale composed of items related to delinquent behavior in school to the low .50s for other scales.
SOCIAL CONTROL THEORY AND DELINQUENCY
Table 5. Varimax Rotated Factor Structure of Measures Related to HirschFs Constructs
CLOSMOM CLOSFATH HOWIMPF TIMWFRN POSSCHI NEOSCHI ACAACHI ABILCON TCHINTR DUNASPI CLAROCPL RCVOJT COMPHS RCVMILT RCVVOC ATNDCOL MADECOLP DATEIND TIMEHW DSCHWFR XTRASCH HONESTI GUILTIN
I . . . . . -. . . . . . -. . . -. . -. -. -. . . . .
11 -. -. . -. . -. . . . . . -. . -. -. . . -. -. -. . . .
III -. -. -. . -. . -. -. . -. -. -. -. . -. -. -. . .ni -. -. -. .
IV -. -. -. -. . -. . . . . -. . -. . -. -. -. . -. . . . .
V . . . -. . -. . -. . -. . -. . -. . . . . -. . . . -.
VI . -. . . . -. . . . . -. . . . . . . . . . -. -. .
VII . . . -. . . . . -. . -. -. -. . . . . . -. -. . -. .
h= . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NOTE: Complete names for variables and sample items included in indexes are provided in Appendix A.
taps a more comprehensive concept of sociability in which the youth chooses to associate not only with his male peers but also with members of the opposite sex. Factor VII is difficult to interpret and rep- resents little of the common variance. The only item with a high loading indicates whether the youth had made college plans. This item was chosen to show whether the youth was able to perceive the litik between educational aspirations and actually attending college. It would have been expected to load on the second factor, and the failure to do so may be interpreted as an indication that attitudes and behavior are not always linked, or that too many factors have been ex- tracted. Because the four elements of the social bond representing attachment, commit- ment, involvement, and belief did not ap- pear as separate factors, a new interpreta- tion of the bond appears necessary. We find factors representing parts or compo- rients of the social bond, sucli as the at- tachmeiit tp school and school involve- inent, high and low status comtnitments, and parental and peer attachments. The dating and belief items also did not appear as factors^ DatingJsad a moderate negative
loading on attachment to school and the high-status career orientation but was un- related to the low-status career stream. This is important because a host of non- productive juvenile activities which in- clude dating, drinking, and cruising around in a car are thought to prevent youths from making investments in con- ventional behavior. While this is partially supported in these data, concomitantly, dating is largely unrelated to all of the factors as a whole (h'' = .29). The low communality of dating suggests that it should be represented separately in a social-control model. These results suggest a more complex interpretation of the social bond than that presented by Hirschi. The emergence of a strong factor involvitig the school accords with other research which indicates that in adolescence the peer structure of boys is a major locus of influence (Greenberg, 1977; Coleman, 1961; Smelser and Halpem, 1978; Polk and Schafer, 1972). The pres- ence of this school-related factor is also consistent with the view that one function of the school is to assist young people in the transition to adult social roles. School serves as a mechanism in which aspira- tions formed earlier in life are translated
into concrete achievement goals. Natu- rally, conclusions derived from any factor analysis are largely determined by which variables are chosen for analysis. While Hirschi's analysis reflects a concern with parental, educational, peer, belief, and aspirational items, it is grounded on the premise that the parental relationship is an important determinant of the later ele- ments of the social bond. Thus the emergence of school-related factors is in part a function of the number of school- related items selected, and it is also indic- ative of the relative strength of those items in a factor analysis of the social bond.
A factor representing a vocational orientation implies that there is a group of youths bonded to society, but in some- what lower status positions. This factor appears to accord with some speculation by Polk (1975) that the relationship be- tween social status and socialization in- cludes lower social status youths who are not involved in an alternative youth cul- ture system. The zero-order correlations of dating with a scaled measure of com- mitment and vocational orientation (de- scribed in a later section of the report) are close to zero (.000 and .085, respectively). These results do not demonstrate the ability of commitment to conventional goals to exclude dating or the preoccupa- tion of those vocationally oriented with activities which are unrelated to future goals.
The emergence of the honesty index on the school-attachment dimension con- tradicts Hirschi, who hypothesized that the adherence to conventional social values should be related to attachment to parents. This is consistent with research which suggests that, as society becomes more complex, socialization functions which once belonged to the family are as- sumed by educational institutions (Smelser and Halpern, 1978; Parsons, 1959). The variety of items in the factor analysis loading on the first factor (at- tachment to school) indicates that youths with a positive relationship to school are making investments in conventional pat- terns of behavior. This is congruent with the thesis that school does have a so- cializing function in which values are
AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
reinforced and also with a social control hypothesis that school involvement repre- sents a primary group process in which socialization occurs in successful, con- ventional social interaction. In summary, some of HirschFs postu- lated dimensions emerge as distinct fac- tors, but the general picttire of the compo- nents of the bond is altered. What this suggests is that it may be more appropri- ate to reconceptualize the nature of the bond.
A SIMPLE MULTIVARIATE MODEL OF THE SOCIAL BOND
We constructed a path model which structured the multivariate examination of Hirschi's four elements of the bond (Fig- ure 1), despite doubts about the elements' utility raised by the communality and factor analyses. Rather than simply argu- ing, as did Hirschi (1969:75), that social class is not important to delinquency, we consider socioeconomic class and ability as prior or exogenous variables whose causes are unanalyzed, but examine direct and indirect effects of these variables via elements of the bond. The contributions of the four elements of social control theory are also assessed with SES and ability used as statistical controls. Thus this "simple" model may be considered a modification of Hirschi's original formu- lation. However, if the hypothesized ef- fects do not emerge, then notions of class and ability differences in socialization can be discarded and Hirschi's theory re- turned to its original form. Appendix B describes the indices which are analyzed in Tables 6, 7, 8, and 9. Table 6 shows the decomposition of ef- fects according to the model in Figure 1, and Table 7 shows the direct path coeffi- cients according to the model.' The re-
•' Path analysis was used to examine the effects of components of the model described in Figure 1 on delinquency outcomes. Central to our analysis is an understanding of the terms total associations, total contributions, direct contribution, and indirect con- tributions (Alwin and Hauser, 1975; Gottfredson, 1978). The total association is the zero order correla- tion between two variables, while the total contribu- tion is the standardized partial regression coefficient (Beta weight) in a regression equation which includes all potential explanatory variables. The direct con-
534 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
Table 7. Standardized and Unstandardized Path Coefficients in Social Control Model of Delinquency
variable Background SES Ability Bond Attachment Commitment Involvement Belief
Residual
Attachment Beta (b)
.122(.006)* .149(.O58)*
. .
Commitment Beta (b)
.287(.006)« .315(.O57)«
. .
Involvement Beta (b)
.092(.002)* .017(.0O4)
. .
BeUef Beta (b)
.006(.000) .214(.023)«
. .
Delinquency Beta (b)
.103(.000)* -.060(.002)"
-.234(-.O19)*
-.0m-M2)" -.H3(-.O16)*
-.206(-.059)« . . *p e .01. ** p >£ .05.
variance in delinquency explained by the model is not large—19%. This is small in comparison with the proportion explained using all twenty-three variables examined in Table 5, primarily because the predic- tive power of the individual variables was ravaged by constructing scales which ac- corded closely with Hirschi's theoretical statement. In particular, because dating did not scale with the commitment vari- ables as Hirschi appears to imply it would, this variable could not be used. (Scoring it together with other measures of commit- ment results in a much lower reliability of that scale. The alpha reliability of the scale used was .59, and when dating is added this drops to .46.) Second, the factor-analysis results imply that an alter- native set of bond elements would more faithfully represent the structure of the variables involved. And third, the model does not explicitly take into account the well-established finding that school grades are inversely related to delinquency (Hirschi, 1969:111-20; Silberberg and Sil- berberg, 1971; Bachman, O'Malley, and Johnston, 1978), which implies that the model is misspecified. The next section describes analysis of a reformulated model designed to remedy these defects.
A COMPLEX MODEL OF THE SOCIAL BOND
In the reformulated model (Figure 2) the bond elements are chosen to more faith- fully represent the bond components and structure derived from interpretation of the factor and communaiity analyses.*
- The measures used in the remainder of this analysis are presented in the bottom portion of Table
Since Hirschi did not present a mul- tivariate model of the social bond, the model here can be challenged on the grounds that the specification of the model is incorrect. However, this should indi- cate the general difficulty of constructing models from verbal descriptions of theories. Socioeconomic status and ability are again treated as exogenous back- ground variables b e c a u s e s t a t u s - attainment research (Blau and Duncan, 1967; Haller and Portes, 1973) implies that SES and ability affect the nature of pa- rental socialization, which in turn affects educational and occupational aspirations and attachment to school. The relation- ship of ability to educational aspirations, school attachment, and grades through parental attachment is ^ s o informed by the status-attainment model. Parental at- tachment was regarded as the foundation of the social bond. Thus, the model shows parental attachment as causally prior to and directly linked with commitment to educational and occupational aspirations, dating, attachment to school, and in- volvement. While factor analysis says nothing about the causal ordering of vari- ables, belief was placed after the previous block of variables because of the loading of the belief items on the attachment-to- school factor. This suggests that accep- tance of conventional social values may be the consequence of a youth's belief in the efficacy of education in pursuing fu- ture goals, although the relationship could
- Dr. Travis Hirschi reviewed an early draft of this paper and did not criticize the specification of the model.
SOCIAL CONTROL THEORY AND DELINQUENCY 535
Figure 2. Complex Model of the Social Bond
be reversed. Belief is treated as a separate element because it is conceptually distinct from attachment to school. The revised model of social control theory explains 32.5% of the variance in delinquency. With 13 fewer variables, the amount of variance in delinquency ex- plained is comparable to that explained in the 23-item regression analysis presented earlier in Tables 1 and 2. Compared to the simple social control model shown in Fig- ure 1, the more complex model of Figure 2 explains an additional 14% of the vari- ance. Table 8 shows the decomposition of ef- fects according to the revised model and Table 9 shows the path coefficients. Pa- jental attachment and school attachment both have substantial negative total and direct effects on delinquency, net of other variables in the model; and dating has substantial positive total and direct ef- fects. Grades, involvement, and belief have smaller but nevertheless statistically significant total and direct effects on de- linquency. In contrast to the earlier model (Figure 1), the revised model implies moderate positive net (direct) effects of SES and ability. Grades make a moderate negative direct contribution, as does in- volvement. In the context of the revised model, commitment to a vocational career, commitment to college and a high-status occupation, and peer attach- ment make no statistically significant contributions to the explanation of delin- quency, implying that their zero-order as- sociation may be regarded as spurious.
In social control theory, the peer rela- tions of delinquents are characterized by their low level of social skills (Hirschi, 1969). The lack of a relationship between peer attachment and delinquent behavior therefore refiects the unimportance of friends to delinquent youth. This illus- trates an important difference between social control theory and other delin- quency theories which posit a central role for peer relations (Hansell and Wia- trowski, 1980). Some of the other results in Tables 8 and 9 should be highlighted. First, except for belief and grades in general, the coeffi- cients of determination (R'') are generally small, implying that the residuals (the contributions of unmeasured variables and measurement error) are large. This means, in short, that even the revised model allows much room for improve- ment. Second, ability has strong positive total and direct effects on grades, and moderate positive total and direct effects on school attachment, and a moderate negative effect on dating. Parental at- tachment has fairly strong positive effects on school attachment, involvement, and belief (as well as delinquency), implying that even for adolescents who are well into their high-school years, parental at- tachment exerts considerable influence.
The proportion of variance in belief which was explained is substantial in comparison to other elements of the bond. This analysis makes possible a compari- son of the effects of parental versus school attachment on belief. The path coefficient
SOCIAL CONTROL THEORY AND DELINQUENCY 537
INVOLVE Total ,094* .
Dir, ,081- , ,222*
COMMIT Total Dir.
-. 0 3 3 -, ,051. -. 0 9 0 ' -. 0 9 0 '
PEERATT Total -. . .066*
Dir. -. , ,066*
BELIEF Total . .217* .229" -.
-. 0 9 I ' ,500* . 0 3 •> -, . .
Dir. -. ,127- ,090- -. -.091* ,500* . -. , -.
DEL.INQ Total . -.
-. 2 9 8 '
- 0 9 7 ' .334-
- , 2 3 9 ' , -,082" . , -,125*
Dir. .095* .096*
- , 182"
- l O O * ,323* -,178* , -.085- . , -,125*
Alfriia
. , . . . . .S . . *p«.Ol. **ps.O5.
attainment goals with delinquency, that reduced relationship may be considered unimportant. This may be due to the re- dundancy of commitment with other mea- sures in the expanded models or to its low reliability. The strength of the involve- ment relationship is also reduced, but still significant and in the predicted direction.
The moderate and significant negative path coefficient for belief in our complex model implies that when other variables are considered simultaneously, con- ventional value orientations are negatively related to the incidence of delinquent be- havior. In short, a lack of conventional value orientations is important in the ex- planation of delinquency. Our model subscribes to the validity of the component concepts introduced in Causes of Delinquency, but questions the utility of that particular set of' elements of socialization. In the context of statistical controls for ability, social class, and grades in school, the bond elements which emerge as important explanatory vari- ables are attachment to parents, dating.
attachment to school, belief, and in- volvement, A model incorporating these bond elements appears more isomorphic with theories of adolescent socialization which treat education as important in the integration of the youth into adult social life. In considering how all the elements of the bond operate simultaneously, a dif- ferent picture emerges than when applying simpler forms of analysis. Our examination of the total association, or the zero-order correlations, shows that large correlations with Hirschfs four bond elements do exist (with the exception of the element of commitment to college and a high-status career). When those components in the complex model are considered simulta- neously and with controls for ability and school grades, however, it can be seen that several components are more impor- tant than others. Our results imply that models such as those depicted in Figures 2 and 3 will be more adequate and par- simonious than that originally formulated by Hirschi.
Figure 3. Modified Complex Model of the Social Bond
538 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
t S. 5^ J-
S
S8SS
q q
540 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL REVIEW
APPENDIX A (Continued)
- SES = Socioeconomic Status—equally weighted composite comprised of a. Father's occupational status. b. Parent's education. c. Possessions in home. d. Number of books in home. e. Number of persons per room.
- ABILITY = Ability Index a. GATB Vocabulary level. b. GATB Arithmetic level.
- GRADETM = Grades Time 1 a. What was the average grade you got in your class last year?
- Delinquency Index Items a. Stayed out later than your parents said you should. b. Taken something not belonging to you worth under $50. c. Hurt someone badly enough to need ban- dages or a doctor. d. Taken an expensive part of a car without permission of the owner. e. Taken part in a fight where a bunch of your friends are against another bunch. f. Taken something not belonging to you worth over $50. g. Used a knife or gun or some other thing like a club to get something from a person.
APPENDIX B ITEMS USED TO CONSTITUTE SCALES IN THE PATH ANALYSIS OF THE SIMPLE AND COMPLEX MODELS OF SOCIAL BOND
The following indices used in Tables 6, 7, 8 and 9 were constructed by equally weighting the composite elements derived from Appendix A. SES = Socioeconomic Status ABILITY = GATB Math and Verbal Test Scores ATTACHMENT = CLOSMOM
- CLOSFATH
- HOWIMPH
- POSSCHI
- NEGSCHI
- ACAACHI
- ABILCON
- TCHINTR COMMITMENT = DUNASPI
- ATNDCOL INVOLVEMENT = TIMEHW
- DSCHWFR
- X-TRASCH BELIEF = Honesty Index The following indices used in Tables iO and II were constructed by equally weighting the composite elements derived from Appendix A.
SES
ABILITY
= Socioeconomic Status = GATB Math and Verbal Test Scores
GRADETM DATEIND SCHLATT
BELIEF
= Parental Attach- ment a. CLOSMOM
- CLOSFATH = Grades Time 1 = Dating Index = School Attach- ment a. POSSCHI
- NEGSCHI
- ACAACHI = Vocational Orientational a. RCVOJT -¥ RCVMILT
- RCVVOC = Involvement a. TIMEHW
- DSCHWFR + XTRASCH = Commitment a. DUNASPI + ATNDCOL = Peer Attachment a. HOWIMPF
- TIMWFRN = Honesty Index NOTE; The items used to construct scales were derived from those measures of the bond presented in Tables 2 and 3. Items were combined on the basis of theoretical parsimony and their contribution to the stability of the scale. Items which did not add to the scale stability and explanatory power of the scale were deleted.
SOCIAL CONTROL THEORY AND DELINQUENCY 541
REFERENCES Alwin, Duane F. and Robert M. Hauser 1975 "The decomposition of effects in path analysis." American Sociologieal Review: 40:37-47. Bachman, Jerald 1975 Youth in Transition. Ann Arbor: Inter- University Consortium for Political and So- cial Research. Bachman, J. G., P. M. QMalley, and J. Johnston 1978 Adolescence to Adulthood. Ann Arbor: In- stitute for Social Research Bealer, R. E., F. K. Willits, and Peter R. Maida I%5 "The myth of a rebellious adolescent sub- culture." In L. C. Burchinal (ed.), Rural Youth in Crisis. Washington, D.C.: U. S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Blau, Peter M. and Otis Dudley Duncan 1%7 The American Occupational Structure. New York: Wiley. Coleman, James S. 1961 The Adolescent Society. New York: Free Press. Dentler, Robert A. and Lawrence J. Monroe 1961 "Social correlates of early adolescent theft." American Sociological Review 26:733-43. Elliot, Delbert S. and Suzanne Ageton 1979 "Reconciling race and class differences in self-reported and official estimates of delin- quency ." Behavioral Research Institute: Mimeo. Empey, LaMar T. 1978 American Delinquency. Homewood, Il- linois: Dorsey. Faine, J. 1974 "A multidimensional approach to under- standing varieties of delinquent behavior." Ph.D. dissertation. University of Iowa. (University Microfilm No. 74-21, 888). Galvin, James 1975 "Youth culture and adult success." Ph.D. dissertation, University of Oregon. Gibbons, Don C. 1976 Delinquent Behavior. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall. Gold, Martin 1966 "Undetected delinquent behavior." Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency 3:27-46. 1970 Delinquent Behavior in the American City. Belmont, Calif,: Brooks/Cole. Gottfredson, Gary D. 1978 "Models and middles in human ecology: an examination of high school crime rates." Center for Social Organization of Schools, The Johns Hopkins University. Report No.
Greenberg, David F. 1977 "Delinquency and the age structure of soci- ety." Contemporary Society 1:189-223.
Haller, William and Alejandro Portes 1^3 "Status attainment processes." Sociology of Education 46:51-91. Hansell, Stephen and Michael D. Wiatrowski 1980 "Competing conceptions of delinquent peer relations." Center for the Study of the So- cial Organization of Schools. Center Report
- The Johns Hopkins University. Hardt, Robert and Sandra Peterson-Hardt 1977 "On determining the quality of the delin- quency self-report method." Journal of Re- search in Crime and Delinquency 14:247-61. Hartshorne, Hugh and Mark A. May 1928 Studies in Deceit. New York: Amo Press. Hindelang, Michael J., Travis Hirschi, and Joseph Weis 1979 "Correlates of delinquency: the illusion of discrepancy between self-report and official measures." American Sociological Review 44:995-1014. Hirschi, Travis 1969 Causes of Delinquency. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press. Hirschi, Travis and Michael Hindelang 1977 "Intelligence and delinquency: a revisionist review." American Sociological Review 42:571-86. Nie, Nieman H., C. Hedlai Hull, Jean G. Jenkins, Karin Steinbrenner, and Dale H. Dent 1975 Statistical Package for the Social Sciences. New York: McGraw-Hill. Nye, F. Ivan and James F. Short, Jr. 1957 "Scaling delinquent behavior." American Sociological Review 22:326-31. Parsons, Talcott 1959 "The school class as a social system: some of its functions in American society." Har- vard Educational Review 29:297-318. Polk, Kenneth 1975 "Schools and the delinquency experience." Criminal Justice and Behavior 2:315-38. Polk, Kenneth and Walter G. Schafer 1972 Schools and Delinquency. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall. Sewell, William H., Archibald O. Haller, and Alejandro Portes 1969 "The educational and early occupational attainment process." American Sociological Review 34:82-92. Silberberg, N. E. and M. C. Silberberg 1971 "School achievement and delinquency." Review of Educational Research: 41:17-33. Simms, Ronald L. 1978 "Comment on Hirschi and Hindelang. The meaning of the IQ-delinquency relation- ship." American Sociological Review 43:268-70. Smelser, Neil J. and Sydney Halpern 1978 "The historical triangulation of family, economy, and education." American Jour- nal of Sociology (Supplement) 84:288-315.
