Gender Differences in Delinquency and Juvenile Justice Processing

Abstract

This article traces the historical coverage of the gender issue in the criminological literature. It also provides contemporary empirical evidence about differences and similarities between girls and boys with respect to juvenile crime and to processing by the juvenile justice system, by analyzing several national juvenile crime data series, all of which have been recently updated. This research has produced numerous results that indicate that female and male delinquents possess more similarities than differences concerning arrest rates, arrest statistics, juvenile court data, and juvenile corrections data.

What Works for Whom? The Effects of Gender Responsive Programming on Girls and Boys in Secure Detention

“…Compared to incarcerated boys, incarcerated girls have more severe mental health problems, especially posttraumatic stress disorder, depression, and anxiety (McCabe et al 2002;Teplin et al 2002); have experienced higher rates of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse and physical neglect (Cauffman et al 1998;Hennessey et al 2004); report more problems with substance abuse (Jasper, Smith, and Bailey 1998;Teplin et al 2002), and report greater degrees of somatic complaints (Cauffman 2004). Girls in custody are also more likely to have been incarcerated for status offenses, technical violations, or less serious crimes than their male counterparts (Belknap 2001;Chesney-Lind and Pasko 2013;Snyder and Sickmund 2006;Tracy et al 2009). …”

Gender Differences in Criminal Intent: Examining the Mediating Influence of Anticipated Shaming

“…With few exceptions, including prostitution (FBI 2010) and partner violence (Rebellon and Straus 2004;Straus 2010), males are disproportionately represented among offenders Tracy et al 2009). The relationship between gender and crime appears to exist across all major sources of criminological data including official, victimization, and self-report data (Lo and Zhong 2006;Steffensmeier et al 2005), but seems particularly strong for severe forms of violence like homicide (Batton 2004).…”

Gender, Race, and Juvenile Court Outcomes

“…Furthermore, of the research that does exist, these studies either rely on data from the mid-1980s (e.g., Bishop & Frazier, 1992 or inferential statistics (e.g., Tracy et al, 2009). While inferential statistics provide a descriptive picture of the relationship between gender, race, and status offenders, the addition of multivariate analyses also have the potential to examine this relationship with juvenile court outcomes by controlling for the potential influence of other confounding factors (e.g., age, prior record, etc.…”