Love, Sex, and Crime: Adolescent Romantic Relationships and Offending

Abstract

Scholars are often pessimistic about adolescent dating, linking it to increases in depression, interpersonal violence, conflict with parents, school failure, associations with delinquents, substance use, and offending. Yet, the various dimensions of dating may have opposing consequences. The closeness offered by adolescent romantic love may fill an important void found between the weakening of bonds with parents and the onset of adult attachments, and it may discourage an array of negative outcomes, including involvement in crime. Adolescent sexual activity, in contrast, may increase offending, in part by augmenting the strain created by relationships. When coupled with a romantic relationship, however, sex is likely less stressful and consequential for crime. In this article, we analyze patterns of romance, sexual behavior, and adolescent crime with panel data from the nationally representative Adolescent Health Survey. Findings support our expectations regarding differential effects of romance and sex. We conclude by discussing the implications of these results for understanding adolescent delinquency, social attachments, and development.

The Language of Ethics and Double Standards in the Affective and Sexual Socialization of Youth. Communicative Acts in the Family Environment as Protective or Risk Factors of Intimate Partner Violence

“…Double standards are understood in that case as the persistence of a desire toward men who have power but not ethical values, and, on the other hand, the maintenance of a feeling of friendship toward men that have egalitarian and solidary attitudes but without power positions (Gomez, 2015). McCarthy and Casey (2008) coincide with this analysis and they indicate an attraction toward violence in young cohorts. These authors also pay attention on the role that family has on this link and they argued that some young people feel their relationship with their parents is weakening, so they seek to fill this emotional void with partners associated with violence.…”

“…In addition, in those analyses the role that family environment and language have in these processes is evidenced. For instance, the literature helps reveal how conceptions of attractiveness are defined through daily interactions in different socializing spaces like family (Duque, 2006;Urpí and Naval, 2006;McCarthy and Casey, 2008;Gomez, 2015). Similarly, it also helps to comprehend how the construction of gender identity and people's emotions perpetuate affective and sexual relationships marked by the attraction toward violence (Kimmel, 2000;Connell, 2005;Schrock and Schwalbe, 2009;Hughey, 2011;Hunter et al, 2011;Shaffer et al, 2012).…”

Interethnic dating preferences of Roma and non-Roma secondary school students

“…Being isolate in the friendship network signifies low status within the class. As status is an important asset to be successful in dating (McCarthy & Casey 2008), students may form their preferences accordingly, to avoid disappointments. Thus, relatively low status members of the majority (high status) group will be willing to choose partners from the minority (low status) groups.…”

Consequences of Casual Sex Relationships and Experiences on Adolescents’ Psychological Well-Being: A Prospective Study

“…Possible moderators that could be examined include the following: individual-level factors such as personality, attachment styles, communication skills, motivations (Vrangalova, 2015b); negative social or health hookup consequences (Napper et al, 2016); and contextual factors such as social norms, peer pressure, coercion, or relationship breakups. Identifying other variables that may be associated with alcohol and drug use, such as delinquency, poorer grades, and truancy (e.g., McCarthy & Casey, 2008), would be useful to verify whether CSREs are part of a constellation of externalizing problems. General selfesteem was not associated with engagement in CSREs in our study, but a measure of sexual self-esteem could be interesting to examine among boys and girls.…”

“…Alcohol use has been considered to be a strong predictor of CSREs (Johnson, 2013), but few studies have investigated substance use as a consequence of CSREs. A representative prospective study among 12-to 18-year-olds reported that casual sex was associated with a significant increase in substance use, including cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine and other illegal drugs, over one year (McCarthy & Casey, 2008). Gender differences were not studied.…”