The Relationship Between Developmental Trajectories Of Girls’ Offending And Police Charges: Results From The Pittsburgh Girls Study

Abstract

The current study is based on longitudinal self-reported data from the Pittsburgh Girls Study (N = 2,450). This is the largest follow-up delinquency study of girls in the USA; an inner-city population of girls, between the ages of 11 and 18. We first investigated self-reported developmental trajectories for delinquency, and we then examined the correspondence between these selfreported delinquency trajectories and later police charges. The results show three self-reported delinquency trajectories for the PGS participants: non-offenders, low-rate offenders, and high-rate offenders. Further, the high-rate offenders also differed in kind in addition to in degree as they were more versatile offenders demonstrating notable involvement in both property and violent offending relative to the low-rate offenders. Additional analyses revealed that these self-reported trajectories were significantly associated with the frequency and the odds of official offending according to police charges during this same time period (i.e., ages 11-18). Study limitations and implications for future trajectory-based research with female samples are discussed.

African American Female Trajectories of Offending From Youth to Young Adulthood

“…This model provides for the statistical identification of subgroups of individuals while also allowing the researcher to estimate the effect of both time-invariant and time-variant predictors of behavior (Nagin, 2005). Consistent with prior research on crime and delinquency using trajectory models (Ahonen et al, 2016) and the skewness of the outcome variable, we estimated a zero-inflated Poisson trajectory form. Following the identification of the most accurate number of groups, we estimated models with various parametric identifications that arrive at the overall best-fitting models as described below.…”

“…Females who were in the “high rate” and “low rate” group were significantly more likely to experience an officially recorded police charge compared with those in the non-offender group. Their results also indicated that the high-rate offending females were more versatile in their offenses than those offending at lower rates (Ahonen et al, 2016).…”

“…Finally, a recent study by Ahonen, Jennings, Loeber, and Farrington (2016) identified three trajectory groups of female offenders, focusing on serious property and violent offending. They identified non-offender, low-rate offender, and high-rate offender groups.…”

Developmental Offending Patterns: Female Offending Beyond the Reference Category

“…However, investigations of community samples of women also identified limited heterogeneity. Three trajectories were typically identified that were defined by nonoffending, low-rate offending, and high-rate offending (Ahonen et al, 2016; Cohen et al, 2010; D’Unger et al, 2002; Jennings et al, 2018; Loeber et al, 2017). In these studies, the nonoffending trajectory was most prevalent, ranging from 72.5% (Loeber et al, 2017) to 89.9% (Cohen et al, 2010).…”

“…Cohen et al (2010) suggested that female offending patterns amounted to either offending or nonoffending, which aligned with Moffitt and Caspi’s (2001) perspective. The lack of heterogeneity identified within community-based studies may relate to a tendency to only follow participants until mid to late adolescence (e.g., Ahonen et al, 2016; Jennings et al, 2018; Lahey et al, 2006; Loeber et al, 2017). A longer follow-up period may be needed given that Moffitt (1993) asserted that AL and LCP offending patterns would resemble each other during adolescence.…”