Understanding Youth Crime: Factors Influencing Delinquency Rates
School
Western University**We aren't endorsed by this school
Course
SOCIOLOG 2206
Subject
Sociology
Date
Dec 12, 2024
Pages
6
Uploaded by CorporalFreedomMonkey29
SOC2006AInitial Proposal - Youth Crime RatesBrooklyn Scudamore251284391
For my research proposal, I will be focusing on the topic of youth crime rates and juvenile justice policies and the factors that affect this issue. Crime is one of the largest sociological issues in today’s day and age as it heavily influences society and is shaped by external factors amongst individuals. It is something I am highly interested in delving into further research on using different perspectives of methodological research. Some potential questions that I am interested in researching surrounding this topic include “How do socioeconomic factors such as poverty, familyhistory, and neighbourhoods influence youth crime rates?” as well as “How do factors such as disadvantages in educational opportunitiesincluding schools funding, locations, teaching quality affect youth crime rates?”. These questions are important for understanding the role that crime plays in society as a whole and the factors that lead to it which are particularly important in understanding the younger generation asthose are the people who will be managing society in the future. The topic of crime in youth is a sociological topic as it represents the way humans act in ways that go against society's morals and policies. The sociological research involving crime aims to understand the underlying social forces and factors influencing young people’s involvement and draw towards participating in criminal activities in addition to recognizing its role in society. It involves the study of how this behaviour is shaped by social factors such as poverty, family background, peer pressure, educational experience, and exposure to violence. Sociologists who study crime in youth aim to understand how these social factors interact to influence young people's decision to engage in criminal activities. These research questions are interesting because they seek to uncover the complex relationship between society's social systems and youth crime and how it is both governed and influenced by society. These questions
highlight the leading causes of youth delinquency and then go on to show how these acts of crime affect the rest of society. For these research questions, the main concepts and relationships concerning youth crimeinclude poverty, employment opportunities, neighbourhood environments, family dynamics and household environments. For example, as shown in the book Juvenile Crime and Juvenile Justice, children who were raised in neighbourhoods with high joblessness, poverty, and crime may see criminal behaviour as an acceptable alternative when other opportunities are lacking, therefore, leading to higher crime rates (MacCord et al., 2001). To define and operationalize these concepts I will be further developing my knowledge of all the contributing variables in these concepts. I will ensure that when turning these theories and concepts into measurable subjects that can be quantified and analyzed, they remain aligned with my original questions. The level of analysis that I will be aiming for in this research will primarily be macro-level due to the focus on the systemic influences on youth crime in the juvenile policies set by the government as well as the general structure of society in a policy sense. This topic could also be analyzed at the meso level since this research will be dealing with smaller groups such as communities when determining influences of crime such as upbringing, neighbourhood, education, poverty, and family life. Meso-level research will mainly be used since I will be researching the effects that smaller communities have on the larger group in society. To ensure that my measures of research are reliable and valid, I will take a systematic approach to developing research to establish accurate findings. Using the test-retest method to confirm that the information I have collected is accurate. In addition to this, I will also be
comparing my information to existing research. An article observing a study done in 2013 involving 55 randomly selected inmates from a prison in Kenya, ranging from the ages of 17 to 21 years old showed that more than 40 of the 55 inmates came from poor families, many of the crimes they had committed related to survival with a lack of necessities to live as teens (Omboto et al., 2013). Another study that I landed upon in my research published by the Journal of Education and Social Sciences combined descriptive statistical analysis and multiple regression to observe further the social factors contributing to youth crime specifically focusing on educational experience. This research study compares the quantitative data on the level of education through the number of years attending a school system to the frequency of crimes committed within those categories of youth. It shows that the majority of adolescents involved injuvenile delinquencies were those who lacked higher education (Mohideen et al., 2016). Comparing my findings to those of previous studies while using the test-re-test method are functional way of ensuring that my proposed measures are reliable and valid. In gathering data and information for my research questions multiple different sociological methods can be used such as surveys, interviews, and observational studies. Surveysmay be most effective in this situation as they can be conducted to collect qualitative data on socioeconomic factors and how they relate to juvenile crime. Data gathered from surveying compared to existing crime rates can help us as researchers pinpoint the most common and reoccurring factors that lead to youth crime. Secondary data can also be used to help conclude the relationships between the variables being studied. Some challenges that are emerging are the feasibility of data collection and ethical considerations. When aiming to collect information fromyouth who have been involved in crime specifically in low-income neighbourhoods, it may be
difficult to find individuals who are willing to participate in surveys. Also, when aiming to survey youth who may lack an education or were raised in a broken home with previous trauma or family issues, it may be a challenge to get these individuals to disclose these personal or sensitive factors to be studied. Additionally, ethical consideration is important to ensure that those who are involved in the research are informed of the outline of the study as well as ensuring confidentiality and privacy to conduct this study fairly and respectfully. It is important to address these potential issues early in the process to ensure that the study turns out to be both feasible and ethical.
ReferencesMacCord, J., Widom, C. S., & Crowell, N. A. (2001). Juvenile crime, Juvenile Justice. National Academy Press. Mohideen, R. S., Khairul Anuar, N. K. K., Abdul Latiff, D. I., Ridzuan, A. R., & Kamarudin, F. H. (2016, February). Social factors that contribute juvenile delinquency at Melaka. Journalof Education and Social Sciences. https://www.jesoc.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/KC3_86.pdfOmboto, J. O., Ondiek, G. O., Odera, O., & Ayugi, M. E. (2013). Factors influencing youth crime and juvenile delinquency. International Journal of Research In Social Sciences,1(2), 18–21.