School Violence and Delinquency: The Dynamics of Race, Gender, Class, Age and Parenting in the Caribbean

• Author: Ramesh Deosaran
• Pages: 89-132

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SCHOOL VIOLENCE AND DELINQUENCY

In seeking to fill a serious gap in

criminological research in the Caribbean,

this paper provides data and examines the

interrelationships on five major factors

relating to violence and delinquency in

different types of secondary schools in the

Caribbean state of Trinidad and Tobago. (We

henceforth use the term ‘delinquency’ for both

violence and delinquency, except where the

distinction is necessary). These factors are:

students’ gender, race, social class, age and

parental structure. The results from this

study may help develop more refined

theorising and research, especially with the

insertion of social psychological mediating

variables between social structure and

delinquency. This paper will first provide a

very brief overview of the relevant research

literature, secondly a description of the

present study, then thirdly, the results and

discussion.

The search for relationships between

students’ socio-demographic background

and the level and kinds of school violence

and delinquency has been a substantial one,

filled with a wide range of research reports

and fairly consistent findings during the last

25 years (see, for example, Binder l988,

Binder et al. 1997, Jensen and Rojek 1992,

Seigel and Senna 1981, Weis et al. 1996 for a

variety of relevant research studies).

These relationships are important for

developing certain theoretical perspectives

in criminology, for example, if social class is

found to be significantly related to

delinquency, then conflict theory in

criminology would be strengthened. Or at

least, it will initiate a further search for the

cultural and psychological processes which

School

Violence and

Delinquency:

The Dynamics of

Race, Gender,

Class, Age and

Parenting in the

Caribbean1

Ramesh Deosaran

Five

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CRIME, DELINQUENCY AND JUSTICE

energise such relationships, thereby attracting support for social psychological

theories in criminology.

GENDER

If gender makes a significant difference with crime or delinquency, then it

will affect the feminists’ argument over the role which differential association

makes with gender. That is, for example, the risk-taking values and expectations

imposed on male adolescents contribute to higher male delinquency. But, before

proceeding to such finer theorising, it is necessary to see whether, in fact, a

relationship does exist between these three major factors — race, gender and

social class — and delinquency.

Liu and Kaplan (1999) concluded that there is a gender difference and that

this difference has been observed using self-report methods as well as arrest

statistics (p. 195). The general findings from both self-report studies and official

records were that male students commit more serious acts of delinquency than

females, especially in violent and property offences. Females do commit serious

offences, but less often than males (see, for example, the early study by Hindelang

1971).

Attacking the ‘male dominated focus’ on delinquency, Heimer and DeCoster

(1999) more recently argued that from self-report studies, the ratio of female to

male violence is higher than commonly perceived. They further argued that the

concepts driving the study of violence and delinquency is itself gender biased,

and so the results flow accordingly. They wrote:

These ratios show that although there is a substantial gender gap, girls do engage

in a significant amount of violent delinquency. A better understanding of youth

violence, therefore, requires moving the traditional focus on males to examine

also the causes of violence among females and the sources of the gender gap in

violence (p. 278).

After studying a national United States (US) sample of 1,725 11 to 17 year-

olds, they concluded: ‘Boys are more violent than girls largely because they are

taught more definitions favouring such behaviour, girls are less violent than boys

because they are controlled through subtle mechanisms, which include learning

that violence is incompatible with the meaning of gender for them and being

restrained by emotional bonds to family’ (Heimer and DeCoster 1999, 306).

Using Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) data for a 22-year period to

examine ‘the convergence hypothesis,’ Austin (1993) revealed that indeed, there

is convergence in delinquency between male and female offenders (p. 52). That

is, males do commit more offences but over the years, females seem to be

committing similar offences in growing numbers.

A consistent finding for delinquents is that the older students, especially males,

commit more serious delinquency than younger ones. Such results suggest an

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SCHOOL VIOLENCE AND DELINQUENCY

escalation from early delinquent versatility to later specialisation. Summarising

the results of 25 longitudinal studies on youth violence from several industrialised

countries, David Farrington (1998) concluded:

Youths who commit one type of violent offense tend to commit others; they also

tend to commit non-violent offenses and have co-occurring problems such as

substance abuse and sexual promiscuity. There is considerable continuity from

childhood aggression to youth violence (p. 421).

Even so, this research on the incidence of delinquency presents a mixed picture.

That is, while younger boys commit less serious offences, they often commit

these much more frequently than older boys. This distinction between prevalence

and incidence is quite important for examining juvenile delinquency (for example,

see Tracy, Jnr. 1990). The distinction is important not merely for categorising the

various types of delinquency, but also to indicate the pathway, from minor to

serious, which young males are likely to take. The delinquency progression factor

is important to note.

SOCIAL CLASS

Some complexities arise with the data for social class (also termed socioeconomic

status) and delinquency. For example, after reviewing a set of relevant studies in

his paper, Social Class and Crime, Weis (l987) noted:

There is a very weak, insignificant relationship with SES when one controls for

level of measurement and compares individual-level data on both variables. It

seems that no matter how one measures, scores or scales the data there are small,

typically negative relations between social class and juvenile crime, whether official

or self-reported.

He further concluded:

In short, there is not the kind of robust relationship between social class and

either self-reported or official juvenile crime that most contemporary theories of

crime propose should exist (Weis 1987, 71–74).

The most common measure of social class in this line of research is parental

occupation, sometimes combined with parental education and income levels.

But, as is commonly noted, no matter how measured, the direct connection

between the social class background of youths and delinquency has been

surprisingly but consistently rather weak.

As Tittle and Meier (1990) noted, even when the measure of social class is

compressed so as to include only an ‘underclass’ vs. the rest, the conclusion is

that there is ‘no firm evidence that social class, no matter how it is measured, is a

salient factor in generating delinquency involvement.’ After reviewing a number