Female Juvenile Delinquency: Misunderstoo d by the ...

[Pages:27]Law and Human Behavior, Vol 22, No. 1, 1998

Female Juvenile Delinquency: Misunderstood by the Juvenile Justice System, Neglected by Social Science

Stephanie Hoyt1 and David G. Scherer2,3

The study of juvenile delinquency has focused primarily on conduct disorder and aggression in males, while relatively little attention has been paid to females who commit delinquent acts. This article offers a critical review of the existing theories of and research on female delinquency and the juvenile justice system's response to female delinquency. The inadequacies and persistence of historical theories and the conceptual and methodological strengths and weaknesses of contemporary perspectives in female delinquency are reviewed. Understanding and treatment of female and male delinquency could be enhanced through the adoption of a gender-integrated theory of delinquency that is informed by the comprehensive study of developmental, psychological, and social-ecological determinants.

Delinquency and youth violence have been growing by epidemic proportions. From 1983 to 1993, juvenile murder and manslaughter arrests leaped 128% (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1993) and from 1986 to 1995, violent crime arrests among juveniles rose 67% (Snyder, 1996). This escalation in violent crime by adolescents has raised concerns about the number of juveniles victimized by youth violence, prompted projections of a doubling in juvenile arrests for violent crime by 2010, and fueled anxieties about a future crime wave as these juvenile delinquents mature into adults (Snyder & Sickmund, 1995; Snyder, Sickmund, & Poe-Yamagata, 1996). Until recently, the research and theories of social scientists and the attention of policy makers and the public have centered on male delinquency (Chamberlain & Reid, 1994; Hirschi, 1969; Zoccolillo, 1993). However, the issue of female delinquency is forcing its way into social awareness. From 1983 to 1992, arrests of female adolescents rose over 25% (Federal Bureau of Investigation, 1993), and in 1994 and 1995 girls accounted for one fourth of all juvenile arrests (Girls Incorporated, 1996; Snyder, 1996; Snyder et al., 1996). Moreover, from 1985 to 1994, arrests of females for violent offenses more than doubled (Girls Incorporated, 1996). Fur-

1University of South Carolina. 2University of New Mexico. 3Correspondence should be addressed to David Scherer, Ph.D., 114 Simpson Hall, College of Education, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131 (e-mail: scherer@unm.edu).

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thermore, epidemiological studies have found that conduct disorder (diagnostically akin to juvenile delinquency) is among the most common psychiatric diagnoses for girls, has a similar prevalence rate in females and males by adolescence, and is predictive of poor long-term psychological outcomes for females (Chamberlain & Reid, 1994; Dembo, Williams, & Schmeidler, 1993; Webster-Stratton, 1996; Zoccolillo, 1993).

Despite growing concern, relatively little is known empirically about female delinquency (Calhoun, Jurgens, & Chen, 1993). Social scientists have excluded females from their studies of delinquents, apparently suspecting that delinquency among females is simply a subset or minor variation of delinquency among males (Figueira-McDonough, 1992; Rhodes & Fischer, 1993). What literature exists on female delinquency betrays a variety of biases and fallibilities (Girls Incorporated, 1996). Moreover, these biases in the study of delinquency also appear to be reflected in the applications of juvenile justice (Bergsmann, 1989; Girls Incorporated, 1996). This review examines these themes. We begin with a look at the precedents established by the nascent studies of female delinquency and how the predilections that emerged from this literature have been paralleled in juvenile justice practices toward females. In the second section, we chronicle contemporary efforts to understand the phenomena of female delinquency by surveying some of the more prominent theses that have emerged from research on female delinquents. These topics span the range of human ecology from individual factors (e.g., developmental considerations, history of victimization), to the effects of social context (e.g., family, peer, and academic correlates of female delinquency) and larger social environmental considerations (e.g., socioeconomic status and opportunity, the impact of the women's movement). We conclude that, without renewed effort from social scientists, female delinquents are apt to continue to encounter misguided justice and intervention.

FEMALE DELINQUENCY, SEXUALITY, AND THE DOUBLE STANDARD

The Stigma of Female Delinquency

Early theories of female delinquency emphasized sexuality as either the cause or expression of females' delinquent behavior (Lombroso & Ferrero, 1895; Thomas, 1928). For example, the "deceitful" nature of women (derived from practice at faking sexual arousal), along with precocious biological maturity, were proposed to account for female delinquency (Pollak, 1950; Pollak & Freidman, 1969). By the 1960s, researchers were documenting the prevalence of "sex delinquencies," vague status-type offenses like incorrigibility, or simply "needing care and protection" as the major factors distinguishing female from male delinquents (Cowie, Cowie, & Slater, 1968; Konopka, 1966; Vedder & Somerville, 1970). Cowie et al. noted that many of the girls in their study claimed they ran away from home because of sexual advances by relatives, but they did not examine this finding for its implication for explaining female delinquency. Vedder and Somerville accounted for reports like

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these by suggesting that adolescent females ran away from home because they feared the incestuous consequences of their sexual impulses. Konopka also attributed the sometimes harsh treatment that female delinquents received to the agitation and ambivalence engendered in others by female delinquents' sexual behavior.

Differential Treatment of Male and Female Delinquents Within the Juvenile Justice System

As a consequence of these early studies that assumed that female delinquency was sexual in nature, female delinquency acquired a stigma not associated with male delinquency. Historically, female delinquents were charged with immorality, waywardness, or status offenses (i.e., offenses such as running away, truancy, or underage drinking, that are illegal for juveniles, but not adults) because of concern about their sexual behavior and moral depravity (Schlossman & Wallach, 1978; Shelden, 1981), and subsequently treated more harshly than males who committed the same or similar crimes (Chesney-Lind, 1973; Datesman & Scarpitti, 1977; Shelden, 1981). This led some to conclude that a sexual double standard existed in the juvenile justice system (Chesney-Lind, 1977; Pope & Feyerherm, 1982).

Over the past 15 years, the question of a double standard in the administration of juvenile justice for females and males has become more complex. There are considerable gender differences in "official" delinquency, the picture of delinquency derived from statistics maintained by law enforcement agencies. Most notably, adolescent females are arrested less frequently than male adolescents, and are more likely than males to have their cases handled informally rather than through formal adjudication hearings. Females arrested for delinquency and formally petitioned to court are less likely to be adjudicated and are less likely to be remanded to adult courts than males (Girls Incorporated, 1996; Poe-Yamagata & Butts, 1996). However, female adolescents are arrested and involved in the juvenile justice system for less serious offenses more often than male adolescents (Girls Incorporated, 1996; Poe-Yamagata & Butts, 1996).

One interpretation of these data is that female delinquents are treated more leniently than male delinquents. Others have argued, however, that the juvenile justice system continues to discriminate against female delinquents, holding them more accountable than males for the commission of status offenses (Girls Incorporated, 1996). The perception of a negative bias toward arresting female adolescents more often for less serious offenses is accented by self-report delinquency data which indicate that females and males commit similar rates of status offenses and minor index crimes (e.g., larceny-theft, vandalism, and prostitution) (Canter, 1982a; Kruttschnitt, 1996; Steffensmeier & Steffensmeier, 1980). The juvenile justice system's commitment to the parens patrie concept and the language of status offense provisions allow discretionary application by law enforcement and juvenile court personnel to hold females legally accountable for behavior (frequently behavior interpreted as sexual acting out) that would not be considered serious if committed by males (Rosenbaum & Chesney-Lind, 1994; Sussman, 1977; Teitelbaum & Gough, 1977). This has raised the specter that the juvenile justice system has evidenced a

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concern for controlling the sexuality of females not seen in the handling of male delinquents (Bergsmann, 1989; Krohn, Curry, & Nelson-Kilger, 1983; Rosenbaum & Chesney-Lind, 1994).

The disparity between females and males in arrest and referral rates for status offenses continues to be found in studies of delinquents (Dembo et al., 1993; Girls Incorporated, 1996; Hancock & Chesney-Lind, 1982; Horowitz & Pottieger, 1991; Rhodes & Fischer, 1993; Rosenbaum & Chesney-Lind, 1994; Smith, 1980). Over the past 15 years, the procedure of "bootstrapping" (the rearrest and detention of previously adjudicated minors upon a violation of a court order) has raised particular concern. Bootstrapping, some contend, has resulted in disproportionately more females being adjudicated and incarcerated for status offenses or violation of non-offense conditions of the original court order (Girls Incorporated, 1996). In fact, much like the case with delinquency crimes, the arrest and incarceration rates of female delinquents for status offenses has been rising (Bergsmann, 1989; Rosenbaum & Chesney-Lind, 1994), and the rates of growth of female petitioned status offenses exceeds that of males (Butts, Snyder, Finnegan, Augenbaugh, & Poole, 1996).

In addition to bias in arresting female delinquents, the juvenile justice system also has been accused of bias against female delinquents in determining their disposition (Girls Incorporated, 1996). The evidence is ambiguous. On the one hand, some social scientists contend that adolescent females have a greater possibility of being incarcerated for less serious delinquent activity than males (Bergsmann, 1989; Chesney-Lind, 1977, 1988; Horowitz & Pottieger, 1991; Rhodes & Fischer, 1993; Schwartz, Steketee, & Schneider, 1990). For example, the decision to process female delinquents informally or to not adjudicate them when formally referred to court has not led necessarily to less serious or less restrictive dispositions (Girls Incorporated, 1996). Following the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Act of 1974, which emphasized diversion and deinstitutionalization of juvenile delinquents, the adjudication and rate of incarceration of juvenile delinquents for status offenses declined. This result chiefly affected the adjudication and incarceration of female delinquents. There is evidence, however, that these delinquents were merely redirected or shifted from public correctional facilities to confinement in private treatment centers (Bergsmann, 1989; Girls Incorporated, 1996; Weithorn, 1988). This incarceration occurred absent even the limited access juveniles have to due process and under conditions that cast doubt on the voluntarinesss of their consent. Another consideration is that female status offenders are much more often referred to juvenile court for running away, while male status offenders are more often referred for liquor law violations. As a result, female status offenders more often received formal probation than male status offenders, who more often received less formal judicial dispositions such as fines and referrals to counseling (Butts et al., 1996). However, from 1989 to 1993, the percentages of female and male status offenders detained and subsequently placed out-of-home for status offenses were quite comparable. Consequently, other researchers assert that when the type of offense and a variety of additional covariates are accounted for in analyses of the incarceration of female delinquents, females receive lenient treatment for the commission of less serious offenses and that no differences exist in adjudication of females and males

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for serious crimes against persons (D. R. Johnson & Scheuble, 1991; Kruttschnitt, 1996).

However, in maintaining a narrow, status-offense, sexuality-dominated perspective on female delinquents, the juvenile justice system is missing the larger picture of serious offending committed by female delinquents. The largest gender differences in both official and self-report delinquency occur for violent and serious index crimes (Kruttschnitt, 1996). Though official delinquency rates indicate that many more males than females are arrested for both offenses against persons and property offenses, the percentages of adolescent females arrested for these crimes have been increasing dramatically and at greater rates than males (Poe-Yamagata & Butts, 1996). For example, between 1989 and 1993, the growth rate of female juvenile arrests was more than twice the growth rate in male juvenile arrests (PoeYamagata & Butts, 1996). From 1985 to 1994, violent crime arrests have increased 125% for females compared to 67% for males, mostly due to arrests for robbery and aggravated assault (male juveniles continue to exceed female juveniles in growth rates for homicide arrests) (Poe-Yamagata & Butts, 1996; Snyder & Sickmund, 1995; Snyder et al., 1996). Property crime arrest rates for female juveniles continue to increase (Snyder & Sickmund, 1995; Snyder et al., 1996). From 1989 to 1993, female arrests for property crimes climbed 22%, while arrests of males for property crimes dropped 3% (Poe-Yamagata & Butts, 1996). Even for most categories of non-index offenses the growth rate of female juvenile arrests exceeds that of male juvenile arrests (Poe-Yamagata & Butts, 1996).

Because the juvenile justice system is oriented toward coping with female status offenders, it quite possibly may be employing ineffective or inappropriate correctional practices (Horowitz & Pottieger, 1991). Treatment interventions for delinquent females are distinctly lacking and have fallen behind the development of intervention programs for males and adult females (Bergsmann, 1989). Calls to intervene with the communities, families, and mental health needs of delinquent females have a long history (Vedder & Somerville, 1970) and continue to be the focus of entreaties on behalf of delinquent females (Bergsmann, 1989; Dembo et al., 1993). Yet, the juvenile justice system has failed to provide services tailored for the needs of female delinquents. When intervention programs are available, incarcerated female delinquents are apt to receive intervention focused on acting-out conduct rather than the internalizing concerns that are potentially more salient (Bergsmann, 1989; Chamberlain & Reid, 1994). Furthermore, those female delinquents who are removed from their homes and placed in residential treatment, foster care, or group homes also may not be receiving appropriate treatment. Chamberlain and Reid (1994) reported that female delinquents respond to therapeutic placement quite differently than males. While males generally responded to Treatment Foster Care with steady improvement after a troubled start, female delinquents appear to begin quietly and then express more problem behaviors, theoretically after gaining some measure of comfort or intimacy in foster care. Consequently, the course and strategy of treatment used for male delinquents in outof-home placements may not be effective for female delinquents.

In sum, the original theories about the sexual etiology of female delinquency were stigmatizing and led to stereotyping of female delinquents. This stereotyping

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of female delinquents has been reflected in the practices of the juvenile justice system, which, in spite of reform efforts, still is accused of unfair bias by handling female delinquents more harshly than male delinquents. Absent more informed social science input, juvenile justice is liable to continue to disregard the unique needs of female delinquents. Over the past 15 years, a variety of correlates, covariates, and theories of female delinquency have been empirically explored. However, the current state of the science of female delinquency is rife with methodological complications and theoretical ambiguity.

CONTEMPORARY PERSPECTIVES ON FEMALE DELINQUENCY

Models of female delinquency that generally emphasized status offenses and female sexuality may never have been accurate and certainly do not account for the full range of delinquent behavior exhibited by contemporary adolescent females. Only recently have social scientists attempted to correct common misconceptions about the nature of female delinquency by emphasizing developmental and socioecological determinants of female delinquency. In doing so, they have encountered considerable uncertainty about how to proceed theoretically and empirically with studies of female delinquency. Many investigations reflect popular misconceptions and stereotypes about females and their lives. Others assume "gender-sameness" and attempt to understand female delinquency by applying the same concepts that dominate research on male delinquency. Still others have argued that female delinquency is a unique phenomenon requiring separate constructs and hypothesizing unique causal paths to the development of female delinquency. As a consequence, basic issues such as whether to use cross-gender analyses or same-sex comparisons are the subject of considerable debate.

Although empirical interest in female delinquency has grown in recent years (Cernkovich & Giordano, 1992; Chesney-Lind & Sheldon, 1992; Rosenbaum & Lashley, 1990; Seydlitz, 1991), this research has suffered from the basic limitations imposed by biased sampling, inadequate sample descriptions, measurement inadequacies, and design restrictions. For example, studies of female delinquency have sampled Caucasians primarily, despite concerns about delinquency in minority populations, have omitted certain types of family structures such as mother-only families (e.g., Brown, 1984; Henggeler, Edwards, & Borduin, 1987), and have neglected chronic offenders (Cernkovich, Giordano, & Pugh, 1985). Often, researchers have failed to specify the actual numbers of females and males in the sample (e.g., Rankin, 1980; Shover, Norland, James, & Thorton, 1979). Some studies (e.g., Seydlitz, 1991) carried out secondary analyses on regional or national surveys like the Seattle Youth Study (Hindelang, Hirschi, & Weis, 1981) or the National Youth Survey (Elliott, 1993) confining what variables could be studied to those collected in the original survey. Some of these data sets were collected in the early 1970s and may not reflect more contemporary trends in female delinquency. Moreover, several studies have used the same data set repeatedly in attempts to test modifications of a theory (e.g., Hagan, Simpson, & Gillis, 1987; R. Johnson, 1986).

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Problems with measurement instruments also have hindered research on female delinquency. Reliance on self-report delinquency inventories has been criticized because they underrepresent truly serious offenses, while overrepresenting relatively minor offenses, typically inquire about behaviors that are not sufficiently described, and aggregate high-frequency offenders in the same category in spite of the severity of criminal conduct (Cernkovich et al, 1985). The lack of standardization in self-report measures used to assess various correlates of delinquency has resulted in researchers using one-item measures and idiosyncratic definitions and constructs, and failing to capture the dynamic and multidimensional nature of female delinquency.

Few systematic attempts have been made to design research or collect data specifically on female delinquents. Research in the field of delinquency has been dominated by cross-sectional designs that provide information about correlates of offending, but offer little firm evidence about the causes of offending. Moreover, statistical analyses that are sensitive to prevalence, such as correlations, may yield lower effect sizes because of the relatively low base rate of female offending. Consequently, while many studies have shown relationships between certain variables and female delinquency, few are able to account for any significant amount of variation in delinquent behavior.

In spite of these methodological complications, several topics have stood out in contemporary theories and research on female delinquents. These themes span the range of biopsychosocial variables from individual traits to larger socio-ecological influences. For example, research on the developmental characteristics of conduct-disorder and delinquency has begun to emerge. An empirical literature on the effects of abuse and sexual victimization and their relationship to female delinquency has been developing. Promising research has addressed how family factors and peer influences play a role in the etiology and maintenance of female delinquency. Academic correlates of female delinquency have been examined along with the significance of broader sociological considerations such as socioeconomic status and opportunity. Even the influence of the women's movement has been studied. The following is a brief review of each of these influences.

Table 1 provides summary information on key studies for the contemporary perspectives discussed below. The studies included in the table were selected because they provided data about factors contributing to the etiology of female delinquency or tested a theoretical perspective on female delinquency. Studies (regardless of sample size and type of participants) were included in the table if their designs were either quasiexperimental or longitudinal. While several crosssectional studies are mentioned in the text, only those cross-sectional studies that tested a model of female delinquency versus cross-sectional studies that are descriptive in nature are included in the table. These studies represent the vanguard in efforts to understand empirically the phenomenon of female delinquency and pave the way for a more comprehensive understanding of female delinquency in the future.

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