Testing the direct, indirect, and moderated effects of childhood animal cruelty on future aggressive and non‐aggressive offending
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 11106219 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Glenn D Walters (0000-0002-7219-1542, Department of Criminal Justice Kutztown University Kutztown Pennsylvania, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2014 |
| Volume | 40 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 238-249 |
| Publication date | 2014-05-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Aggressive Behavior (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0096-140X • E-ISSN: 1098-2337 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1002/ab.21514 |
| PMID | 24302554 |
| OpenAlex | W1807098699 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 10 |
| References cited | 36 |
The relationship between childhood cruelty toward animals and subsequent aggressive offending was explored in 1,336 (1,154 male, 182 female) participants from the 11-wave Pathways to Desistance study (Mulvey, 2013). Aggressive and income offending at Waves 1 through 10 were regressed onto a dichotomous measure of prior involvement in animal cruelty and four control variables (age, race, sex, early onset behavior problems) assessed at Wave 0 (baseline). Results indicated that childhood animal cruelty was equally predictive of aggressive and non-aggressive (income) offending, a finding inconsistent with the hypothesis that cruelty toward animals desensitizes a person to future interpersonal aggression or in some way prepares the individual for interpersonal violence toward humans. Whereas a significant sex by animal cruelty interaction was predicted, there was no evidence that sex or any of the other demographic variables included in this study (age, race) consistently moderated the animal cruelty-subsequent offending relationship. On the other hand, two cognitive-personality measures (interpersonal hostility, callousness/unemotionality) were found to successfully mediate the animal cruelty-subsequent offending relationship. Outcomes from this study imply that a causal nexus-partially or fully mediated by hostility, callousness/unemotionality, and other cognitive-personality variables-may exist between childhood animal cruelty and subsequent offending, although the effect is not specific to violence
Aggression · Criminology · Cruelty · Developmental psychology · Hostility · Injury prevention · Medical emergency · Personality · Poison control · Bullying, Victimization, and Aggression · Clinical Psychology · Medicine · Psychology · Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment · Psychopathy, Forensic Psychiatry, Sexual Offending · Social Psychology
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Animal Abuse as a Type of Trauma
Integrating animal cruelty exposure into person-centered models of childhood adversity
Animal Abuse and Bullying/Victimization in a Community Sample of School-Age Children
Understanding and Conceptualizing Childhood Animal Harm
Intra-familial Violence and Peer Aggression Among Early Adolescents
Intentional Harm to Animals
An evaluation of the directional relationship between head injuries and subsequent changes in impulse control and delinquency in a sample of previously adjudicated males
Psychopathic traits and different types of criminal behavior
A Preliminary Exploration of the Psychological Risk Factors for Childhood Animal Cruelty
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
Linking Callous-Unemotional Traits to Instrumental and Non-Instrumental Forms of Aggression
The Relationship of Animal Abuse to Violence and Other Forms of Antisocial Behavior
The Brief Symptom Inventory
Species Richness of Parasite Assemblages
Common method biases in behavioral research
A general approach to causal mediation analysis.
Social Learning and Social Structure
Are There Multiple Paths to Delinquency
A General Theory of Crime
Distress and Restraint as Superordinate Dimensions of Self‐Reported Adjustment
Childhood Cruelty to Animals
Developing an empirical classification of violent offences for use in the prediction of recidivism in England and Wales
Childhood Cruelty toward Animals among Criminals and Noncriminals
Techniques of Neutralization
Exploring the Link between Corporal Punishment and Children's Cruelty to Animals
| Citations per year | 1.25 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2018 - 2025 (8) |
| Highly cited | No |