Confinement as a two‐stage turning point

Do changes in identity or social structure predict subsequent changes in criminal activity

Bibliographic Data

ID9680319
AuthorsAudrey Hickert (0000-0002-0740-8602, Criminology and Criminal Justice Southern Illinois University, corresponding author), Shawn D Bushway (0000-0003-4040-431X, RAND Corporation), Shawn Bushway (Behavioral and Policy Sciences Department RAND Corporation), P Nieuwbeerta (0000-0001-5134-3175, Department of Criminology, Faculty of Law Leiden University), Anja Dirkzwager (0000-0001-7530-1826, Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement)
Year2021
Volume59
Issue1
Pages73-108
Publication date2021-02-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueCriminology (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0011-1384 • E-ISSN: 1745-9125
PublisherWiley (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1111/1745-9125.12262
OpenAlexW3098566620
LanguageEN
Citations received5
References cited78

Scholars frequently characterize incarceration as a possible turning point in criminal activity. This implies a two‐stage process: 1) change in life‐course mechanisms around confinement and reentry result in 2) subsequent change in criminal activity relative to preconfinement. Following this model, we examine change in criminal activity, criminal identity, and social/structural challenges using data from the Prison Project, a cohort of adult males with short‐term confinement in the Netherlands in 2010–2011. Results of a novel test for within‐individual change in arrests from preconfinement to post‐reentry show that most individuals are stable—yet there is a substantial group who go down meaningfully and a much smaller group who go up. Even though changes in criminal identity from the intervening period do not predict these change groups, increases in social/structural challenges predict those who go up in criminal activity. We build from prior work on desistance and reentry, contrasting our findings and highlighting the unique insight gained from, as well as challenges of, measuring individual change within our two‐stage turning point model. Although life‐course mechanisms often correspond with changes in criminal activity concurrently, identifying individual changes that are predictors of subsequent shifts in criminal offending remains elusive

Cohort · Criminal behavior · Criminology · Identity (music · Life course approach · Period (music · Physics · Prison · Reentry · Tipping point (physics · Turning point · Crime Patterns and Interventions · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis · Engineering · Homelessness and Social Issues · Medicine · Psychology · Social Psychology

Tools

Open DOI