Deck 2: The Measurement and Nature of Delinquency

Question 1

The term ________ of delinquency has to do with the proportion of members of a cohort, or specific age category, who have committed delinquent acts by a certain age.

A) prevalence
B) incidence
C) validity
D) reliability

Answer 1

prevalence

Question 2

The term ________ of delinquency refers to the frequency of offending or to the number of delinquent events.

A) prevalence
B) incidence
C) validity
D) reliability

Answer 2

incidence

Question 3

The term ________ refers to the extent to which a research instrument measures what it says it measures.

A) prevalence
B) incidence
C) validity
D) reliability

Answer 3

validity

Question 4

The term ________ refers to the extent to which a questionnaire or interview yields the same answers from the same juveniles when they are questioned two or more times.

A) prevalence
B) incidence
C) validity
D) reliability

Question 5

Most information about the number of children appearing before the juvenile court each year comes from what publication of the U.S. Department of Justice?

A) Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency
B) National Crime Victimization Survey
C) Uniform Crime Reports
D) Juvenile Court Statistics

Question 6

A(n) ________ collects data from youths who report on their own delinquent acts.

A) self-evaluation survey
B) observational study
C) self-report survey
D) cohort study

Question 7

Which of the following is a good example of a longitudinal method of research study?

A) content analysis
B) cohort group
C) survey data
D) experimental data

Question 8

The four cohort studies (Philadelphia, PA; London, England; Racine, WI; and Columbus, OH) agree on far more than they disagree. On which finding do these studies NOT agree?

A) Lower-class minority males committed the most serious offenses
B) A few offenders committed the majority of serious property and violent offenses
C) Punishment by the juvenile justice system tended to encourage rather than discourage future criminality.
D) Youth crime does not progress from less serious to more serious

Question 9

Victimization data show that adolescent females are victimized more often than adolescent males and that generally speaking, this victimization is influenced by their gender, race, and ________.

A) religion
B) age
C) socioeconomic status
D) geographical location

Question 10

Studies based on official statistics have reported that ________ are overrepresented in arrest, conviction, and incarceration rates relative to their population based.

A) African Americans
B) Asians
C) Hispanics
D) Whites

Question 11

The term ________ refers to the age at which a child begins to commit delinquent acts; an important dimension of delinquency.

A) hidden delinquency
B) escalation of offenses
C) age of onset
D) chronic offending

Question 12

The term ________ refers to an increase in the frequency and severity of an individual's offenses an important dimension of delinquency.

A) hidden delinquency
B) escalation of offenses
C) age of onset
D) chronic offending

Question 13

Rolf Loeber and colleagues identified multiple developmental pathways to a delinquent career. An early ________ pathway consists of a sequence of stubborn behavior, defiance, and authority avoidance.

A) authority conflict
B) covert
C) overt
D) chronic

Question 14

What is the term for the repeated involvement of a juvenile in one type of delinquency during the course of his or her offending?

A) specialization
B) modeling
C) imitation
D) copying

Question 15

According to research on chronic offenders, official records make it very difficult to ________.

A) measure violent crimes
B) investigate sociopathic attitudes
C) document chronic offenders' social class
D) predict chronic offenders' criminal career outcomes

Question 16

Which of the following is NOT one of the three population groups Alfred Blumstein identified in his classic study?

A) persisters
B) anti-socials
C) amateurs
D) innocents

Question 17

The experience of having been ________ as a juvenile seriously compromises multiple life domains in adulthood, especially for females.

A) specialized
B) institutionalized
C) decriminalized
D) humanized

Question 18

A small number of juvenile offenders accounts for a disproportionate number of all crimes.

A) authority conflict
B) covert
C) overt
D) chronic

Question 19

The national epidemic of youth violence began in the late 1980s, peaked in the ________, and then dropped to earlier levels, where it remains today.

A) 1990s
B) early 2000s
C) late 2000s
D) 2010s

Question 20

________ has/have played a major role in the decline of gun use by juveniles.

A) The police
B) The family
C) Lawyers
D) The school

Question 21

The term "prevalence of delinquency"refers to the frequency with which delinquent behavior occurs.

Question 22

The term "incidence of delinquency"refers to the percentage of the juvenile population involved in delinquent behavior.

Question 23

The Federal Bureau of Investigation sponsors the for the Uniform Crime Reporting Program data source.

Question 24

Many crimes are hidden or are not reported to the police; therefore, the UCR Program vastly underestimates the actual amount of crime in the United States.

Question 25

According to the UCR Program, juvenile murder rates increased greatly between 1993 and 2003.

Question 26

Official arrest statistics show that adolescent males are involved in more frequent and more serious delinquent acts than are adolescent females.

Question 27

Studies based on official statistics have reported that African Americans are overrepresented in arrest, conviction, and incarceration rates relative to their population base.

Question 28

Victimization data reveal that adolescent males are more likely to be victims than are adolescent females and that their victimization is shaped by their gender, race, and social class.

Question 29

Research traditionally has been unable to find a clear relationship between social class and delinquency.

Question 30

Several studies have found that the age of onset is one of the best predictors of the length and intensity of delinquent careers.

Question 31

Young people who begin offending early tend to have long delinquent careers; and at least some youthful offenders progress to increasingly serious forms of delinquency, with a handful of youthful offenders going on to become career offenders.

Question 32

A juvenile who engages repeatedly in delinquent behavior is a "chronic offender." The Philadelphia cohort studies defined chronic offenders as youths who had committed five or more delinquent offenses. Other studies use this term to refer to youth involved in serious and repetitive offenses.

Question 33

Homicide death rates of males 13 to 17 decreased in the 1990s.

Question 34

The Boston Gun Project has been one of the least successful efforts at reducing firearm violence in major cities.

Question 35

Good communications between the community and the police is one strategy to reduce juvenile gun violence.

Question 36

The easy availability of handguns has contributed to a growing trend in youth violence in this country.

Question 37

The term ________ of delinquency refers to the percentage of the juvenile population involved in delinquent behavior.

Question 38

The term ________ of delinquency refers to the frequency with which delinquent behavior occurs.

Question 39

The extent to which a questionnaire or interview yields the same answers from the same juveniles when they are questioned two or more times is called ________.

Question 40

One major difficulty with cohort studies is that their findings cannot be ________ confidently beyond the persons in the cohort.

Question 41

Most studies using self-report measures have found that African Americans are more likely to be ________ delinquent but are not significantly worse than Caucasians in their prevalence or frequency of offending.

Question 42

Victimization data shows that adolescent ________ are victimized more often than adolescents of the other gender.

Question 43

The Seattle Social Development Project data showed that an early age of onset predicted a ________ rate of offending in both self-reports and court referrals.

Question 44

The term escalation of offenses refers to a(n) ________ in the frequency and severity of an individual's offenses.

Question 45

A small number of chronic juvenile offenders accounts for a ________ share of all crimes.

Question 46

Research shows that ________ is strongly predictive of premature, unstable, precarious, and unsatisfied conditions in multiple life domains.

Question 47

Please match each concept or term with its definition.

-Prevalence of delinquency

A) Any unobserved or unreported delinquency
B) The percentage of the juvenile population involved in delinquent behavior.
C) The frequency with which delinquent behavior occurs.

Question 48

Please match each concept or term with its definition.

-Incidence of delinquency

A) Any unobserved or unreported delinquency
B) The percentage of the juvenile population involved in delinquent behavior.
C) The frequency with which delinquent behavior occurs.

Question 49

Please match each concept or term with its definition.

-Hidden delinquency

A) Any unobserved or unreported delinquency
B) The percentage of the juvenile population involved in delinquent behavior.
C) The frequency with which delinquent behavior occurs.

Question 50

Match each major source of data on delinquency with its type of information.

-Uniform Crime Reporting Program

A) Victimization data
B) The FBI's program for compiling annual data about crimes committed in the United States.
C) Delinquency cases processed in federal courts
D) Individual self-reports of involvement in delinquency and crime

Question 51

Match each major source of data on delinquency with its type of information.

-National Crime Victimization Survey

A) Victimization data
B) The FBI's program for compiling annual data about crimes committed in the United States.
C) Delinquency cases processed in federal courts
D) Individual self-reports of involvement in delinquency and crime

Question 52

Match each major source of data on delinquency with its type of information.

-Juvenile Court Statistics

A) Victimization data
B) The FBI's program for compiling annual data about crimes committed in the United States.
C) Delinquency cases processed in federal courts
D) Individual self-reports of involvement in delinquency and crime

Question 53

Match each major source of data on delinquency with its type of information.

-Self-report surveys

A) Victimization data
B) The FBI's program for compiling annual data about crimes committed in the United States.
C) Delinquency cases processed in federal courts
D) Individual self-reports of involvement in delinquency and crime

Question 54

Discuss the various weaknesses attributed to the Uniform Crime Reporting Program as a measure of crime.

Question 55

Discuss the findings of various studies on racial/ethnic background and delinquent behavior.

Question 56

Discuss the various factors that may lead to juvenile offenders continuing on into adult criminal behavior.

Question 57

Discuss the relationship between guns and youth violence.

Question 58

What is the importance of both reliability and validity to the measurement and nature of delinquency?

Question 59

The term "hidden delinquency" refers to any unobserved or unreported delinquency. What delinquent acts do you think are reported the LEAST? Explain and justify your choices.