Family Social Capital and Delinquent Behavior in the United Kingdom

John P. Hoffmann, Jared D. Thorpe and Mikaela J. Dufur
Additional contact information
John P. Hoffmann: Department of Sociology, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602, USA
Jared D. Thorpe: Department of Sociology, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA
Mikaela J. Dufur: Department of Sociology, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602, USA

Social Sciences, 2020, vol. 9, issue 10, 1-15

Abstract: Research suggests that juvenile delinquency has a number of deleterious effects on adolescents’ lives. A promising way to discourage delinquent behavior is by increasing social capital, which involves social connections adolescents have to other actors and pro-social norms that flow through these networks. The primary source of social capital is one’s family members, but no studies to date have focused directly on the effects of family social capital on delinquent behavior in the United Kingdom (U.K.). We use data from the U.K. Millennium Cohort Study (MCS, 2015–2016; n = 11,352) to assess different sources of family social capital among youth. The results of negative binomial regression models indicate that certain types of family social capital, including parental supervision, not fighting with parents, and talking to parents when youth are worried, are associated with less delinquent behavior, even after adjusting for covariates such as family structure, household income, and peer behaviors. The results add to the empirical foundation that supports family social capital’s attenuating effects on youth misbehaviors and increases confidence in the utility of social capital to serve as a generally applicable theory of youth development and behaviors.

Keywords: family social capital; juvenile delinquency; adolescents; United Kingdom (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A B N P Y80 Z00 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/9/10/178/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0760/9/10/178/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jscscx:v:9:y:2020:i:10:p:178-:d:424374

Access Statistics for this article

Social Sciences is currently edited by Ms. Yvonne Chu

More articles in Social Sciences from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().