Violent youth group involvement an integrative theory (published in Tijdschrift voor Criminologie)

1. The school context of violent street gang involvement in Antwerp
Prof. Dr. Lieven Pauwels, Ghent University

2. Introduction
• This study builds upon previous comparative research
(Pauwels and Oberwittler, 2006)
• Self-reported delinquency studies explicitly measuring
street gang involvement in Belgian metropolitan context
have previously been non-existing
• This study explicitly aims at filling in a gap in Belgian
empirical research

3. Introduction
• Results are based on a large-scale survey of young
adolescents (grade 7-8; aged 13-15 year) both living in
Antwerp and going to school in Antwerp
• Original data were used to test neighbourhood contextual
effects on individual differences in delinquent behaviour
using both hierarchical and non-hierarchical multilevel
methods (testing social disorganization theory-Pauwels,
2006)

4. Introduction
• This finding led to a further examination of school
level effects in the Antwerp context on both
serious self-reported delinquency and violent
street gang involvement
• A set of questions measuring involvement in
violent street gang was included in the survey
(Heitmeyer et al, 1995; Oberwittler, 2004)

5. The measurement instrument
• 1 filter question: involvement in clique that considers
itself as group (no organised group)
• 4 follow-up questions with same answering categories
• fighting with other adolescents
• strife with others from outside the cliques area
• being prepared to do dangerous things
• act not talk if group’s reputation is at stake
• Method: cut-off point: upper half of the scale range

6. The measurement instrument
• Discriminating validity: commitment of violent acts (ever-
never odds) gang members to non-members
• Involvement does not per se mean the committment of
delinquent acts
• Comparing these odds should give us an indication of
discriminating power (Klein, Weerman and Thornberry,
2006)

7. The measurement instrument: odds ratios gang members to
non-gangmembers
Violence-items Oddsratio violence items
ever threatened so on
streets
9.23
ever kicked so 5.07
ever participated in fights
outside school
11.16
ever vandalized sth 9.16
ever committed burglary 10.26

8. The Sample
• Cluster sample on multiple non hierarchical
levels: 2486 individuals in 23 schools and
42 neighbourhoods
• No neighbourhood effects on street gang
membership using cross-classified
multilevel models
• Continuing with 2-level hierarchical models

9. Individual differences in street gang membership
in Antwerp
• 146 srd-based identified gang members
• 69.2% males
• 13.7% from disadvantaged families
• 17.2% from single parent families
• 64.6% with immigrant background outside
EU

10. Belgium
+EU
1 or 2 parents
outside EU
Girls (ns) 96,50% 96,40%
-574 -1197
3,70% 3,50% 3,60%
-24 -21 -45
100,00% 100,00% 100,00%
-647 -595 -1242
Boys * 95,80% 87,40% 91,80%
-609 -500 -1109
4,20% 12,60% 8,20%
-27 -72 -99
100,00% 100,00% 100,00%
-636 -572 -1208
Violent street gang involvement
Immigrant background Total
Not involved 96,3%
-623
Total boys
Involved
Total girls
Not involved
Involved

11. Theoretical background
• Integrating school contextual effects and
individual level predictors of street gang gang
membership from an integrated informal
control/lifestyle risk perspective
• Vertical and horizontal sequential integration
• Seeking to explain interaction between sex and
immigrant background of young adolescents

13. Explaining variables Minimum Maximum Mean Std
School level (N: 23)
% of juveniles living in economic deprived family 3 26 11 0.06
Individual level (N: 2176)
Sex
(1= boys)
Family Structure
(1= one parent family)
Economic Deprivation
(1= low)
School Failure (1= 1 year behind)
0 1 .35 --
Age (1= older then14 years old) 0 1 .26 --
Immigrant Background
(1= outside EU)
Parental Control (knowledgde) 5 25 19.58 4.37
Commitment to school 5 25 18.27 3.91
Delinquency Tolerance 4 20 9.90 4.35
Low Self Control 7 35 21.21 6.28
Lifestyle Risk -3 3 -1.47 1.32
0 1 .49 --
0 1 .15 --
0 1 .10 --
0 1 .39 --
Sample descriptives

14. Explanatory variables Model 0 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 5
Level-2: school characteristics OR OR OR OR OR OR
% adolescents from deprived family 1.31 1.34 1.37 1.32
Level-1: adolescent chararteristics
Background variables
Sex (0=girl, 1=boy) 1.27 1.26 1.16 1.06 1.01
Immigrant background (0=EU, 1=outside EU) .69 .64 .63 .53 .83
Sex* immigrant background 3.68 3.72 3.15 2.92 2.54
Deprivation (0=low, 1=high) .89 .86 .88 1.02 1.07
Single parent family (0=no, 1=yes) 1.52 1.55 1.35 1.19 1.14
School failure (0=no, 1=yes) 1.61 1.60 1.35 1.19 1.14
Age (0=12-14, 1= 15 and older) 1.07 1.05 .87 .98 .80
Informal controls
Bond to school .90 .98 1.00
Parental control .86 .91 .94
Socialization
Delinquency tolerance 1.15 1.11
Low self control 1.12 1.11
Situational characteristics
Lifestyle risk 1.66
Variance level 1 1 1 1 1 1 1
ICC 2.49 1.32 0.49 0.07 0.00 0.00
difference in deviance-value * * * * *

15. Summary of findings
• School context matters for street gang involvement
• The nett-contextual effect is rather small but significant
• And especially moderated by mechanisms of informal
control
• Schools are rather highly segregated by pupils’ level of
informal controls (higher then neighbourhoods)

16. Summary of findings
• Social controls moderate the effects of school context and
the interaction term between gender and immigrant
background (the interaction term can even be explained by
the school context of poverty-nog shown in analyses)
• Effects of social controls are almost completely mediated
by morality and self control
• Lifestyle risk is the strongest predictor variable and further
reduces the interaction term

17. Discussion
• Results suggest that modification in the school
concentration of poverty will reduce the likelihood
that any pupil gets involved in a violent youth
gang
• Social structure influences gang membership
through mechanisms of social control and
socialization
• Social control and socialization influences young
adolescents’ life styles (see Wikström and
Butterworth, 2006)

18. Discussion
• We need to augment efforts to understand the youth gang
phenomenon by searching for the mechanisms that lie
behind observations
• We should therefore move towards an analytical
criminology (inspired by “Analytical Sociology”,
Hedström, 2006)
• This approach to criminological theorizing and research,
aims at explaining complex social processes by carefully
dissecting them and then bringing into focus their most
important constituent components

19. Discussion
• Unraveling ‘black boxes’ using a causal
mechanism-based approach is extremely important
for efficient crime prevention
• This approach makes a clear differentiation
between science and ‘story-telling’ possible