Doctoral Dissertation Research: A Multilevel Analysis of Youth Crime

University Of Miami, Coral Gables FL

Investigators

Abstract

In this project, the effects of school-level, neighborhood-level, and individual level variables on youth crime are analyzed using a dataset that is combined from a multi-level survey and the Census. This study addresses the complex issue of adolescent crime in contemporary society by taking into account youth capacity to make decisions and by examining adolescents in different areas in the U.S. in the 21st century. It considers contemporary adolescent crime as a product of the interrelationship between decision-making and various social contexts in youth life including school environment, neighborhood milieu, family dynamics, and other important domains. Results from this project will help develop recommendations for youth crime reduction strategies and will facilitate collaborations between sociologists, criminologists, educators, decision makers, and other stakeholders on strategies concerning adolescent crime prevention. This analysis will use a unique dataset constructed by combining data from a recently conducted multi-level survey of over 2,000 middle and high school students from 40 schools in several metropolitan areas in the U. S. (ISRD, Wave III), the U.S. Census, and the National Center for Education Statistics. Different types of quantitative analyses will be employed, such as multi-level modeling, to address the cross-level interactional effects of predictors on adolescent crime. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.