Romantic Partners, Friends, and Parents: Enmeshment in Networks Characterized by Deviance and Adolescent Delinquency
Year: 2007
Type: article
Study design: Observational Study
Abstract: ii Peggy C. Giordano, Advisor Adolescents are members of several social networks, yet research on social learning mechanisms related to delinquency has not explicitly examined the associated risks of differential exposure to deviance across the various social networks with which youths are affiliated (romantic partners, friends, and parents). Employing data from Wave 1 of the Toledo Adolescent Relationship Study (n=957), this analysis has four main objectives. The analysis first explores whether romantic partners ’ delinquency is significantly related to the respondents’ own levels of delinquency involvement, after taking parent and peer deviance into account. The remaining objectives include categorizing the adolescents by level and type of network ‘enmeshment ’ in deviance, and examining the relationships between these network classifications and self-reported delinquent behaviors. First, controlling for demographic characteristics and measures of social control, all three deviance variables contribute significantly to variation in levels of respondent delinquency. Second, the distributions of
Author: Robert A. Lonardo
Institution: Bowling Green State University
Language: English
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W28702945