Kristen Tringali 5/6/13 Soc 181 Final Paper Prof. Mangino
Family Structure Vs. Adolescent Delinquency: Is there something inherently wrong with non-nuclear families? Introduction In this study, we have decided to examine the relationship, if any, present between family structure and child deviance. From this deviance, we have selected three different subcategories to substantiate our claims of “deviance”. These three sectors are drug use, sexual deviance, and finally, delinquency in relation to the law. We have hypothesized a negative relationship between biological family structures and deviance, stating that when a child comes from a family with two biological parents, that they will then in turn be less likely to perform deviant behaviors. Children who come from nontraditional families will experience dev Literature Review
In accordance with previous studies, we have learned much about our topic through the research of others. A study done in 2004 by Demuth and Brown studied the correlation between family structure, family processes and adolescent delinquency. More specifically, they studied parental absences and genders to draw their conclusions on family structure. The study qualified delinquency with concrete concepts such as damaging property, stealing, fighting, larceny, use of weapons, and finally disorderly conduct. The study found that children from families with one parent were more likely to engage in delinquent behavior. This scale of different enumerated behaviors was very helpful in our formulation of our delinquency-rating questions. Brown studied adolescent smoking and drinking behaviors in 2010 using his survey contrasting said habits and family structure, in the terms of maternal socialization. The special attention to maternal socialization was particularly interesting, and results yielded a negative connection between the two variables: as maternal socialization goes up, risk behaviors of drinking and smoking go down. Turner, Irwin, and Millstein conducted a study in 1991 studying the relationship between adolescent substance abuse and emotional detachment from parents. Respondents were asked in a dichotomous format to indicate their usage. Although this format would elicit more responses seeing that a third option of “don’t know/neutral” significantly reduces response rate, we found it interesting and decided to alter our instrument, feeling that the third option should not be omitted.
1
Youth risk behaviors were compared to the number of parents in a household in a 2005 study conducted by Oman, Vesely, and Aspy. The study found that when adolescents lived in a household with two parents, they were less likely to be involved in fights, play hooky from school, possess weapons, get arrested, or have any other form of police involvement. This study influenced ours subtly. It should be noted that arrest rates and police involvement depend largely on other factors besides behaviors, so we decided to omit these terms and substitute them with concrete actions that would constitute an arrest or police involvement instead. A large scale of delinquent behaviors was studied in relation to their explicit family structure and adult members present in their household. This study preformed in 2001 by Mathern and Thomas included many questions with the use of a likert scale, which we found very adequate and effective for this subject. The study hypothesized that traditional families would produce children with lower levels of delinquency than non-traditional families. Hypothesis
We have hypothesized, as many studies before us, that delinquency levels would be less present in children who lived with both biological parents than those who did not. Conceptual and Operational Definitions, and Measurement Upon initial consideration, we intended to study family structure, using the structure and presence of various parental/adult figures in the home as an indicator of family structure, as was done in Mathern and Thomas’ study in 2001. After discussing our intentions with Professor Mangino, he emphasized the significance of having biological parents in the home, so we limited our family structure to just questioning the presence of biological parents in the home. For our dependant variable, we studied adolescent delinquency. In the context of this study, we have qualified the abstract concept of “delinquency” into three subcategories. 1. School Performance- Here we studied the respondent’s grade point average, or GPA on a scale of 0-4. 2. Drug Use- Recent (in the scope of the past year) use of a variety of drugs, even if only once. The drugs that we considered in this survey were marijuana, alcohol, prescription drugs with and without a prescription, Adderall and Ritalin, cocaine, crack, speed, methanphetamines, exstasy, inhalants, opiates, heroin, morphine, coedeine, methadone, hallucinogens, LSD, mushrooms, PCP, ketamine, and mescaline. 3. Performance of “delinquent behaviors”- We identified behaviors based off the most common arrest charges. These behaviors include engaging in a physical fight, taking something that was not yours without permission, signing 2
someone else’s name to a document, consuming an illegal substance in any quantity, carried a weapon, or entered property when not supposed to. We kept the scope of these behaviors within the past year. After submitting several questions for review, Professor Mangino selected for us the questions that were the most pertinent to our study, and helped us to formalize the verbiage, leaving us with the final questions that would appear on our instrument. Some questions we left in the traditional format, and others we reverse coded, in order to elicit more honest responses from our participants. To measure these concepts, we selected the following questions:
Please indicate the family structure you lived in during your senior year in high school by completing this statement: “In my senior year of high school, I lived with…” (Please mark one choice): o Both biological parents in the same home o One biological parent and one step parent in the same home o One biological parent and no other parent in the home o Neither biological parent in the home Approximately, what is your overall Grade Point Average (GPA) in college? o 0.0 to 1.4 (About a D or lower) o 1.5 to 2.4 (About a C) o 2.5 to 3.4 (About a B) o 3.5 to 4.0 (About an A) In the past year, have you ever… (mark all that apply) Yes
No
Had a physical fight
Taken something that was not yours without permission
Signed someone else’s name on a document
Consumed an illegal substance in any quantity
Carried a weapon
Entered private property when not supposed to
3
In the past year, have you tried any of the following, even if only once? Yes
No
Marijuana
Alcohol
Prescription drugs for the purpose of getting high
Prescription drugs for the purpose of enhancing your performance at something
Adderall or Ritalin other than as prescribed by a doctor
Cocaine, crack, speed, methanphetamine, or ecstasy
Inhalants
Opiates, heroin, morphine, codeine, methadone
Hallucinogens, LSD, mushrooms, PCP, ketamine, mescaline
4
As for control variables, we decided to control variables for respondent’s gender, how much their families worried about money during the respondent’s high school years, their parent’s education levels, and if the respondent was white or non white. Methods The population sampled for this survey included all Hofstra undergraduate students who were registered and taking sociology courses during the spring 2013 semester. We acquired our respondents through a one-stage cluster sample. Since all students necessarily are nested in classes, classes were selected and students within those classes were asked to complete the instrument. Our sample frame was the registrar’s Sp2013 list of all classes with a SOC prefix, excluding independent studies, honors theses, and internships. There were 28 SOC classes in the sample frame. From our sample frame, five classes were randomly selected, and all students present in each class on the day of the survey administration were asked to complete the survey. The five classes had a total of 127 students officially enrolled in them according to the registrar’s list. Our survey yielded 96 completed surveys, leaving us with a response rate of 76%. The survey consisted of 6 pages with a cover letter on top. It took about 5 minutes to complete, on average. Surveys were administered by several of our colleagues and were distributed to students in the first minutes of their classes. They were instructed to complete the survey honestly, and that their responses were anonymous. Results The average age of our respondents ranged from 19-27, with the mean age being 21.07. 38% of respondents were males, and 62% were females. The mean class standing code was a 2.75, indicating that most respondents were currently finishing up their junior year. 70% of our respondents lived with both biological parents in the home, which corresponds to national averages. Below is a chart of other relevant statistics to our study. USE Variable
N
Mean
Std. Deviation
Min
Max
q7bioparNY
96
1.70
0.46
1
2
new_4wht
95
0.66
0.48
0
1
PAR_ED
92
3.36
1.18
1
5
q14gpa
96
3.16
0.62
1
4
q17a_fightYN
95
1.81
0.39
1
2
5
q17b_takethingYN
95
1.66
0.48
1
2
q17c_signnameYN
96
1.73
0.45
1
2
q17d_illegsubYN
95
1.38
0.49
1
2
q17e_weapYN
94
1.85
0.36
1
2
q17f_entprivpr~YN
95
1.76
0.43
1
2
There was a lot of information to be understood from this chart. Firstly, the basics; The first column represents the question that we asked. Some questions had several answers, meanwhile others only had two. There were several questions that we reverse coded, and we illustrated this through writing NY instead of YN to make the interpretation process easier. The second column illustrates the number of active responses we had to each question. Following that, the average response is shown in the Mean column, which is followed by the column that states the standard deviation of the specific question. The last two columns are the min and max answers, which show the highest and lowest possible response choices. We found some interesting correlations among the data that we studied. Here are various regression charts run off several different variables: Substance use regression: regress sunstunceuseRC q7
q2sex1f2m AGE PAR_ED new_4wht, beta
Source | SS df MS 90 -------------+-----------------------------1.86 Model | .637271385 5 .127454277 0.1107 Residual | 5.76620084 84 .068645248 0.0995 -------------+-----------------------------0.0459 Total | 6.40347222 89 .071949126 .262
Number of obs = F(
5,
84) =
Prob > F
=
R-squared
=
Adj R-squared = Root MSE
=
----------------------------------------------------------------------------sunstunceu~RC | Coef. Std. Err. t P>|t| Beta ------------+----------------------------------------------------------------
6
q7bioparNY | q2sex1f2m | AGE | PAR_ED | new_4wht | _cons |
-.0247587 -.0425354 -.0743335 -.1351105 -.0334897 -.1809239 .0132809 .0584794 -.1037904 -.1848993 2.644135 .
.0620146
-0.40
0.691
.0622411
-1.19
0.236
.020006
-1.67
0.098
.0253539
0.52
0.602
.0614908
-1.69
0.095
.4360443
6.06
0.000
Sexual activity regression: ----------------------------------------------------------------------------sex_activityRC | Coef. Std. Err. t P>|t| Beta ------------+---------------------------------------------------------------q7bioparNY | -.1931777 .2770732 -0.70 0.488 -.0746323 q2sex1f2m | -.4162511 .2798697 -1.49 0.141 -.1699685 AGE | -.1517966 .0891907 -1.70 0.093 -.184853 PAR_ED | .0496835 .1144979 0.43 0.665 .0487841 new_4wht | -.3225463 .274053 -1.18 0.243 -.1291455 _cons | 7.357829 1.945212 3.78 0.000 . Correlations
Having two biological parents in the home positively correlates with substance abuse, when all other control variables are set equal. Although there is a weak positive relationship present, this statistic does not generalize towards the entire population. Males use substances more than females, and parents with higher education levels have children who are less likely to participate in drug use. Other insignificant correlations we found included the following relationships: as one gets older, they are more sexually active. As parental education goes up, sexual activity goes down. In addition, white people have more sex than non-white people, although this is also an insignificant correlation. White people use substances more than nonwhites. This is significant, and can be generalized to the population. Getting older increases substance use, and this is also a significant correlation that can be generalized to the entire population. Mean GPAs were significantly changed when the introduction of two biological parents in the home was considered. On average, those who lived with 2 biological parents had GPAs of 3.24, and those who did not had GPAs of 2.97. The difference 7
appears to be large, however the correlation was not statistically significant, associated with just a .1 significance value. The correlation between 2 biological parents and GPA is 2.0 with a significance value at the .10 level, meaning that we are 90% sure that the relationship in our data is real and not due to random chance. Respondents who lived with two biological parents in their senior year of high school have a collage GPA (on average) of 3.24 on a 4 point scale. Those respondents who lived in some other family structure had an average GPS of 2.97. The difference, we can now see is statistically significant. To see if this relationship was indeed spurious, we decided to introduce more control variables. We controlled the respondent’s gender, how much their family worried about money during their high school years, parent’s education levels, and if their parents were white or non white. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------q14gpa | Coef. Std. Err. t P>|t| Beta ------------+---------------------------------------------------------------q7bioparNY | .261305 .1471618 1.78 0.079 .1899568 q2sex1f2m | -.1825911 .1442157 -1.27 0.209 -.1390098 q6money_wo~y | -.0598845 .0647278 -0.93 0.358 -.1020519 PAR_ED | .0711727 .0613899 1.16 0.250 .1299193 new_4wht | .1405566 .1458518 0.96 0.338 .1056508 _cons | 2.807209 .4204317 6.68 0.000 . -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This table illustrates a regression using the control variables previously stated to test the relationship between family structure and GPA. The relationship holds through the controlling of all aforementioned variables. Among people who hare of the same sex, had the same amount of money worries, same parental education, and same race, living with two biological parents in high school is positively associated with a higher GPA in college. The next variable that we decided to focus in on was fighting. The correlation between living with two biological parents and fighting is a -.20. It is a moderate correlation that shows that respondents from households with two biological parents are more likely to have engaged in a physical fight in the past year. This correlation is statistically significant at the .10 level. Just as before, we decided to test this variable’s spuriousness by adding in the same control variables. Below is the regression of the fighting variable when introduced to the new control variables. -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
8
q14gpa |
Coef. Beta
Std. Err.
t
P>|t|
------------+---------------------------------------------------------------q7bioparNY | .261305 .1471618 1.78 0.079 .1899568 q2sex1f2m | -.1825911 .1442157 -1.27 0.209 -.1390098 q6money_wo~y | -.0598845 .0647278 -0.93 0.358 -.1020519 PAR_ED | .0711727 .0613899 1.16 0.250 .1299193 new_4wht | .1405566 .1458518 0.96 0.338 .1056508 _cons | 2.807209 .4204317 6.68 0.000 . -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This table clearly shows that the relationship between family structure and fighting remains. Among respondents with the same gender, family money worries, parents education and race, living with two biological parents in the respondent’s senior year of high school is associated with a higher propensity to engage in a physical fight over the past year. This relationship is not spurious when we use these specific control variables. Discussion Our hypotheses were not very strongly supported. Although most of the data illustrated weak and completely absent correlations, we were still able to derive some meaningful correlations from our data. The less statistically significant correlations still provide interesting insights into the possibilities of family structure affecting other areas in an adolescent’s life that we previously hadn’t considered. Overall, the two significant correlations that we found suggest opposite theories. If we were to hold school performance and deviance from the law as equal judging points, the scale swings in both ways. According to our research, respondents who lived with two biological parents in their senior year of high school are more likely to have higher GPAs in college, and also have engaged in more physical fights in the past year than respondents who came from alternative family types. From our findings, we can only postulate the reasons behind these correlations, and wonder why they are contradictory.
Improvements Our group wanted to focus more on the family structure aspect of our respondents. In our original instrument there was a series of three of these types of questions, asking the respondent what their family structure was at various points in their lives, so that we could better understand if and when their family structure 9
changed. We discussed the possible effects of a divorce or death in the family, and how children from that environment are much different from those who were raised by one parent from their birth. If we were able to repeat the study, we would have surely included more than one question about family structure, which would also act as a control variable later in the study, discriminating between those who had changing family structures and those who were fully engulfed in the same family structure since birth. Our team had about three of our questions make it on to the final instrument, and some of our information for our study had to be subsidized through the questions from other groups, who did not have the same focus as us. This made it slightly more difficult to extract information from an unfamiliar format. The questions that the other groups used that we had to share information from were not framed in the way that would facilitate the best answers for our particular interest in this study. The overall instrument could have been more catered to our specific research study, and eliminating irrelevant questions from our instrument could have significantly increased respondent honesty, the number of students willing to take our survey, or the quality of the responses we received. Many students and teachers alike were very concerned with the amount of time that this survey was to take, and by shortening the survey by eliminated unnecessary questions, we might have had a better turnout. Our sample was very small and specific. Students that are currently taking sociology classes at Hofstra University in the Spring of 2012 are much different than the rest of the population. Our sampling procedure was very precise and accurate, and in my opinion, we could not have done a better job at being truly random when selecting the sample from the population parameters given. In order to make this more statistically significant, we would have to largely widen our sample and add in more control variables to test for spuriousness. Conclusion Overall, we learned a lot about family structure and delinquency. There were many strengths of our research, including a truly random sample from our population. We also were able to keep all of the respondents anonymous. Their responses were surprisingly honest, which assisted our teams in coming up with statistics that can be more easily generalized to the entire population. There were areas in which we could have improved our research, which mainly includes having a larger and more diverse population. Although we did find contradictory results, from all the research derived from this study, we can assume that there is nothing inherently wrong with nontraditional families. Overall, adolescents seem to assimilate fairly similarly into society, with moderately low levels of “delinquency�, regardless of their family structure during their senior year of high school.
10