Juvenile delinquents are defined as children or adolescents who engage in illegal acts (Berk, 2006). This does not imply that all adolescents who break the law are doomed to a life of crime. One study found that when teenagers are asked directly and confidentially about lawbreaking, almost all admit to having committed an offence of some sort (Flannery et al., 2003). The small percentage of juvenile delinquents who become repeat offenders often commit more serious crimes and, without intervention and rehabilitation, are at risk for a life spent cycling in and out of the criminal justice system. The juvenile delinquents who make up this small percentage contribute to thirteen percent of violent offenses that are documented in the United States (U.S. Department of Justice, 2005).

There are many factors that contribute to juvenile delinquency. Some factors are present outside of the juvenile delinquent in the environments and family structure that influence youth at risk. One of the most consistent findings about juvenile delinquents is that their families are low in warmth and emotional responsiveness, high in conflict, and use parenting methods that are defined by harsh and inconsistent punishment (Berk, 2006).

The buffering factors that could potentially protect juvenile delinquents from the negative effects of a tumultuous family life, such as a positive role model outside of the family, positive peer relationships, high quality teachers in school, and a community with healthy economic and social conditions (Berk, 2006) are often absent from the lives of youth who are at the greatest risk of becoming juvenile delinquents. The contributing factor of poor family structure is a difficult one to overcome.

The family situations that produce juvenile delinquents provide little supervision. This could be the result of too many children, too few adults, or adults preoccupied with their own careers or their own social problems (Schneider, 1995). Lack of supervision is a huge contributing factor to the situation of juvenile delinquency. It has been found that crimes committed by juveniles increase on weekdays between 2:00 and 8:00 PM when many children and adolescents are unsupervised (Berk, 2006).

Poor parenting and family structure can also facilitate aggression in youth and make aggressive behavior a permanent characteristic of some high risk juveniles. Berk states:

Boys are more likely than girls to be the targets of angry, inconsistent discipline because they are more active and impulsive and therefore harder to control. When children who are extreme in these characteristics are exposed to inept parenting, aggression rises during childhood, leads to violent offences in adolescence, and persists into adulthood (422).

There are two paths that children and adolescents can follow to juvenile delinquency. The early onset type and the late onset type characterize the juvenile delinquents in each category by analyzing the social, emotional, cognitive, and environmental factors that put them at risk. Research has shown that juvenile delinquents characterized as early onset type are far more likely to end up with patterns of aggression and criminality that lead to a life of crime (Farrington & Loeber, 2000). Juvenile delinquents in the early onset category seem to inherit traits that predispose them to aggressive behavior (Berk, 2006). The members of the early onset category who are easiest to identify are aggressive boys with difficult and fearless temperamental styles who are emotionally negative, restless, and willful as early as age two( Berk 2006). Other characteristics of early onset juvenile delinquents include cognitive deficits that contribute to disruptions in language development, memory, and cognitive and emotional self-regulation (Berk, 2006).

These risk factors alone rarely results in serious delinquency and adult criminal behavior. It is the combination of biological risk factors with a poor family structure that lead early onset youth to turn their uncontrolled style into defiance and persistent aggression (Berk, 2006). Their aggressive behavior often results in academic failure and peer rejection that leads them to befriend other youth who exhibit deviant behavior. These anti social peer groups facilitate the deviant behavior of one another and multiply the risk of becoming entangled in the juvenile justice system (Berk, 2006).

The cognitive deficits of early onset youth provide another set of risk factors that may lead them to drop out of school and/ or lose their jobs. The loss of structure provided by attending school or working in a career often adds to the antisocial involvements of these youth (Berk, 2006).

Youth who follow the late onset path to juvenile delinquency are less likely to have negative outcomes that last into adulthood. Juvenile delinquents who are characterized as late onset type usually begin to display antisocial behaviors around the time of puberty, gradually increasing their deviant behavior through late adolescence (Berk, 2006). Unlike early onset juvenile delinquents, the youth who follow the late onset pattern of delinquency have conduct problems that arise from the peer context of early adolescence, rather than from biological and developmental risk factors (Berk, 2006).

The privileges that are naturally acquired by a transition into adulthood cause most late onset juvenile delinquents to draw upon the prosocial skills that they mastered before adolescence. This change in lifestyle and increase in autonomy usually results in the abandonment of antisocial behavior (Berk, 2006).

In some cases, late onset juvenile delinquents become trapped by the seriousness of the offences they committed during adolescence and end up in situations that deny them the opportunities for responsible behavior (Berk, 2006). In a study conducted by Clingempeel & Henggler (2003) late onset juvenile delinquents who found a satisfying job and developed positive, close relationships ended their criminal behavior by age twenty.

Prevention and treatment strategies for juvenile delinquents involve the early identification of risk factors and proper intervention strategies that involve the use of education and behavioral rehabilitation. If early onset type patterns of behavior are identified in young children before they have a chance to exhibit deviant criminal behavior, cognitive, social, and emotional self-regulation skills can be taught to them in order to drastically reduce their risk of continuing down the path to juvenile delinquency (Berk, 2006). However, identifying children who are at risk for juvenile delinquency at such an early age is rare, and the use of prevention strategies to treat children with known risk factors in early childhoods is even less common.

The situation for youth who are not identified and helped at an early age is not hopeless. Multisystemic Therapy is one of the most effective treatment strategies for delinquent youth. It teaches the parents of juvenile delinquents communication strategies while disengaging the youth at risk from antisocial peers and integrating them into positive school, work, and leisure activities (Berk, 2006). One study found that when compared to typical community services or individual therapy, Multisystemic Therapy led to greater improvement in child- parent relationships and a dramatic decrease in the number of arrests over a four year period (Berk, 2006).

Prevention and treatment strategies for juvenile delinquents are essential to the improvement of the social problem caused by juvenile delinquency in the U.S. Unfortunately, the growing body of research that supports the success and cost-effectiveness of prevention and intervention programs that are aimed at treating delinquent youth are mostly ignored by policy makers (Bottoms, Kovera, &McAuliff, 2002). Rather than moving towards rehabilitation, policies that govern juvenile delinquency have moved towards harsher punishment. Two of the most common methods for punishing juvenile delinquents involve long periods of incarceration and the mandatory transfer of delinquent youth to the adult criminal justice system (Bottoms, et al., 2002).

The complete disregard for the effective social and community intervention strategies geared towards juvenile delinquents leaves many juvenile delinquents cycling in and out of the criminal justice system (Bottoms, et al., 2002). Punishing youth, rather than rehabilitating them, leaves many of the juvenile delinquents without the skills required for a job. This often leads to juvenile delinquents who grow up needing financial assistance or jail space (Schneider, 1995). The price that society pays for failing to prevent and treat juvenile delinquency in a holistic manner is manifest in the enormous financial cost of criminal punishments that could potentially be avoided.

Programs that address the issue of juvenile delinquency include Fight Crime: Invest in Kids and Building Blocks for Youth. Fight Crime: Invest in Kids is led by more than 3,000 police chiefs, sheriffs, prosecutors, other law enforcement leaders, and survivors of violent crime. The members of this group use social influence in combination with research to urge policy makers to work towards the prevention of juvenile delinquency and violence (www.fightcrime.org).

Building Blocks for Youth is another well established program that works to improve the juvenile justice system. Building Blocks for Youth is an alliance of youth advocates, researchers, law enforcement professionals, and community organizers. This program works to reduce the overrepresentation and disparate treatment of youth of color in the juvenile justice system. Building Blocks for Youth also seeks to promote fair, rational, and effective juvenile justice policies (www.buildingblocksforyouth.org).

Advocacy efforts made by community members are facilitated by well established groups like the ones mentioned above. It is the responsibility of all members of society to protect the rights of youth that are often overlooked by the juvenile justice system. Prevention of juvenile delinquency and intervention programs geared toward the rehabilitation of delinquent youth are less costly and more effective than the strict criminalization of juvenile delinquents. More research is needed to objectively determine all of the risk factors that involve the effective rehabilitation of juvenile delinquents.

By intervening in the lives of the children and adolescents who are at a high risk for developing antisocial and criminal behavior, we can prevent the social and economic consequences of ignoring the factors that predict negative outcomes.

References

Berk, L. (2007). Development therough the lifespan.

          Boston, MA: Pearson Education, Inc.

Bottoms, B.L., Kovera, M.B., & McAuliff B.D. (2002).  Children, social science, and the

          law.  New York, Cambridge University Press.

Clingempeel, W.G., & Henggeler, S.W. (2003). Aggressive

       juvenile offenders transitioning into emerging adulthood: Factors discrimination

       persistors and desistors. American Journal of Orthopsychiatry, 73, 310-323

Farrington, D.P, &Loeber, R. (2000). Epidemiology of juvenile violence. Juvenile

       Violence, 9, 733-748.

Flannerly, D.J., Hussey, D.L., Biebelhausen, L., & Wester K.L. (2003). Crime,

         delinquency, and youth gangs. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Schneider, D (1995).  American childhood: Risks and realities.

     New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.