Trajectories of Boys' Physical Aggression, Opposition, and Hyperactivity on the Path to Physically Violent and Nonviolent Juvenile Delinquency

• Published in: Child development Vol. 70; no. 5; pp. 1181 - 1196
• Main Authors: Nagin, Daniel, Tremblay, Richard E.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Boston, USA and Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishers Inc 01.09.1999; Blackwell Publishers; Blackwell; University of Chicago Press for the Society for Research in Child Development, etc; Blackwell Publishing Ltd
• Subjects: Adolescence; Adolescent; Adolescent Development; Adolescents; Adults; Aggression; Aggression - psychology; Aggressiveness; Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity - psychology; Behavior Problems; Biological and medical sciences; Boys; Child; Child clinical studies; Child Development; Childhood; Children; Delinquency; Development; Externalization; Externalizing behaviour; Human aggression; Humans; Hyperactivity; Juvenile Delinquency; Larceny; Longitudinal Studies; Male; Males; Medical sciences; Models, Psychological; Oppositional Behavior; Personality and Social Development; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Social behavior disorders; Trajectories; Violence; Violent crimes; Human; Hyperactivity; Violence; Conduct disorder; Male; School age; Etiology; Follow up study; Juvenile delinquency; Adolescent; Risk factor; Social behavior disorder; Child; Antecedent
• ISSN: 0009-3920; 1467-8624
• DOI: 10.1111/1467-8624.00086

A semi-parametric mixture model was used with a sample of 1,037 boys assessed repeatedly from 6 to 15 years of age to approximate a continuous distribution of developmental trajectories for three externalizing behaviors. Regression models were then used to determine which trajectories best predicted physically violent and nonviolent juvenile delinquency up to 17 years of age. Four developmental trajectories were identified for the physical aggression, opposition, and hyperactivity externalizing behavior dimensions: a chronic problem trajectory, a high level near-desister trajectory, a moderate level desister trajectory, and a no problem trajectory. Boys who followed a given trajectory for one type of externalizing problem behavior did not necessarily follow the same trajectory for the two other types of behavior problem. The different developmental trajectories of problem behavior also led to different types of juvenile delinquency. A chronic oppositional trajectory, with the physical aggression and hyperactivity trajectories being held constant, led to covert delinquency (theft) only, while a chronic physical aggression trajectory, with the oppositional and hyperactivity trajectories being held constant, led to overt delinquency (physical violence) and to the most serious delinquent acts.