"Measuring Crime and Delinquency Over the Life Course" presents one of the most detailed analyses of the longitudinal pattern of crime and delinquency, using data from one of the most famous longitudinal studies ever conducted in the field, the Rochester Youth Development Study, as well as complimentary data on offending from both official and self-report records. Never before has such information been presented with a specific focus on changes in offending patterns between adolescence and adulthood among individuals differentiated by race and gender. This project will undertake a replication of the classic Hindelang, Hirschi, and Weis (1981) book, "Measuring Delinquency".
Aside from replicating key chapters, the proposed project will move beyond this previous work in three important ways: it will present a comparison of both self-report and official records of offending among the same persons; it will extend the previous analyses by also conducting race/ethnic comparisons, specifically by including Hispanics, as well as conducting gender comparisons; and it will examine whether self-report estimates of offending at a previous time period relate to official records of offending at a later time period. The authors of this book are among the leading life-course criminologists in the world, and their collective theoretical, methodological, statistical and policy expertise will make this book one of the key readings in criminology generally, and life-course criminology in particular.