Download PUBLIC LECTURE Adolescent Offending Behaviour

PUBLIC LECTURE
Adolescent Offending Behaviour
The Theory of Planned Behaviour and Anti-social Behaviour
Date:
23rd March 2011
The European Centre for Educational Resilience
presents
Adolescent Offending Behaviour
Time:
12.00 – 13.00
The Theory of Planned Behaviour and
Anti-social Behaviour
Grace Skrzypiec
Venue:
Room 326 Old
Humanities,
University of
Malta, Msida
Campus
School of Education
Flinders University, Adelaide, South Australia
Current primary crime prevention programs in South Australia have been shown
to be ineffective in reducing crime amongst adolescents. However, little is
known about the design and development of these police-lead prevention
initiatives, which are delivered by police in schools, or whether they are theory
or evidence-based.
This seminar will present research using the Theory of Planned Behaviour
(TPB) (Ajzen, 1991) to identify the antecedents of adolescents’ intentions to
undertake three anti-social behaviours, namely drug taking, fighting and
stealing, with the aim of informing a future crime prevention intervention.
In addition to the constructs of attitudes, subjective norms and perceived
behavioural control, postulated in the TPB, three other possible concepts were
identified from the criminological literature as likely antecedents of the
intention to offend and corresponding models were hypothesised.
Over 500 young students currently attending South Australian high schools or
detained in a youth detention facility, aged 15-18, completed a questionnaire
which measured these antecedents and anti-social intentions, as well as “Low
self-control” (postulated in the General Theory of Crime (Gottfredson and
Hirschi, 1990) as the “the individual-level cause of crime” (p. 232)).
Structural Equation Modelling techniques were used to test the models and
investigate the significance of these elements in relation to adolescents’
intentions to offend. All six factors were found to be important aspects that
should be addressed in the design and development of a crime prevention
intervention. Furthermore, “Low self-control” was also identified as a likely
antecedent of anti-social behaviour. This understanding is particularly
significant, since low self-control is linked to poor socialisation skills early in
childhood and this highlights the importance of designing educational
programs that are aimed at improving students' social, emotional and
behavioural capabilities.