The Invisible Woman. Joanne Belknap
sexual abuse, academic problems, future expectations, school dropout, and criminal legal system involvement) increased all three types of offending studied (property crimes, threatening interpersonal aggression, and using interpersonal aggression), and the increase was consistent across gender (Jennings, Piquero, Gover, & Perez, 2009).
A large GST study of youths who were referred to juvenile court looked at how gender and living situation were related to initial and recidivate arrests and youths’ responses to strain regarding drug offending (Grothoff, Kempf-Leonard, & Mullins, 2014). Girls reported 3 times as much child abuse as boys (physical, sexual, and emotional), and while it increased girls’ drug arrests (as expected), it decreased boys’. Boys, but not girls, not living with one or both parents were more likely to recidivate. Mental health problems increased both girls’ and boys’ drug offenses similarly (Grothoff et al., 2014). Hay’s (2003) GST study measured family strain using five dimensions: physical punishment, parental rejection, psychological control, unfair discipline, and non-intact family among high school students. Hay found no gender differences in youth anger levels resulting from family strain; however, girls’ feelings of guilt associated with family strain were higher than boys’. Moreover, this gender difference in the response of guilt to family strain explained much of the overall gender difference in delinquency, in that anger encourages delinquency while guilt discourages delinquency.
Notably, the GST tests have focused far more on anger than depression. Many studies conclude that boys report significantly more delinquent behavior than girls do, whereas girls report more negative self-feelings (e.g., depression, anxiety, self-esteem) than boys do (Jang & Rhodes, 2012; Jennings et al., 2009; Kaplan & Lin, 2000; Kaufman, 2009; Luthar & D’Avanzo, 1999; Ostrowsky & Messner, 2005). Kaufman’s (2009) longitudinal GST study found that depressive symptoms predicted suicidal thoughts, weekly drinking, running away, and violent offending among girls but “only” suicidal thoughts and running away among boys.
Ostrowsky and Messner’s (2005) GST study found victimized young adults were more likely to commit property and violent offenses than their nonvictimized counterparts, strains tended to have more impact on violent than property crimes, and strains were related to depression. Notably, strains were more commonly associated with depression among the young women than among the young men, but the young men who were strained and depressed were more likely to offend (Ostrowsky & Messner, 2005). A GST study of women and men involved in drug courts across the United States found recent sexual or physical abuse increased the risk of further substance use, and this was associated with (or mediated by) increased depression following either of these (sexual or physical) abuses (Zweig, Yahner, & Rossman, 2012). However, the resulting depression could not explain the reuse of substances for recent sexual abuse victims as completely as depression explained the drug reuse by recent physical abuse victims (Zweig et al., 2012).
Watts and Iratzoqui (2019) conducted one of the few GST studies that included girls and boys, ran the models separately for each, and included three types of abuse or maltreatment (i.e., physical, sexual, and neglect by a parent or guardian before sixth grade) and six self-reported offenses (i.e., violent, property, drug use, drug-selling, alcohol use, running away). They concluded that “child maltreatment increases delinquent behavior during middle adolescence, that different types of maltreatment differentially shape delinquent behavior, and that these relationships are marked more by gender similarity than gender difference” (p. 178). Specifically, their findings, summarized in Table 2.1, indicate that the three abuses impact both girls’ and boys’ violent offenses and running away the most, and alcohol and drug use the least. Child neglect is more frequently significantly related to the types of offenses than is physical or sexual abuse. Although other research shows that girls are significantly more likely than boys to be victimized by sexual abuse, this study found sexual abuse victimization is more likely to increase boys’ than girls’ subsequent offending—specifically, their violent offending, drug-selling, and running away. Indeed, all abuse in general impacts boys’ likelihood of subsequent offending far more often than it does girls’ likelihood in this study. One could speculate that the other GST research on gender differences in anger and depression (as reviewed earlier) could incite boys to be more likely to externalize (via anger) and girls to be more likely to internalize (via depression) their negative emotions from being abused and neglected.
Table 2.1
aThe models controlled for race/ethnicity, parent’s education, public assistance (SES measure), self-control, peer deviancy, and closeness to mother. Offending variables are self-reported (not necessarily known by the criminal legal system). The abuse/maltreatment variables only measured these abuses before the start of sixth grade and if perpetrator was a parent or adult caregiver.
Source: Watts, S. J., & Iratzoqui, A. (2019). Gender, child maltreatment, and delinquency. Victims & Offenders, 14(2), 165–182.
Note: Data from U.S. National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health). Sample = 14,322 youths followed over time.
Some GST research has included only girls and women in their samples. Belknap, Holsinger, and Little (2012) applied GST to incarcerated girls to study how different types of abuse (differentiated by family-perpetrated vs. non-family-perpetrated and sexual abuse vs. physical abuse) impacted girls’ self-harming (e.g., cutting, suicide attempts, etc.), while controlling for the girls’ sexual identities. Consistent with “community” (nonincarcerated sample) studies, they found that sexual minority status (SMS) girls (those who identified as lesbian or bisexual) reported more of all types of abuses (than their straight counterparts) and more self-harming behaviors than non-SMS (straight) girls. However, when controlling for abuse, the relationships between sexual identity (SMS vs. non-SMS) and self-harming disappeared (Belknap, Holsinger et al., 2012). Stated alternatively, the relationship between sexual identity and self-harming was indirect and completely explained by abuse; this indicated that SMS girls were disproportionately abused as a gender-based/homophobic response, and this was related to self-harming. (Thus, deterring homophobic assaults and bullying will likely deter the association between SMS and self-harming.) This needs to be tested in community samples as well.
A GST study of drug and alcohol use among women incarcerated in Oklahoma looked at a long list of strains (primarily different types of abuse and traumas), as well as anger, self-esteem, and antisocial behavior (Sharp, Peck, & Hartsfield, 2012). Consistent with GST, the greater the cumulative strain, the greater the women’s anger, and the more likely they were to abuse substances. Also, both sexual abuse and witnessing their mothers being abused were related to daily drug use. Contrary to GST, self-esteem and antisocial behavior were not related to daily drug or alcohol use (Sharp et al., 2012).
Differential Association Theory (DAT) and Social Learning Theory (SLT)
Differential Association Theory (DAT)
E. H. Sutherland, first alone and then in collaboration with Cressey, developed the theory of differential association (DAT) in the classic text Principles of Criminology (E. H. Sutherland, 1939; E. H. Sutherland & Cressey, 1966). Sutherland’s attempt was to move the major explanation of criminal behavior from poverty to association: Just as any other behavior is learned, so is criminal behavior. Thus, one’s peer group association is instrumental in determining whether one becomes delinquent.
Although Sutherland and Cressey agreed with Cohen’s contention that there is unequal access to success in the United States, they departed from Cohen’s belief that all classes have internalized the same definition of success (i.e., the goals of middle-class males). Further, Sutherland and Cressey claimed that criminal subcultures are not unique to frustrated working-class male youths; people of all classes, including white-collar workers, can and do partake in criminal behavior. Similarly, whereas Cohen defined a U.S. culture that excludes women and girls, Sutherland and Cressey’s perspective is not so exclusively male in theory and is presented as a general non-sex-specific theory (Naffine, 1987).
Despite Sutherland and Cressey’s promise of a non-sex-specific theory, they rarely addressed girls. And where girls are briefly mentioned,