Associations Between Long-Term Gang Membership and Informal Social Control Processes, Drug Use, and Delinquent Behavior Among Mexican American Youth.

Research has found that among juveniles weak ties to informal social control entities such as parents, school, and conventional peers increase the probability of the initiation and continuation of deviant behaviors such as drug use and crime. Given the weak ties of formal social control mechanisms in highly disadvantaged communities, informal social control mechanisms are often an important deterrent that reduce or moderate engagement in deviant behaviors among serious and persistent offenders. This analysis examines the association between long-term gang membership and adolescent informal social control processes, drug use, and delinquency. This research is based on data from a study of 160 Mexican American male gang members between the ages of 16 and 20. Findings suggest that among gang members in this context, commonly studied informal control mechanisms such as the family and schools do not function to deter long-term gang membership that is associated with serious criminal and violent behavior and drug use. The implications for future research on desistance or continuation of antisocial behavior across the life course are discussed.

Una medida de la conducta desviada: Verificación Empírica de la Estructura Factorial en Reclusos de Brasil

En el ámbito delictivo, se destaca el comportamiento antisocial y criminal, que a pesar de la diversidad de conceptos que se les asignan, se destacan como antecedentes de la criminalidad. Con base en estudios de la conducta desviada en Brasil en sujetos no criminales, esta investigación tiene como objetivo determinar, a partir de un análisis confirmatorio de factores, la adecuación estructural y coherencia con respecto de la conducta antisocial y delictiva en una muestra de reclusos. La muestra estuvo conformada por 355 participantes, hombres y mujeres condenados por diversos tipos de delitos y detenidos en la prisión Profesor Jacy Assis en Uberlândia-MG. Después de generar el modelo propuesto en GRAFICS AMOS, se encontró que, además de confirmar la estructura bifactorial de la conducta desviada, los indicadores psicométricos demostraron mejor grado de ajuste que los encontrados en estudios con sujetos no penales.

The antisocial and criminal behaviors are prominences in criminality contrast, which can be pointed out as antecedent of crime, although the diversity of concepts that are attributed to them. The present study, take as orientation studies about deviant behaviors in Brazil in not criminal individuals, wich objective is verify, from a confirmatory factorial analysis, the adequacy and structural consistency referring to the antisocial and criminal behaviors for a prisoners' sample. It was composed by 355 men and women, sentenced for different types of rimes in Professor Jacy de Assis Penitentiary in Uberlândia ­ MG. The model proposed in AMOS GRAFICS observed that, beyond the confirmation of the bifactorial structure of the deviant behaviors, the psychometric indicators demonstrated better degree of adjustment than the indicators founded in studies with not criminal individuals