Definition Essay: Juvenile Delinquency

What is Juvenile Delinquency?

Juvenile delinquency is taking part in illegal activities by adolescents under the legal age of 17 years. The legal systems in most countries have  specialized processes for dealing with youthful offenders, which includes juvenile incarceration centers, and courts. A youthful offender or juvenile delinquent is generally under the age of 17 and who commits any wrongful action  that normally  would have been considered  a crime if they were 18 years of more of age. In some case according to the seriousness of the crime committed it is possible for persons under 18 to be charged and tried as adults. However, juvenile offending can be considered normative adolescent behavior.

Frequent violence leads to repetitive violent offenses. When this happened the offender often showed antisocial behavior even before reaching teenage years.  In recent years, more youngsters have been arrested by their early 20s than previously, although some experts have reached the conclusion that this is more an indication of more uncompromising criminal policies and zero-tolerance status rather than changes in youth behavior. Juvenile crimes can range from petty offenses larger and violent crimes. Youth violence rates in the United States have dropped to approximately 12% of peak rates in 1993 according to official US government statistics, suggesting that most juvenile offending is non-violent.

Juvenile offending is mostly committed by young men.  One suggestion is that thoughts about being macho make young men more likely commit offenses. . Being tough, powerful and aggressive tough, bold and spirited is a way for young men to assert and express their masculinity. Expressing these bold concepts may make young men more likely to indulge in antisocial and criminal behavior. Also, the way young men are treated by others, because of their masculinity, may bolster violent tendencies   and make them more susceptible to indulging in illegal activities.

On the other hand young men may, in fact, be physically more aggressive, audacious and indulge risk-taking. In recent years, however, there has been a lessening of the disparity between sex differences concerning juvenile delinquency. While it is still more common for males to offend than females, the ratio of arrests by sex is one-third of what it was 20 years ago.  This is most likely due to the combined effects of more females being arrested for offenses that did not get them arrested before, and a decline in male offenses. Because most teenagers tend to show some form of antisocial or delinquent behavior during adolescence, it is important to account for these behaviors in childhood in order to determine whether they will be life-course-persistent offenders or adolescence-limited offenders.

 

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