Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Developmental Trajectories Of Physical Aggression And Nonaggressive Rule-Breaking Among At-Risk Males And Females During Late Childhood And Early Adolescence, Eugena Givens

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Criminological, psychological, and developmental researchers have relentlessly explored behavioral characteristics and juvenile justice outcomes in an effort to establish the most appropriate means of analyzing childhood and adolescent problem behaviors. Cross-discipline, empirical evidence and factor analytic research has consistently identified the presence of two predictive concepts, physical aggression and nonaggressive rule-breaking. Research pertaining to the risk factors and correlates of these two distinct substructures of offending align with theoretically postulated typologies of delinquency and offending as well as the frequently cited patterns of delinquency and offending within reviews of longitudinal research. Using longitudinal data from a sample of 756 at-risk, …

The Tattoo: A Mark Of Subversion, Deviance, Or Mainstream Self-Expression?, Jocelyn Camacho

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

While an estimated one-third of the United States population has a tattoo, tattoos are still seen as a sign of deviance. The appearance of the first tattoos in the United States were relegated to the bodies of the lower classes and outcasts of society. Over the past few decades tattoos have migrated on to the celebrity skin of today's pop culture icons. In the past twenty years, tattoos have moved from deviant subcultures to the mainstream, and yet are still considered to be a mark of the disfavored factions of society. The dominant culture continues to regard the bearers of …

Predicting Fear Of Crime Using A Multilevel And Multi-Model Approach: A Study In Hillsborough County, Jonathan Maskaly

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In the 1960s, the government formed the President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration of Justice to looked at the problem of crime and fear of crime in modern American society. In addition to looking at these issues, the Commission also looked at ways to potentially reduce both crime and fear of crime. One of the primary outcomes of the Commission's report was that policing agencies in the United States needed to fundamentally alter the way they served their communities, notably by transitioning to community-oriented policing (COP). Starting in the 1970s, law enforcement agencies around the nation began to embrace …

Evidence-Based Practice Attitudes, Knowledge And Perceptions Of Barriers Among Juvenile Justice Professionals, Esther Chao Mckee

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This mixed methods study examined the attitudes, knowledge and perceptions of barriers toward Evidence-Based Practice (EBP) among Florida Juvenile Justice Service Professionals (JJSP). Previous research established individual factors such as age, gender, years of professional experience and educational attainment are related to attitudes and perceptions of barriers among social service and mental health professionals, but scant research has been conducted among juvenile justice providers (Aarons 2004, 2010; Rubin & Parrish, 2007, 2012; Jette et al., 2003). Most individual factors were found to have no significant effect on attitude and knowledge scores within this population with exception of gender and major …

Predicting Successful Drug Court Graduation: Exploring Demographic And Psychosocial Factors Among Medication-Assisted Drug Court Treatment Clients, Autumn Michelle Frei

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of psychosocial factors on drug court graduation among a medication assisted treatment drug court population. The extant research identifies drug courts as effective in reducing recidivism and relapse rates; however meta-analyses of the drug court literature reveal that there is little explanation as to why drug courts are effectual and especially for whom. This study examined trauma, mental health, and social support to determine predictive psychosocial factors of drug court participants while controlling for certain demographics. The analyses showed that social support was predictive, but failed to identify trauma or …

Resources Matter: The Role Of Social Capital And Collective Efficacy In Mediating Gun Violence, Jennifer Lynne Dean

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

This study explains how community activists make use of available social capital and collective efficacy while attempting to mediate gun violence. It specifically focuses on twelve in-depth interviews of activists' perspectives, processes and rationales to alleviate community gun violence, based on informal social control models. Findings suggest activists must establish trust and respect with youth they work with before mediation begins, which is established through similar life experiences or backgrounds. Once a strong bond is established with youth, activists identified five core processes to reduce violence: 1) improve the mindset, 2) provide life skills, 3) assist youth as their …

The Influence Of Community Context On Social Control: A Multi-Level Examination Of The Relationship Between Race/Ethnicity, Drug Offending, And Juvenile Court Outcomes, Jennifer Peck

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Studies of the association between race/ethnicity and juvenile court outcomes have found that minority youth often receive disadvantaged outcomes compared to similarly situated Whites, and that community context may condition this relationship. Sampson and Laub's (1993) revised conflict perspective is one theoretical model that can potentially explain the social control of youth throughout juvenile justice proceedings. One of the main propositions of Sampson and Laub's (1993) perspective is that communities characterized by underclass poverty and racial inequality will impose greater social control on youth referred to the juvenile court, especially Blacks and youth charged with a drug offense because they …

Juvenile And Adult Involvement In Double Parricide And Familicide In The U.S.: An Empirical Analysis Of 20 Years Of Data, Averi Rebekah Fegadel

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The killing of parents and stepparents by biological and stepchildren is a rare event. Incidents involving multiple parricide victims and/or multiple parricide offenders are an even rarer occurrence. The majority of studies on parricide involve a single victim and single offender. Using the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS), this study identified 603 single-victim, single-offender incidents, 22 single-victim, multiple-offender incidents, 60 single-offender double parricide incidents, 17 multiple-offender double parricide incidents, and 15 familicide incidents over the 20 year period 1990 to 2010. Univariate and bivariate analyses examined parricidal incidents involving single or multiple offenders and single or multiple victims with the …

Public Knowledge And Sentiments About Elite Deviance, Cedric Michel

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A growing body of research has revealed that the financial cost and physical harmfulness of elite deviance overshadow the impact of street crime on society (Knowlton et al., 2011; Landrigan et al., 2002; Leigh, 2011; Lynch & Michalowski, 2006; Herbert & Landrigan, 2000; Rebovich & Jiandani, 2000; Reiman & Leighton, 2010). However, despite such discrepancies, crimes of the poor continue to outshine white-collar offenses in the news media (Barak, 1994; Barlow & Barlow, 2010; Ericson et al., 1991; Lynch & Michalowski, 2006; Lynch, Nalla & Miller, 1989; Lynch, Stretesky & Hammond, 2000), the criminal justice system (Calavita, Tillman, & Pontell, …