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Abstract
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VioLit summary:
OBJECTIVE:
The aim of this research by Brownfield was an examination of the effects of the father-son relationship upon adolescent violent behavior. The study was loosely based upon findings from the Moynihan Report, and implications of the findings were directed at propositions derived from social control and cultural deviance theories.
METHODOLOGY:
The author began with a brief discussion of the findings of the 1965 Department of Labor Moynihan Report, which claimed that, due to the excess of female-headed households within the black community, many black adolescent males tended to be compulsively masculine and to exhibit high levels of violent behavior. Whilst the author could not directly test this thesis, he examined the effect of the father-son relationship upon violent behavior among adolescents. The study involved secondary analysis of data from the Richmond Youth Study in California, which collected questionnaire data from students in 11 high schools in one county. More than 1,500 questionnaires were completed by white males, and over 1,000 were collected from black males. The design of the Richmond study was not reported in this paper. Independent variables included self-report data concerning race, family structure (concerning the person acting as a father), father's social status and identification or attachment to the father (asking if the subject would like to be like his father, how much time the father spent with the family, how often plans for the future were discussed, and whether thoughts and feelings were shared). The dependent variable was a self-report measure of assault, with a dichotomous question concerning whether or not the subject had ever beaten or hurt anyone on purpose, not including fights with siblings. Analysis included log-linear models to test the relationships between the variables and examination of frequencies.
FINDINGS/DISCUSSION:
The author found no significant differences in assault rates for either race between those subjects who were living with their biological father, those whose acting father was a step-father and those with no father in the family - a finding that does not support Miller's cultural deviance theory. For both whites and blacks, the absence of the biological father before the subject was five years of age also had no significant impact on assault rates. The author concluded that the physical absence of the father was not related to adolescent violent behavior for either race. The author also examined the discipline techniques employed within the family, asking subjects about which parent made final decisions regarding punishment. No association was found between this measure of matriarchy or patriarchy and assault for blacks; however, for white males, those subjects who came from a home where decisions were shared were less likely to commit an assault (34.4%) than were those boys who had come from a home where the father made the final decisions (47.6%). The author suggested that the ideal of the egalitarian household applied more to white subjects, with any departure from this ideal possibly fostering violent behavior. Father's unemployment status was also measured, and was found to affect assault rates for both whites and blacks. Having an unemployed father increased the likelihood of assault much more for whites than for blacks - the odds ratio of assault for unemployed compared to employed for whites was 1.96, and for blacks was only 1.17. Degree of identification did not have a significant impact upon assault rates for blacks, although for whites, those who identified less with their fathers were more likely to commit assault (52.6%) than those who identified well with their fathers (37.6%). For blacks, amount of time the father spent with the family had little systematic effect upon assault rates, whilst for whites whose fathers had been unemployed, 46.5% of those whose fathers spent a lot of time with their family had committed assault and 85.7% of those whose fathers had spent no time with family had assaulted someone. For black subjects whose fathers had been employed, there were only random fluctuations in assault rates across the groups which often, occasionally or never discussed future plans. For blacks with unemployed fathers, discussion of plans acted as a barrier to assaultive behavior - 52.2% of those who never shared plans had assaulted someone, whilst 42.0% of those who often talked had committed assault. This result does not support Miller's cultural deviance theory, which claimed that attachment to a person who provided lower class socialization would increase delinquency. For whites, regardless of employment, discussion of future plans inhibited assaultive acts, with 37.7% of those who often shared their plans, and 48.8% of those who never shared thoughts, having exhibited assaultive behavior. Contrary to both social control theory and cultural deviance theory, black males with unemployed fathers were unaffected by levels of intimacy with fathers as measured by sharing of feelings. For blacks with employed fathers, however, if feelings were shared the likelihood of assault was lower (36.6%) than if there was no discussion of thoughts and feelings (48.9%). For whites, regardless of employment status, those who were intimate with their fathers were much less likely to report assault (30.2%) than those who never spoke of their feelings (50.2%). The author concluded that degree of identification with the father had no impact upon assault rates for blacks - a finding which refuted both social control and cultural deviance theory. However for whites, the quality of the father-son relationship was an important factor in levels of assaultive behavior. The author suggested that the theory of compulsive masculinity forwarded by the Moynihan Report, which was written by white theorists, might be ethnocentric, in that the lack of a father figure played no role in the incidence of assaultive acts for black subjects. It was, rather, the white subjects who were most highly influenced by father-son relationships, with better relations leading to less violence - a finding consistent with Hirschi's social control theory.
AUTHOR'S RECOMMENDATIONS:
The author suggested that further research be conducted in order to clarify the various relationships among family structure, family interactions and assaultive behavior.
EVALUATION:
This study presents a valuable and informative insight into the impact of father-son relationships and family structural conditions upon rates of assault. However, the reliance upon secondary analysis of self-report data, and the use of single questions as measures of both the independent and the dependent variables, leads one to examine the results with some caution. No direct measure of compulsive masculinity is available, and assault is not divided into the various types of less serious and more serious assaults. A discussion of some implications of the findings for prevention and treatment planning would have been useful, as would have a description of the design of the original study from which the data were drawn. Despite these flaws, the study provides a firm foundation upon which to base future research in the field of the violent adolescent. (CSPV Abstract - Copyright © 1992-2007 by the Center for the Study and Prevention of Violence, Institute of Behavioral Science, Regents of the University of Colorado)
KW - California
KW - Family Relations
KW - Father Child Relations
KW - Juvenile Violence
KW - Juvenile Offender
KW - Juvenile Male
KW - Male Offender
KW - Male Violence
KW - Parent Child Relations
KW - Violence Causes
KW - Caucasian Juvenile
KW - Caucasian Offender
KW - Caucasian Violence
KW - Caucasian Male
KW - African American Juvenile
KW - African American Male
KW - African American Offender
KW - African American Violence
KW - Black-White Comparison
KW - Cultural Deviance
KW - Theory
KW - Social Control Theory |