TY - JOUR PY - 2010// TI - On the utility of Moffitt’s typology trajectories in long-term perspective JO - European journal of criminology A1 - Stattin, Håkan A1 - Kerr, Margaret A1 - Bergman, Lars R. SP - 521 EP - 545 VL - 7 IS - 6 N2 - We used a prospective longitudinal study to examine the utility of Moffitt’s (1993) trajectories of antisocial behaviour. Data on registered criminality in three time periods — before age 15 (childhood), from 15 to 20 (adolescence) and from 21 to 35 (adulthood) — were used to construct life-course trajectories of offending for males. Life-course-persistent and adolescence-limited groups were found. The life-course-persistent males had the most problematic upbringing conditions, school problems and adjustment difficulties in adolescence, and the highest social and mental health problems in middle age. Adolescence-limited offenders did not differ much from non-offenders. In these respects, Moffitt’s typology was confirmed. However, there was an equally large childhood-onset desister group. They had many of the same problems as the life-course-persistent males up to age 15, but did not differ much from the non-registered males in mid-adolescence or at the middle-age follow-up. These males are not predicted from Moffitt’s model, but cannot be ignored. There was also a group of males who started to offend in adolescence and continued in adulthood, who had about the same problematic upbringing conditions, mid-adolescent maladjustment, and middle-age social and mental health problems as the life-course-persistent group.

LA - SN - 1477-3708 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1477370810376573 ID - ref1 ER -