TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2020//
TI  - Moral disengagement as a mediator of the co-offending-delinquency relationship in serious juvenile offenders
JO  - Law and human behavior
A1  - Walters, Glenn D.
SP  - 437
EP  - 448
VL  - 44
IS  - 5
N2  - OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this study was to determine whether moral disengagement (MD) mediated the relationship between co-offending and future delinquency once age, race, gang affiliation, unsupervised routine activities, and perceived peer delinquency were controlled.     HYPOTHESES: It was predicted that the temporal relationship between co-offending and future offending would be mediated by MD but not by cognitive impulsivity (CI), and that the MD-mediated effect would be significantly stronger than the CI-mediated effect.     METHOD: Participants were 1,162 serious delinquent male youth from the Pathways to Desistance study. A fixed-sample panel longitudinal design was implemented and a path analysis with two parallel mediators (MD and CI) and one dependent variable (delinquency) was performed.     RESULTS: Consistent with predictions, a path analysis determined that MD but not CI mediated the relationship between co-offending and future self-reported delinquency. In addition, the indirect effect for MD was significantly stronger than the indirect effect for CI.     CONCLUSIONS: It is surmised that co-offending may provide youth with the opportunity to observe, model, and learn criminal attitudes and behaviors from other offenders, which then augments MD and sets the stage for a rise in delinquency. Policies and programs designed to disrupt co-offending and reduce MD are discussed in terms of delinquency prevention and desistance. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2020 APA, all rights reserved).    Keywords: Juvenile justice <p />  <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 0147-7307
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/lhb0000425
ID  - ref1
ER  -