NCJ Number
87887
Date Published
1982
Length
149 pages
Annotation
This study, based on an analysis of arrest records for 1939-76 in one New Jersey city, explored whether increases in arrests of females indicated a new stage in female criminality, resulting from changing sex role definitions of behavior.
Abstract
Female arrests increased markedly between 1949 and 1959 and between 1959 and 1969. From 1969 to 1976, arrests among both male and female adults rose, while juvenile criminal activity declined. The ages of first offenders first dropped noticeably among white females in 1959. In that year, 24 percent of arrests of juvenile females were for status or public order offenses. In both 1969 and 1976, half of the arrests of female juveniles were for these less serious offenses. The large increase in arrests in 1969 resulted in part from increased percentages of runaways, truancy cases, and drunk-and-disorderly arrests. Cohort effects appeared to be more powerful than period effects in defining change in the seriousness of criminal activity; these changes probably related more to historical and demographic characteristics (such as changes in family structure) than to social movements related to sex roles. The women's movement did not have a long-range or lasting impact on arrest rates; there is no change in the key elements of sex roles that affect criminal propensity. However, traditional deviance paradigms, informed by sex role theory, do explain sex ratios in criminality. Figures, tables, an appendix presenting multiple regression results, an index, and 149 references are provided.