Amidst growing concerns about a rise in girls entering the Youth Justice System and official data highlighting increases in girls violent offending this doctoral thesis focuses on girls in the Youth Justice System. Drawing on case files and in depth interviews with a cohort of girls supervised by a Home Counties Youth Offending Team (YOT), and interviews with YOT practitioners it explores their needs and offending patterns and examines contemporary system responses to them. It aims to contribute to practice knowledge and understanding about girls offending, and to identify approaches and interventions most likely to be effective with them. Findings point to girls having multiple and interrelated needs and troubled backgrounds. Exclusion from school and non attendance, experience of severe family conflict and violence, heavy alcohol use and poverty and disadvantage are all cited as key risk factors for girls’ involvement in offending and other types of behaviour which can lead to social exclusion. Minor assault and the influence of alcohol emerge as key features in girls offending patterns. Assaults commonly arise from disputes with friends or family members, or occur whilst girls are in a mixed peer group where assaults are perpetrated against another young person or a Police Officer. The impact of more formal responses by Police and YOTS are evident and show that the highly regulated and male oriented Youth Justice System hampers the likelihood of successful interventions with girls. This study cites the importance of gender specific responses and interventions which are holistic, informal and flexible to meet the distinct needs and offending patterns of girls in the Youth Justice System. More widely early identification of girls at risk, information sharing across children, health and adult services, and the provision of a range of support and positive opportunities to girls which extend beyond the life of a Court Order are identified as key aspects of strategies aimed at improving future outcomes for girls.

published_or_final_version / Sociology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

published_or_final_version / Criminology / Master / Master of Social Sciences

OBJECTIVES: (1) Describe the population of mentally ill offenders over whom Ontario Review Board (ORB) held jurisdiction. (2) Assess the influences of psychopathology and criminal factors on criminal career. METHOD: This study was a retrospective case series design that reviewed all offenders who were court ordered for psychiatric evaluation at Mental Health Services Site of Providence Care in Kingston, Ontario from 1993 to 2007 (N=347). Eighty five subjects were found not criminally responsible on the account of mental disorder and were included in statistical analysis (n=85). Bivariate associations between five key variables and two outcome variables, seriousness of crime and recidivism, were examined. Logistic regressions were conducted to test the role of the predictor variables on the outcome variables. RESULTS: Age and change in principal psychiatric diagnosis over time were shown to be associated with seriousness of crime. Timing of psychiatric onset, early signs of deviance and change in diagnosis were shown to be associated with recidivism. On the whole, study population did not markedly vary in their distribution of variables by the outcome variables. Regression model included timing of psychiatric onset; psychiatric history; existence of criminal associate; child abuse history; and early signs of deviance. Recidivism was shown to be predicted by early signs of deviance (OR=8.154, p<0.05). Existence of criminal associates was shown to have substantial values of odds ratio at marginal significance (OR=7.577, p=0.13). CONCLUSION: Seriousness of crime is a complex factor that could not be sufficiently predicted by any one or combinations of study variables. Recidivism is better predicted by criminality factors than psychopathology. In the future, an exploratory analysis that more broadly examines the psychopathology and criminal factors in Canadian forensic population is needed. Findings from this study have important clinical and legal implications. / Thesis (Master, Neuroscience Studies) -- Queen's University, 2011-08-10 10:35:13.036

This thesis examines the life experiences of a sample of women in English prisons. It is focused on developing a greater understanding of the experiences and needs of women in prison in areas where the research literature is lacking, or where women s experiences are not yet fully understood. The research is set within the context of significant increases in the women s prison population, developments in policy and practice relating to the treatment of women offenders, and recent reports from the Ministry of Justice that the UK government lacks a thorough understanding of the needs of women in prison. Approved by HM Prison Service National Research Committee, the research includes review of Offender Assessment System records and in-depth interviews with 43 women from three English prisons. Adopting a primarily qualitative approach, the data are thematically analysed with the aid of NVivo to explore women s experiences in childhood and growing up; adult life circumstances; parenthood; alcohol and drug use; mental health; and experiences within prison. Key findings from the research suggest that for many women in prison their past experiences are specific responsivity factors that require focused input in order to tackle the reasons underlying their criminogenic needs. Specifically, the research highlights that women in prison attribute much of their life experience and offending as related to past experiences, but that there is a need to broaden the definitions of childhood trauma and victimisation used when discussing women offenders in order to more fully reflect the lived experiences of women who offend. The research identifies a number of gender specific issues that have been previously neglected in the literature. The findings challenge some of the recent literature around the drug and alcohol use of offenders, and also highlight how poor relationships can exacerbate women s issues with drug and alcohol use. The research provides evidence of consistency in mental health problems experienced by women in prison and the underlying causes of these problems, answering questions concerning the extent to which women s mental health problems exist prior to prison. Furthermore, the research documents how prison can present an opportunity for women to engage with treatment. However, the research also highlights the failure of the prison service to fully record the scale and scope of mental health and emotional problems experienced by women in prison. The thesis concludes that there is a need for a gender-informed focus in prison in both assessment and treatment.

This thesis uses an exploratory case study design to chronicle the shifts, recognition, and implementation of programs, tools and policies designed for high need federally sentenced women in Canada that were created after 1990, in accordance with or opposed to the gender specific principles outlined in the Creating Choices (1990) report. The body lens is used as an analytic tool to deconstruct eleven of the most pertinent documents regarding policy and strategy for high need women offenders that were implemented by the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) personnel and the Office of the Correctional Investigator (OCI) over the past twenty years. Coding of a wide range of documents reveals that despite appearing to be rhetorically progressive, CSC’s attempt at creating a women-centered mental health strategy uses contradictory disciplinary techniques that control and restrain the bodies of federally sentenced women in hopes of normalizing the behaviours of high need women. The policies imposed by CSC for high need women offenders fail to make any substantial changes in women’s prison reform and resulted in a different form of regulation and control. High need women offenders are imprisoned in their own bodies.

Nationally vehicle theft is associated with approximately 40 fatalities per year with an estimated annual cost of one billion dollars. During 2000 - 2001 almost 139,000 motor vehicles (cars, motor cycles, campervans, and trucks) were stolen across Australia. Vehicle theft is an overwhelmingly adolescent male crime yet gender has not been considered in either policy or program initiatives.----- This thesis used Spence's Multifactorial Gender Identity theory to examine the relationships between vehicle theft, offending, and adolescent male gender identity. Four central research questions were posed:----- 1. Is vehicle theft a gendered behaviour, that is, do some adolescent males engage in vehicle theft to create a particular adolescent male gender identity?----- 2. Do vehicle theft offenders engage in other offending behaviours?----- 3. Are these other offences also used to create a particular adolescent male gender identity and----- 4. Will the use of a variety of gender-related scales to measure gender identity support Spence's Multifactorial Gender Identity Theory that gender identity is multifactorial?----- Study One Parts A and B provided the empirical basis for Studies Two and Three. Part A of Study One examined the &quotmaleness" of vehicle theft and two other problem behaviours: problem drinking and traffic offence involvement. Cross-sectional and longitudinal methodologies were used to investigate a representative sample of 4,529 male high school students in relation to vehicle theft, problem drinking, and traffic offence involvement as a novice driver. Results indicated that &quotmaleness" was significantly related to vehicle theft, problem drinking, and traffic offence involvement. Subsequent analyses, based on Jessor's Problem Behaviour Theory, found a significant relationship between vehicle theft offenders and problem drinking. Study One Part B examined the relationship between masculinity as measured by the Australian Sex Role Scale (ASRS) and problem drinking in a rural sample of 1,248 male high school students. Using a cross sectional methodology, Masculine students were more likely than students in the other gender trait groups to report a range of problem drinking behaviours. Contrary to previous research, both socially desirable and socially undesirable masculine traits were significantly related to most problem drinking behaviours.----- Having established significant relationships between &quotmaleness" and vehicle theft and masculinity and the adolescent problem behaviour of underage drinking, Study Two qualitatively examined the perceptions of adolescent males with histories of vehicle theft in relation to &quotdoing masculinity". Using semi-structured interviews, 30 adolescent males, clients of the juvenile justice system were asked &quotwhat do you have to do to be a man?" Vehicle theft was clearly identified as a masculine defining behaviour as were other offending behaviours. Overall, participants nominated very traditional behaviours such as having a job and providing financially for families as essential behaviours in &quotdoing masculinity". It was suggested that in the absence of legal options for creating a masculine gender identity, some adolescent males adopted more readily accessed illegal options. Study Two also canvassed the driving behaviour of adolescent males in stolen vehicles. Crash involvement was not uncommon. Speed, alcohol, and the presence of other adolescent males were consistent characteristics of their driving behaviour. Indigenous and non-Indigenous participants were similar in their responses.----- Study Three compared the gender identity of offender and non-offender adolescent males as measured by three gender-related measures: the ASRS, the Toughness Subscale of the Male Role Norm Scale (TSMRNS) and the Doing Masculinity Composite Scale (DMCS). While the ASRS measured gender traits, the TSMRNS measured masculinity ideology. The DMCS was developed from the responses of participants in Study Two and sought to measure how participants &quotdo masculinity". Analyses indicated vehicle theft was endorsed by just over a third of the sample as a masculine defining behaviour. Overall, offenders were again very traditional in the behaviours they endorsed. When compared to non-offenders, offenders were more likely to endorse illegal behaviours in &quotdoing masculinity" while non-offenders were more likely to endorse legal behaviours. Both offenders and non-offenders strongly endorsed having a car and the ability to drive as masculine defining behaviours.----- In relation to gender traits, non-offenders were more likely than offenders to be classified as Masculine by the ASRS. Surprisingly offenders were more likely to be classified as Androgynous. In relation to masculinity ideology, offenders and non-offenders were similar in their results on the TSMRNS however offenders were more likely to endorse beliefs concerning the need to be tough. Overall Indigenous and non-Indigenous offenders were similar in their responses though Indigenous males were more likely to endorse beliefs concerning the need to be tough. Spence's Multifactorial Gender Identity theory was supported in that the relations between the three gender-related measures were significant but low.----- Results confirmed that vehicle theft was endorsed by a minority of participants as a gendered behaviour. Other offending behaviours were also endorsed by some adolescent males as means to create masculine gender identity. Importantly though both offenders and non-offenders endorsed very traditional behaviours in relation to &quotdoing masculinity". The implications for policy and program initiatives include the acknowledgement of gender identity as an important component in relation to vehicle theft and offending and the desire of adolescent male offenders to engage in legal, traditional male behaviours. In the absence of legal avenues however, some adolescent males may use illegal behaviours to create gender identity. Cars and driving also feature as important components of gender identity for both offenders and non-offenders and these needs to be considered in relation to road safety initiatives.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Auburn University, 2007. / Abstract. Vita. Includes bibliographic references (ℓ. 184-194)

Thesis (Ph.D.) - Carleton University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 247-267). Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

Thesis (M.S.W.)--Smith College School for Social Work, 2008. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 16-20, 34-37, 57-60).