Aboriginal youth are overrepresented at Vancouver Island’s Youth Forensic Psychiatric Services (YFPS) clinics. Despite this, research on Aboriginal young offenders is very limited. Information of the unique needs of Aboriginal young offenders is needed to enhance culturally appropriate forensic services. The goal of this study was to identify psychosocial characteristics associated with delinquent behaviour that distinguish Aboriginal young offenders from non-Aboriginal young offenders. Utilizing data of 638 reports (168 Aboriginal young offenders and 470 non-Aboriginal young offenders) from the YFPS databank, logistic regression models were used to predict being an Aboriginal young offender, from 24 psychosocial characteristics. Aboriginal young offenders were differentiated based on 12 significant factors. Key findings were: Aboriginal youth were almost 5 times more likely to report alcohol use, 3 times more likely to be incarcerated and 3 times more likely to have lived with a step-parent, a non-parent and to be removed from their families for 1-2 months, than non-Aboriginal youth. The results are preliminary; significant amounts of unknown data was found for both ethnic groups in the YFPS databank. This study is an important first step in laying the foundation for empirical research on Aboriginal young offenders necessary for culturally appropriate treatment services. / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/4285 |
| Date | 21 September 2012 |
| Creators | Voll, Stayc |
| Contributors | Anderson, John O. |
| Source Sets | University of Victoria |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Rights | Available to the World Wide Web |
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