Understanding the Context of Youth Problem Behaviors: LCA Analysis of Neighborhood and Family Risk Characteristics

Background/purpose: Adolescent delinquency and related risk behaviors remain serious problems in the United States, with over one million youth arrested in 2014 (OJJDP, 2015). The literature is robust in analyzing risk factors for delinquency, however the bulk has focused on individual effects. Even less research has examined risk factors from an interactional perspective, allowing for the fact that certain experiences and risks tend to co-occur (e.g., Baglivio & Epps, 2015). This study examines a diverse sample of high-risk males in a mid-size, Northeastern, urban area for significant clustering based on neighborhood and family risk factors. We theorized that differential experiences of family and neighborhood poverty, in addition to parenting factors, would result in heterogeneous expression of problem behavior among at-risk adolescents.

Methods: Data derive from a longitudinal survey (n=625) of young men in a midsize northeastern city in the United States. Latent class analysis was performed with nine indicators, including family composition, family poverty, positive and negative parenting practices, and neighborhood perceptions, services, crime, and poverty. Resulting classes were tested for significant differences on individual outcomes, including delinquency, school outcomes, substance use, and victimization.

Results: The mean age of the sample was 17.86 (SD=1.16); 47.1% of the sample reported their race as black, 47.3% as white, and 5.6% reported some other race. Examination of multiple fit statistics suggested that a four-class solution best fit the data. Groups differed significantly based on assessed individual risk factors tested across the four classes. The first class (17.9%) was characterized by high SES, intact families in good neighborhoods with good parenting. The outcomes for this group generally demonstrated low risk, but engagement in problematic drinking behaviors. The second class (24.2%) was characterized by impoverished, non-intact families in good neighborhoods with average parenting. The outcomes for this group showed low delinquency, but frequent high school dropout and high smoking. The third class (21.0%) was characterized by high SES, intact families living in poor neighborhoods with disengaged parenting. The outcomes for this group indicated frequent victimization and high delinquency. The fourth class (37.0%) was characterized by impoverished, non-intact families in poor neighborhoods with abusive parenting. The outcomes for this group demonstrated substantial risk, including high delinquency, victimization, substance use, and moral disengagement.

Conclusions/Implications: These results are evidence of the complex and interactional nature of risk factors that occur in youths’ ecological systems. These results extend the literature by providing a framework for understanding contextual risk factors and underscore the idea that one single indicator cannot be used to predict negative outcomes (Lanza et al., 2010). By extension, targeting one indicator—such as family poverty of neighborhood characteristics—for intervention may not be enough to counteract influences from other domains.  The four classes that resulted from this analysis evince the need for interventions rooted in the context of family and neighborhood characteristics. Given the complexity of the relationships of youths’ ecology, we suggest that interventions to prevent substance use and delinquency must also be multi-faceted and tailored to the individual (Farmer et al., 2007).