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Running head: URBAN POVERTY AND FAMILY CONTEXT OF DELINQUENCY

Urban Poverty and the Family Context of Delinquency Summary

Rebecca Oshinbanjo
University of Texas at El Paso

URBAN POVERTY AND FAMILY CONTEXT OF DELINQUENCY

Urban Poverty and the Family Context of Delinquency Summary
In the article Urban Poverty and the Family Context of Delinquency, Robert

J. Sampson, a professor of social sciences and the director of the Boston Area
Research Institute and John H. Laub who is also a professor in Northeast
University conducted a study on the direct effects that parents have on their
childrens delinquent behavior. The research found that a solution to
adolescent misconduct is found in the behavioral pattern of the family.
(Samson, Laub 1994) They based their theory on poverty and structural
disadvantage influencing delinquency by reducing the capacity of families to
achieve effective informal social control. Sampson and Laub reconstructed
and reanalyzed the Gluecks original data and also united structures and
processes in integrated theoretical frame works (page 523). Other previous
studies were also used to back up their theory (pages 524-526).
Sampson and Laub described previous study, they reconstructed and
computerized the Gluck data and measured the key methods found in the
theory (page 526). The 500 population used by the Gluecks were resampled
and some of the things measures in the new studies were family size, family
disruption, residential mobility, maternal employment, and foreign born
which was meant to create more detailed idea. They decided to go with the
Glueck studies because it was more detailed and they realized that they
would not be able to recreate the study by the same standard (page 531).

URBAN POVERTY AND FAMILY CONTEXT OF DELINQUENCY

The results had all relationships in the expected directions as

delinquency declined with increased level of supervision, and parental
attachment (page 532). The result supported the theory by showing that
erratic, threatening, and harsh discipline, low supervision, weak parental
attachment facilitate the effect of poverty and other structural factors on
delinquency (page 524).
Although the data used was detailed and accurate but it was still old
and as not accounted for generational changes. However it still proven
relevant today because it contains appropriate solution to reducing
delinquency even at this time.

URBAN POVERTY AND FAMILY CONTEXT OF DELINQUENCY

References
Sampson, R. J., & Laub, J. H. (1994). Urban poverty and the family context of delinquency: A
new look at structure and process in a classic study. Child Development, 65(2, Children
and Poverty), 523-540. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/1131400
This article is an eye opener to the huge responsibility that lies on the
shoulder of parents as they strive to teach their children the right way of life so that
they can become better persons and be a productive citizen of society. Sampson
and Laub based their study around poverty and how it tends to limit the ability of
parents to exercise the needed control over their children. They also explained how
family structure contributes to the up rearing of children by explaining that the
probability of abnormality increases when the bond that holds children to the
society is weak or broken. Their theory reconstructed the old Glueck data to come
up with their own conclusion. I made use of this article because it discusses in detail
an important limitation to parental effort, which is poverty and how it affects the up
bring of children. Though the theory was not as detailed as the Rankin and Quanes
theory, it was able to explain to some extent the causes and solutions to juvenile
misconduct even though it was limited to the family structure and poverty.

URBAN POVERTY AND FAMILY CONTEXT OF DELINQUENCY