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DOI 10.1007/s10964-010-9579-5
EMPIRICAL RESEARCH
Received: 8 October 2009 / Accepted: 23 July 2010 / Published online: 13 August 2010
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010
P. J. Hirschfield (&)
Department of Sociology, Rutgers University,
26 Nichol Avenue, New Brunswick, NJ 08901, USA
e-mail: phirschfield@sociology.rutgers.edu
J. Gasper
Westat, 1600 Research Boulevard, Rockville, MD 20850, USA
e-mail: josephgasper@westat.com
Introduction
School performance and behavior are among the most
frequently cited factors in the etiology of delinquency
(Cloward and Ohlin 1960; Cohen 1955). A solid research
tradition in criminology has examined delinquency as a
function of academic performance (e.g., grades and test
scores; for a review, see Maguin and Loeber 1996). Likewise, delinquency is often linked empirically to school
bonds (Cernkovich and Giordano 1992; Liska and Reed
1985), which encompass the myriad ways in which students
are connected to and invested in their schools (attachment
involvement, conventional school beliefs, and commitment;
Cernkovich and Giordano 1979; Hirschi 1969; Liska and
Reed 1985). In short, a large body of research has consistently established that students who perform poorly in
school and who feel alienated from school are more likely to
engage in delinquency.
These relationships have attracted less attention within
the fields of education and adolescent development, where
a close conceptual cousin to Hirschis school bond is a
cluster of school attitudes and behaviors known as
engagement. Whereas the concept of social bonds was
developed to explain restraints on deviance, engagement
encompasses active, goal-oriented, focused, and constructive behaviors and interactions (Furrer and Skinner 2003).
Disengagement from school, which may take root as early
as first grade, is widely regarded as the primary developmental process underlying school failure and dropout
(Alexander et al. 2001; Finn 1989; Marks 2000). Failure
and dropout, in turn, exact many economic and social
costs, especially in urban America (Manlove 1998; Orfield
2004; Pettit and Western 2004). Accordingly, student disengagement is increasingly recognized as a serious social
problem (National Research Council and Institute of
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(as opposed to non-school activities) or by other dimensions of engagement or social bonds remain unclear.
Delinquency as a Cause of Disengagement
A conflicting interpretation of the relationship between
engagement and delinquency is that delinquency lowers
engagement, or that they have a reciprocal relationship
(Thornberry et al. 1991). School delinquency can prompt
peer rejection, exclusionary discipline, and negative valuations at school and at home (Ford 2005; Sampson and
Laub 1997). These reactions may reduce enthusiasm for
school (Finn 1989; French and Conrad 2001; Natriello
1984). An impact of off-campus delinquency on school
engagement is surely less common and direct. However,
some offenses may deplete the time or energy available for
school work. Juvenile justice involvement may also divert
time and energy while promoting stigmatization, social
exclusion, and deviant peer affiliation (Hirschfield 2009;
Hjalmarsson 2008).
Relatively serious delinquency and substance use appear
to increase dropout (Fagan and Pabon 1990; French and
Conrad 2001; Mensch and Kandel 1988)perhaps the final
act of disengagement. Liska and Reed (1985) conducted
one of three known studies that estimate both the impact of
school bonds or engagement on delinquency and vice
versa. They reported that, among a national sample of high
school boys, school bonds (a 19-item mega-construct that
taps attachment, commitment, and distinct aspects of
emotional and cognitive engagement) had null to very
weak effects on subsequent delinquency. However, violent
and property offending markedly reduced school bonds, net
of parental attachment. The second study similarly found
that delinquency weakened school bonds (a composite of
attachment, effort, and commitment; Thornberry et al.
1991). Both studies, however, omitted factors like family
adversity/disruption and peer behavior that predispose
youth to both disengagement and delinquency. Steinberg
and Avenevoli (1998), by contrast, found that delinquency
predicted increased high school engagement. This anomalous result likely occurred because the measure of delinquency indexed mainly illicit recreational pursuits (e.g.,
marijuana, alcohol, fake ids) rather than anti-social
behavior. The observed residual positive association
between risky behavior and subsequent enjoyment of
school may attest to the social benefits of participation in
the party subculture (Hagan 1991).
Delinquency and Disengagement Have a Common
Etiology
A third perspective holds that disengagement and delinquency are not causally related but, rather, share common
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123
variable. Liska and Reed (1985) found that among AfricanAmericans, but not among whites, school bonds predicted
strong reductions in violent and property offenses. They
suggested that structural disadvantages (i.e., fewer opportunities outside of school) may lead black youth to invest
more of their aspirations in school and, therefore, to be
more responsive to variations in teacher support and
control. Although these effects could be due to omitted
variable bias or to their relatively small African-American
sub-sample, subsequent studies also suggested that emotional or cognitive engagement exert larger effects in disadvantaged urban communities (Cernkovich and Giordano
1992; Dornbusch et al. 2001; Schmidt 2003). This possibility begs examination with larger samples and rigorous
longitudinal methods.
Another possibility that motivates the present inquiry is
that engagement and delinquency begin to affect each other
prior to high school (Liska and Reed 1985; Steinberg and
Avenevoli 1998). High school engagement is often an
extension of similar patterns during middle school or even
early in elementary school (Alexander et al. 2001). However, affirming Thornberrys (1987) predictions on a 1977
national longitudinal study, Jang (1999) found weaker
effects of school commitment (a composite of studying/
homework, attachment to school/teachers, and grades) at
ages 12 and 13 than during high school. He argued that,
early in high school, as parental influence declines, schools
assume a larger role in mediating peer associations and
equipping children to cope with developmental challenges.
Nonetheless, the roles the specific dimensions of school
engagement play in delinquency, and vice versa, particularly in the context of disadvantaged urban elementary
schools in more recent times remain unsettled.
This study assesses whether there is a direct relationship
between delinquency and engagement and, if so, this
relationships directionality. Addressing several limitations
of prior research, this study makes some important contributions. First, following Steinberg and Avenevoli
(1998), this study focuses on engagement, a multi-dimensional construct that has greater conceptual clarity and
practical importance than the school bonding constructs
derived from social control theory. Second, it uses data
from a large panel of elementary school students (grades 5
through 8) from disadvantaged inner-city Chicago neighborhoods. Third, it controls for several potential common
causes of disengagement and delinquency that are generally omitted from prior studies, such as disruptive life
events, anger levels, and peer deviance. Foregoing theories
of the behavioral impact of academic engagement and of
the underlying sources of problem behavior yield conflicting notions as to whether family and peer problems
confound the impact of school engagement on delinquency
or whether they are precursors or sequelae (i.e., mediators)
Hypotheses
The goal of this study was to determine whether engagement predicts delinquency, delinquency predicts engagement, or both. It was hypothesized that emotional,
behavioral, and cognitive engagement would each negatively predict school misconduct and general delinquency
in disadvantaged urban contexts, although the inclusion of
parental and peer relationship dynamics weakens these
relationships. This hypothesis was largely based on social
control theory and prior studies showing an impact of
attachment and involvement on delinquency. There are
also theoretical and empirical reasons for examining whether the relationship runs in the opposite direction. It was
therefore hypothesized that school and general misconduct,
especially the former, negatively predict each of the three
dimensions of school engagementrelationships partially
explained by parental and peer relations.
Methods
Design and Sample
This study is set in inner-city Chicago from fall 1992
through spring 1997. It uses survey data from a sub-sample
of the 5th through 8th grade students in the 22 public
elementary schools (mean = 92% low-income in
19931994) that participated in Comers School Development Program Evaluation (SDP). SDP was a randomized
whole school reform to improve disadvantaged urban
elementary schools academic and social climates through
building cohesion and integrating parents and mental
health professionals into school operations and management (Cook et al. 2000). Students were surveyed twice
annually from the 19921993 school year through the
19961997 school year. About 95% of eligible students
participated in the surveys each year (see Cook et al. 2000
for full details of sampling design). First, an attitudes and
behavior survey measured academic and psycho-social
adjustment including delinquency and cognitive and
behavioral engagement. Later (1.6 months on average), a
school climate survey gauged perceptions and attitudes
123
Measures
Variable
Male
43.3%
Female
57.6%
28.8%
School Misconduct
Black
Asian
66.5%
4.7%
Wave 1
Wave 2
Mean
or %
SD
Mean
or %
SD
School misconduct
1.57
0.67
1.63
0.69
General delinquency
1.39
0.62
1.43
0.63
Emotional
3.38
1.13
3.17
1.13
Behavioral
0.17
0.09
0.16
0.08
Cognitive
3.32
0.56
3.24
0.42
Problem behavior
School engagement
Demographics
Gender
Race
Age
11.33
1.02
12.44
1.08
Family structure
Both biological parents
32.6%
29.0%
46.0%
53.4%
No biological parent
21.4%
2.36
17.6%
1.23
74.6%
79.3%
Part-time
14.9%
12.5%
Unemployed
10.5%
8.2%
Kids in household
3.99
2.94
3.73
2.70
0.74
0.77
0.76
0.75
1.15
1.78
0.68
0.98
1.24
1.73
0.79
0.98
Parental attachment
4.00
0.77
3.99
0.82
Parental control
3.89
0.49
3.80
0.55
Peer delinquency
1.41
0.63
1.44
0.62
Latent traits
Cigarette smoking
Anger
Social control
models included all of the variables in the model, at multiple time points, as predictors of all of the other variables.
Five imputed data sets were generated and each model was
estimated five times. The results of each set of five models
were averaged to generate the regression results presented
herein (correcting the standard errors to account for the
random variation introduced into our imputed values).
123
123
10
123
The contemporaneous impact of emotional disengagement on delinquency is not estimated because the school
climate surveys were administered after the attitudes and
behavior survey. To ensure proper temporal ordering of
these variables and to partially adjust for the impact of
emotional engagement on delinquency, an SEM is estimated that models emotional engagement (P2) as a function of wave 1 controls including, wave 1 emotional
engagement (E1). Given the strong association between
wave 1 and wave 2 emotional engagement (r = .382),
controlling for P1 reduces the share of the association
between delinquency and engagement a month or two later
that can be accounted for by the effects of prior engagement on delinquency.
Unlike the cross-lagged model, the contemporaneous
effects models cannot be estimated using OLS regression.
Because delinquency and disengagement are allowed to
affect each other, they correlate with the error terms of
each equation, violating one of the basic assumptions of
OLS. The maximum likelihood (ML) estimation methods
in SAS (PROC CALIS) are employed to address this
problem by taking into account the endogeneity of
engagement and delinquency.
Estimates of the impact of engagement on delinquency
and, especially, of the impact of delinquency on disengagement are conservative. All time-varying covariates
measured during the same wave as delinquency (except
disruptive events) reference a period that largely postdates
the measurement period for delinquency, which is the past
year. Thus, cross-lagged models technically examine the
impact of retrospective delinquency at wave 1 on engagement at wave 2, independent of concurrent engagement at
wave 1. As mentioned, peer and family dynamics may
mediate (and thereby attenuate) the impact of wave 1
engagement on wave 2 delinquency, and vice versa.
Therefore, both partially specified models, which include
only presumably exogenous controls, and full models,
which include parental control and attachment and peer
delinquency, are estimated. The contemporaneous effects
models (Eq. 2) are less clearly conservative, because the
sequential order of cognitive and behavioral engagement
and delinquency is less precise. Both partial and full synchronous effects models are presented to proximately
measure the potential confounding/mediating influence of
peer and parental factors.
Results
Descriptive Findings
As shown in Table 2, the three measures of engagement are
only modestly intercorrelated at both wave 1 and wave 2.
.420**
Peer delinquency
.289**
Anger
-.242**
.356**
-.178**
.092**
Cigarette smoking
Parental control
.091**
Parental attachment
.005
-.212**
-.152**
Behavioral engagement
Cognitive engagement
Parental education
-.113**
Emotional engagement
Kids in household
1
.722**
School misconduct
General delinquency
.721**
.481**
-.325**
-.203**
.411**
.373**
.118**
.086**
.018
-.271**
-.124**
-.183**
-.075**
.183**
.242**
-.162**
-.054**
.002
-.004
.009
.108**
.063**
-.147**
-109**
-.167**
.231**
.018
-.195**
-.120**
-.113**
-.059**
-.037*
1
-.014
.047**
-.200**
-.171**
-.115**
.130**
.226**
-.052**
-.094**
.057**
-.020
.102**
.016
1
.058**
-.134**
-.143**
5
.063**
.049**
.065**
.030
.072**
.020
.036*
.052**
-.017
-.036*
.079**
-.038*
6
.053**
.001
.046**
.047**
.006
-.039*
.044**
.044**
.019
-.025
-.062**
-.002
7
.067**
.115**
.067**
-.020
.007
.154**
.028
.030
.048**
-.087**
.037*
-.007
-.047**
-.020
-.167**
-.109**
.028
.037**
.030
1
.228**
.201**
-.290**
-.109**
-.168**
.317**
.054**
.191**
.054**
-.113**
-.076**
.146**
-.030**
.161**
.127**
-.057**
-.143**
.184**
-.146**
-.107**
.018
-.020
.219**
-.176**
-.393**
-.154**
-.284**
11
.344**
10
.324**
-.178**
.215**
-.143**
-.141**
.001
-.006
.055**
.135**
.174**
.159**
-.260**
-.202**
12
-.152**
-.138**
.244**
.343**
.082**
.054**
.053**
-.139**
-.107**
-.096**
.433**
.445**
13
* p \ .05; ** p \ .01
Correlations in the lower left half of the table are for Wave 2 and correlations in the upper-right half are for Wave 1. Correlations are presented for all variables expect for dichotomous
demographic variables and are computed as Pearsons R
13
12
11
10
4
5
Variable
Cross-Lagged Models
123
12
123
predicts school misconduct and the second predicts emotional, behavioral, or cognitive engagement. The top panel
presents the results for the first equation predicting school
misconduct, and the bottom panel for the second equation
predicting each dimension of engagement. The final two
columns present the results of nested models (partial and
full, respectively) of the impact of wave 1 emotional
engagement on wave 2 school misconduct, net of wave 1
delinquency and controls.
As expected based on Fig. 1, wave 1 emotional
engagement exerts small effects on wave 2 school misconduct (model 1), which are no longer significant after
controlling for parental control and peer delinquency
(model 2). The protective effects of spending more time on
homework relative to leisure appear relatively substantial
and robust to model specification (models 3 and 4). Models
(not shown) that controlled for academic achievement in
the form of reading and mathematics test scores (which
address concerns that the engagement/delinquency relationship is due to confounding strain-induced school failure) did not change the findings. The effect of cognitive
engagement is significant and positive in the full and partial
models (model 5 and 6). Thus, all else being equal,
increases in cognitive engagement appear to increase
school misconducta reversal of the negative association
between these two variables at wave 2 (r = -.152).
The control variables hold few surprises. Males, smokers, and those living in households with a greater number of
other children all exhibit increased levels of school misconduct. Anger, parental attachment and control, and peer
delinquency also predictably influence school misconduct.
As expected, most selection factors that are relatively stable exert a weak or null influence on school misconduct
with a lagged measure of the outcome in the model.
The models in the second half of Table 3 examine
relationships in the opposite direction (Eq. 2). Models 1
through 4 suggest no effect of prior school misconduct on
either emotional or behavioral engagement. Consistent
with the cross-lagged results, school misconduct exhibits a
negative effect on cognitive engagement (Models 5 and 6).
Unexpectedly, however, African-American youth become
more cognitively engaged (but less emotionally and
behaviorally engaged) from school. Parental attachment
and control appear to improve cognitive engagement, as
expected.
Table 4 presents similar results for simultaneous equation models for engagement and general delinquency. The
impact of wave 1 emotional disengagement on general
delinquency is almost identical to its impact on school
misconduct (models 1 and 2). Similar to the results for
school misconduct, the inclusion of parental attachment
and control renders the relationship between emotional
engagement and general misconduct non-significant. The
13
Table 3 Parameter estimates from simultaneous effects models of the reciprocal relationship between school engagement and school
misconduct, ML estimates: Wave 2
Variable
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Model 4
-.09*
-.08*
Model 5
Model 6
.11*
.10*
.04*
-.09*
-.06
Wave 2 behavioral
Wave 2 cognitive
Demographics
Age
.06**
.03*
.07**
.04*
.07**
Male
.08**
.05**
.07**
.05**
.08**
.05**
Black
-.04*
-.03
-.04*
-.04
-.06*
-.05*
Asian
-.03
-.03
-.01
-.01
-.02
-.02
.02
.06**
.02
.05*
.02
.06**
.02
.05*
.03
.08*
.02
.06*
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.02
.01
.00
.00
.00
.02
-.05*
-.05*
Kids in household
.04*
.03*
.03*
.03
.04*
.03*
.04**
.04*
.04*
.03
.04*
.03
Part-time
Unemployed
-.04
-.05*
-.03
-.02
.01
-.04*
Latent traits
Cigarette smoking
.25**
.19**
.25**
.19**
.26**
.19**
Anger
.18**
.12**
.19**
.11**
.20**
.12**
Social control
Parental attachment
-.04**
-.05**
-.06**
Parental control
-.09**
-.08**
-.11**
.23**
.23**
.24**
Peer delinquency
Prior school misconduct
Wave 1 school misconduct
Variable
.27**
.21
Emotional
Model 1
.26**
.21**
Behavioral
Model 2
Model 3
.28**
.22**
Cognitive
Model 4
Model 5
Model 6
.01
-.23**
-.21**
-.03
.02
.02
-.03
-.03
-.01
.00
.02
-.05*
Male
.01
.01
-.06**
-.04*
.01
Black
-.03
-.06**
-.05*
-.04*
.11**
Asian
-.02
.00
.11*
.12**
-.04*
.00
.10**
-.02
.01
.01
-.01
-.01
.00
.00
No biological parent
.01
.03
.00
.00
.00
.01
Parents education
.03
.02
.01
.00
.03
.02
Part-time
.01
.02
-.03
-.03
-.03
-.02
Unemployed
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.06**
-.06*
Kids in household
.01
.02
-.02
-.02
-.02
-.02
.02
.02
-.04*
-.04*
.02
.01
Cigarette smoking
-.02
-.01
-.05*
-.03
.03
.04
Anger
-.13**
-.08**
-.10**
-.07**
-.00
.04
Latent traits
Social control
123
14
Table 3 continued
Variable
Emotional
Model 1
Behavioral
Model 2
Parental attachment
.17**
Parental control
.07**
Peer delinquency
.00
Model 3
Cognitive
Model 4
Model 5
-.03
Model 6
.14**
.16**
.06**
-.08**
.01
.35**
.32**
Wave 1 behavioral
.30**
.28**
Wave 1 cognitive
RMSEA
.04
.04
.03
.03
.31**
.30**
.04
.03
Standard errors are in parentheses. Control variables are measured at Wave 2 for models including behavioral and cognitive engagement and
Wave 1 for models including emotional engagement
* p \ .05; ** p \ .01
123
Discussion
Disengagement from school, which often begins during
elementary school, is widely recognized as the principal
long-term social-psychological process that turns motivated students into high school dropouts (Alexander et al.
2001; Finn 1989; Steinberg et al. 1996). Scholars also tend
to agree that this multifaceted problem, however defined
and wherever it originates, is more pronounced and more
costly in inner cities, where dropouts have a relatively slim
chance of a healthy and productive future (see Orfield
2004). The scientific community is still a long way from
consensus, however, regarding whether disengagement is
also a primary and direct cause of delinquency, especially
outside of school. The first obstacle to reliable causal
inference is that measures of school bonds rooted in
social control theory are not completely consonant with
prevailing conceptualizations of engagement among
scholars of education, which are themselves beset with
inconsistency or ambiguity. Second, research linking
school bonds/engagement to delinquency is vulnerable to
the criticism that latent factors explain both engagement
and delinquency. Third, delinquency may lead to disengagement rather than the other way around. Fourth, most
15
Table 4 Parameter estimates from simultaneous effects models of the reciprocal relationship between school engagement and school misconduct, ML estimates: Wave 2
Variable
Model 1
Model 2
Model 3
Model 4
-.12**
-.11**
Model 5
Model 6
.11**
.10**
.01
-.08*
-.05
Wave 2 behavioral
Wave 2 cognitive
Demographics
Age
.04**
.01
.05**
.01
.05**
Male
.10*
.07**
.09**
.06**
.10**
Black
.01
.01
.00
.01
Asian
.00
.00
.02
.02
.01
.00
.00
.01
.00
.00
.00
.01
-.01
-.01
.01
.03
.00
.00
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.01
.01
.00
.00
.00
.02
.01
-.02
-.02
-.02
-.02
.00
-.01
Kids in household
.03
.02
.02
.02
.03
.02
.05**
.04**
.04**
.03*
.05**
.04**
Cigarette smoking
.26**
.19**
.26**
.19**
.27**
.19**
Anger
.28**
.20**
.28**
.20**
.29**
.20**
Parents education
Part-time
Unemployed
-.01
.06**
.00
Latent traits
Social control
Parental attachment
-.04*
-.05**
-.06**
Parental control
-.14**
-.12**
-.15**
.29**
.28**
.29**
Peer delinquency
Prior general delinquency
Wave 1 general delinquency
Variable
.28**
.21**
Emotional
Model 1
.28**
.21**
Behavioral
Model 2
Model 3
.30**
.22**
Cognitive
Model 4
Model 5
Model 6
.03
-.21**
-.18**
-.03
-.03
-.04
-.03
-.02
-.01
.00
.02
-.05**
Male
.02
.02
-.06**
-.04*
.01
Black
-.03
-.06**
-.05*
-.04*
.12**
Asian
-.02
.00
.01
.01
-.01
No biological parent
.02
.03
.00
Parents education
.03
.02
Part-time
.01
Unemployed
.11**
.12**
.00
.11**
-.03
-.02
-.01
-.01
-.01
.00
-.02
.00
.01
.00
.03
.03
.02
-.03
-.03
-.03
-.02
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.01
-.06*
-.05*
Kids in household
.02
.02
-.02
-.02
-.02
-.02
.02
.02
-.04*
-.04*
.02
.02
.01
-.05*
-.03
.03
.03
-.07**
-.10**
-.08**
.03
.05
Latent traits
Cigarette smoking
-.01
Anger
-.12**
123
16
Table 4 continued
Variable
Emotional
Model 1
Behavioral
Model 2
Model 3
Cognitive
Model 4
Model 5
Model 6
Social control
Parental attachment
.16**
-.03
.14**
Parental control
Peer delinquency
.06**
.01
.17**
-.09**
.06**
.01
.35**
.32**
Wave 1 behavioral
.30**
.28**
Wave 1 cognitive
RMSEA
.04
.04
.04
.01
.31**
.30**
.03
.01
Standard errors are in parentheses. Control variables are measured at Wave 2 for models including behavioral and cognitive disengagement
and Wave 1 for models including emotional disengagement
* p \ .05; ** p \ .01
123
17
123
18
123
that improving engagement, especially behavioral engagement, will also reduce school and general delinquency.
Moreover, because the effects of engagement are direct,
reducing delinquency through increasing behavioral
engagement does not appear to require altering patterns of
peer and parental relationships. Our findings also caution
that that improving cognitive engagement without also
improving opportunities and resources for academic success may actually increase delinquency. Concordantly,
multi-modal approaches to improving student engagement
have met with some success. Effective or promising
interventions to improve elementary school student
engagement, too abundant to list here, include training
parents to reinforce homework completion (Debaryshe
et al. 1993), improving school social climate through
integrating parents and mental health professionals into
schools (Cook et al. 2000; shown to both increase school
attachment and reduce delinquency) and working directly
with students to build trust, communication, and problemsolving skills (Lehr et al. 2004).
Scholars of adolescent development have increasingly
defined the problem of high school dropout as essentially
a problem of academic disengagement. Fewer scholars,
however, have advanced similar claims with respect to
juvenile delinquency or other problem behaviors, such as
alcohol and drug use. Yet, disengagement, dropout, and
delinquency/problem behavior appear to go hand-in-hand
(Finn 1989). This lack of emphasis on disengagement
may reflect the prominence of strain, social bonding, and
problem behavior theories of schooling and delinquency.
It may also reflect the ambiguities and inconsistencies in
the measurement of disengagement and in their relationship with delinquency. This article lends much needed
clarity to these matters by distinguishing between
engagement and school bonding, by distinguishing among
dimensions of engagement, and by disentangling causal
order. It suggests that engaging early adolescents in
homework carries the greatest pay-off in terms of
reducing misbehavior both inside and outside of school.
Improving their emotional dispositions toward school is
also helpful but not as much, whereas improving cognitive engagement, by itself, is not helpful at all. Interventions designed to improve engagement should be more
attentive to such differences in the importance of the
various dimensions of engagement.
Acknowledgments The authors are grateful to Helene Raskin White,
the Editor, and three anonymous reviewers for their helpful feedback
on this manuscript and to Thomas Cook for providing the data.
19
Appendix
See Table 5.
Items
Range
1 = none; 3 = 23 h; 5 = 67 h
123
20
Table 5 continued
Scale
Disruptive life events
Items
Range
1 = yes; 0 = no
1 = never; 5 = everyday
My parents
Trust me
Approve of my friends
Discuss my problems with me
Respect my ability to make decisions
Give me small jobs to do without checking on me a lot
Discuss important family matters with me
Parental control
Letting your family know where you are going when you
go outside
Who you spend your free time with
Getting your homework done,
What time you should be home at night
What time you go to bed at night.
Having friends over when no grownups are home
Peer delinquency
1 = none; 5 = all
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Author Biographies
Paul J. Hirschfield is an Associate Professor in the Department of
Sociology, Rutgers University, Piscataway, NJ. He earned his
doctorate in Sociology from Northwestern University. His theoretical
and empirical work focuses on the control and criminalization of
youth in the contexts of schools and the juvenile justice system, along
with the effectiveness of schools in the prevention of delinquency and
recidivism. His current research centers on the reintegration of youth
from correctional facilities into schools.
Joseph Gasper received his Ph.D. in Sociology from Johns Hopkins
University. He currently works as a Research Associate at Westat in
Rockville, MD. His research interests include high school dropout,
student engagement, and adolescent delinquency and substance use.
In addition, he has conducted research on the effects of residential and
school mobility on youth educational and behavioral outcomes.