Aggressive behavior among Italian justice-involved juveniles: the impact of attachment, discipline, and moral disengagement

ABSTRACT

Our research investigates the influence of family attachment, perceived parental discipline, time spent with parents, and moral disengagement on aggressive behaviors among 234 justice-involved juveniles from Italian Youth Detention Centers (14–25 years old). Participants fulfilled the Socio-demographic Questionnaire, Moral Disengagement Scale-short version, Attachment Style Questionnaire, and the Aggression Questionnaire. The stepwise multiple linear regression analysis showed a positive association between moral disengagement and insecure-avoidant attachment with aggressive behavior. The time spent with parents and the perceived severe discipline was negatively associated with aggressive behavior. Results provided suggestions for future research and directions in preventing criminality among juveniles.

KEYWORDS:

• Justice-involved juveniles
• aggressive behavior
• family attachment
• discipline
• detention center

Open Scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badge for Open Data. The data are openly accessible at .

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Ethical statement

All procedures performed in the present study involving human participants were applied following the ethical guidelines and standards of the institutional and national research committee and the Declaration of Helsinki. Informed consent was obtained from all participants involved in the present study.

Additional information

Funding

The research benefits from the Department of Human, Social and Health Sciences University of Cassino and Southern Lazio funding.