Delinquency and the Black Middle Class: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

This study addresses the lack of criminal justice research on non-poor African Americans. The author empirically tested ideas from Pattillo-McCoy (1998, 1999) using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. The main research question was what causal factors predict delinquency among middle class Blacks. Having delinquent friends predicted a greater likelihood of future arrest among middle class Blacks but a lesser likelihood among poorer African Americans, suggesting different processes at work. Indicators of parental relationship problems had more of an impact on poor Black and White youth than on middle class youth of either race.

KEYTERMS:

• Black
• African American
• middle class
• delinquency

Notes

1. According to the U.S. Census classification methodology, Hispanics can be of any race.

2. All the youth and young adults in the survey were born from 1980–1984 and would have been 12 to 16 years at Round 1 (1997) and 18 to 22 years at Round 6 (2002).

3. I also considered alternative income categorizing approaches (e.g., SE ± mean; .75 × SE ± mean). However, these worked less well and tended to create severely unbalanced class groups.

4. A third category not used in the analyses, “affluent” youth and young adults, included 84 individuals. These respondents had parents with incomes $40,001 and above. Among the affluent category, only four respondents indicated that they had been arrested since the date of last interview (the dependent variable).

5. This comment comes from one of the anonymous reviewers of the original version of this article. I am grateful for the perspective.

6. The comments in this paragraph also came directly from a suggestion from one of the anonymous reviewers of an earlier draft of the manuscript. I am grateful for the perspective.