Besides biological factors that primarily drive risk-taking and law-breaking attitude among teenagers, culture too may play a key role in shaping criminal mindset among them, a study has showed.
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According to a Study:
- According to Yunmei Lu, doctoral candidate at the Pennsylvania State University.
- Whatever the biological, or neurobiological, factors that might contribute to criminal behaviour, culture and social structure apparently play as great, or greater role.
- “It also suggests a greater amount of plasticity for humans, including during their adolescence,” Lu added.
- The way societies eventually integrate youth into the world of adults also may play a large role in age-crime patterns, the researchers noted.
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- Different societies may have differences in age-graded norms and integration of youth with adult society.
- Furthermore, in ways that lead to differences in extent of adolescent crime and the age-crime associatio.
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- For the study, detailed in the journal Criminology.
- The team analysed age and patterns of teenage crime in the US and Taiwan in Asia.
- They found significant differences, which suggest that cultural factors may also be important influences on criminal behaviour.
- In the US, which tends to be more individualistic.
- For example, involvement in crime tends to peak in middle to late teenage and then declines.
- However, in Taiwan, which has more of a collectivist culture with less separation between generations.
- The crime rate does not dramatically peak as it does in the US.
- Participation in most crimes in Taiwan tends to reach a high point in the late 20s or early 30s.
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