The Association between Low Expectation, Delinquency and Depression

Live Poster Session: ZoomLink

Felix Clayton
Felix Clayton

Clayton graduated from St. Benedict’s Prep. He was born and raised in Newark, New jersey. The passion to explore this topic was ignited when he read Richard’s Wright novel Native Son. Wright mentioned how when people are denied basic control over their own life, it can manifest in negative forms such as crime. Clayton wanted to test this correlation empirically using the statistical tools he learned in this class. Also, Clayton is considering being a government major.

Abstract: The objective of this study was to see if low expectations and depression was linked with delinquency. Moreover, the sample consisted of about 6,500 adolescents in 7th to 12th grade from socioeconomic and ethnically diverse backgrounds. Most of the literature focusing on low expectations, depression, and delinquency focus predominately on urban and African American communities. After combining variables different variables for low expectation, depression, and delinquency, different statistical analysis tests was ran on these variables. The statistical analysis showed that low expectation and depression is associated with delinquency, but it is unclear whether it is a negative or positive association. This correlation is important because the United States has one of the highest rates of juvenile delinquency among developed countries. If there is a clear association between the three variables mentioned above, then the justice system could help the juvenile delinquents in different ways other than punishment.

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