The Intergenerational Transmission of Social Capital, Its Meaning for Crime in Adolescence, and for Offending in Early Adulthood

Social capital has grown into an important theoretical concept in thesocial sciences. In criminology it has been applied within the framework of social disorganization theory and other theories of social control. However, while adult social capital has received much attention, adolescent social capital, and its possible relationship to offending, has not been studied. In order to fill this gap in the literature I answer three important questions. First, I theorize about, and empirically investigate, the development of social capital and the possible transmission of it from parents to adolescents. Second, I investigate the relationship between adolescent social capital and adolescent violence and property offending. Third, I investigate how adolescent social capital is associated with offending in early adulthood.

My results suggest that the intergenerational transmission of social capital is an important source of social capital development that influences adolescents' behaviors for years to come. Parental social capital relates positively to adolescent neighborhood social capital and adolescent school social capital. The investigation also shows that the relationship between parental social capital and adolescent school social capital is as strong as the one with neighborhood social capital.

The intergenerational transmission of social capital has diametrically opposed effects for violence. While adolescent neighborhood social capital increases violence, social capital in school decreases violent offending. The cause for these opposing relationships is likely the different environmental contexts in which both types of social capital exist. While adolescent neighborhood social capital exists in an environment providing adolescents with unstructured activities, the environment in which adolescent school social capital is developed represents structured activities and, by definition, pro-social value formation.

My research also shows that, at least for the early years of adulthood, adolescent social capital is an important predictor of offending. The relationships in early adulthood mirror the associations in adolescence. It is likely that young adults in the transitional period between adolescence and adulthood maintain their adolescent social capital networks, leading them to engage in the same offending patterns they displayed in adolescence. Social capital networks, and with them offending patterns, likely shift after the young adults have established themselves in adult life.