Cause of Juvenile Delinquency

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Cause of Juvenile Delinquency: Juvenile Justice CJ-304 October 24, 2011 Cause of Juvenile Delinquency There is no doubt that various experts can give us many theories as to the causes of juvenile delinquency, including one's economic background, substance abuse, delinquent peer groups, repeated exposure to violence, increased availability of firearms and media violence, however, I feel that the number one cause of juvenile delinquency is the breakdown of families, including lack of parental control over children. It is ironic in America, today, one must have a driver's license to operate a vehicle, a permit to own a gun and even a license to own a dog, but one does not have to have training or a license in order to become a parent. Without specialized educational programs in child development and parenting, many of our future parents will not have a chance at becoming successful parents and worse; yet, many parents today are already contributing to the ever increasing problem of juvenile delinquency simply by not knowing how to be parents. Being a parent is a lifelong commitment and new parents must learn parenting skills immediately; they do not have the luxury of internships and often times, mistakes in parenting will have drastic effects on the child. There are many reasons for this major crisis in families today. Below are several of those causes and a theory that works with these reasons is Authority Conflict Pathway: Authority Conflict Pathway- the pathway to delinquent deviance that begin at an early age with stubborn behavior and leads to defiance and then to authority Confusion about Parent Roles and Friend Role - When children reach adolescence, conflict between parents and teens normally increases as teens need to distance themselves from parental identity to establish their own identity. Experts agree they are generally three

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