Gender Differences in the Effects of Risk Factors on American Indian Youths’ Engagement in Delinquency

Introduction: Existing scholarship demonstrates the need to focus on gender within examinations of juvenile justice-involved youth, particularly due to the evolving landscape of juvenile arrests and procedures. However, relatively few studies have focused on American Indian (AI) youth delinquency and associated risk and protective factors, including gender. This study examined the unique effects of gender on the relationships between some commonly identified risk factors in delinquency research with non-AI populations (school engagement, parent monitoring, non-sexual victimization, and sexual assault) and three categories of illegal behavior: 1) substance use (SU), 2) property crimes and vandalism (PCV), and 3) violent threats and behaviors (VTB) among a national sample of AI youth.

Methods: The current study is a secondary analysis, using multiple regression, of cross-sectional survey data obtained from AI adolescents (N = 3356) who participated in the 2009-2013 wave of a national survey, Drug Use Among Young American Indians: Epidemiology and Prediction, 2001-2006 and 2009-2013.

Results: We found that girls were at increased risk for SU relative to boys. Boys were at increased for engaging in PCV, as well as VTB, relative to girls. Additionally, we found that risk factors (i.e., school disengagement, non-sexual victimization, and sexual assault), representing two important facets of AI youths’ contexts (i.e., school, individual), were associated with AI youths’ reported engagement in all three categories of illegal behavior. Parent monitoring was associated with a decrease in risk for both boys and girls’ engagement in SU, PCV, and VTB. For girls, sexual assault was a gender-specific risk factor for SU. For boys, non-sexual victimization was a gender-specific risk factor for PCV and VTB. Exploratory analyses outcomes suggested that parent monitoring may be an important buffer, for both boys and girls, between school disengagement and youths’ engagement in PCV and VTB.

Conclusions: Gender-specific needs have important implications for prevention efforts. Findings from this study demonstrate unique risk factors associated with AI boys’ and girls’ delinquency risk. Further, these findings underscore the need to further examine gender-specific risk and protective factors associated with AI youths’ risk for delinquency and incorporate them into prevention efforts.