Living with persistent poverty and/or parental mental illness throughout childhood may double the risk of carrying and/or using a weapon and getting on the wrong side of the law by the age of 17, suggests research published online in the Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health. These factors may account for nearly 1 in 3 cases of weapon use or carriage and more than a quarter of all police contact among 17 year olds, nationwide, estimate the researchers. Youth crime and violence are common around the world, they note.
In England and Wales, for example, around 104,400 first-time offenders were recorded in the criminal justice system in 2020, with 11% of them aged between 10 and 17. As risk factors tend to cluster, the researchers set out to assess the extent to which early life exposure to poverty and family adversities might be associated with involvement in youth violence, crime, and contact with the justice system. They drew on long term data from the representative UK Millennium Cohort Study for 9316 children whose exposure to family adversities and household poverty had been reported from birth to the age of 14.
When they were 17 the teens were asked, via questionnaire, if they had carried or used a weapon, such as a knife, and/or had been in contact with the police, to include being stopped and questioned, given a formal warning or caution, or being arrested. The overall prevalence of weapon use/carriage was just over 6%, while that of police contact was 20%. Analysis.
