Limitations and Future Research

Generalizability issues can be divided into three categories: research design, sample demographics, and international variations in sentencing practices. Beginning with research design issues, like Chapter Five, the current study was limited by the duration of the follow-up period. For many of these offenders, their criminal careers are still incomplete. For example, the low level persistent trajectory may appear to be a much more serious incarceration trajectory compared to the EOFD incarceration trajectory if the study continued to measure incarceration into middle adulthood. Further, although the selection of a sample of incarcerated adolescent offenders helped address issues associated with prior trajectory studies in terms of low base rates of serious offenders (e.g., Sampson & Laub, 2003), the use of this sample precluded the identification of an ‘adult-onset’ incarceration trajectory. Creating incarceration trajectories as opposed to accounting for exposure time within Proc TRAJ may be unnecessary for non-offender samples given that the magnitude of the effect of exposure time on offending trajectories is weaker in community-based samples (e.g., Wiesner & Capaldi, 2003). At the same time,

34 _{Given the short term but not long term impact of incarceration on unemployment demonstrated}

by van der Geest et al. (2016), for offenders who have been employed and spend less time in custody, their incarceration may simply temporarily disconnect them from informal social controls.

the type of offender sample used in the current study was necessary for addressing certain theoretical perspectives, especially desistance theories (see Chapter Five).

The demographic characteristics of the sample may also impact generalizability. The current study was conducted in British Columbia, Canada and therefore the percentage of Aboriginal offenders was dissimilar from incarcerated adolescent offenders in the United States (e.g., Teplin et al., 2013). However, the over-representation of Aboriginal offenders in Canada is not dissimilar to the over-representation of African American and Hispanic offenders in the United States (Teplin et al., 2013). The over- representation of Aboriginal youth may still be generalizable to some jurisdictions in the United States, such as Alaska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Montana, where Native Americans account for 29–42% of all youth in custody (Cross, 2008). Looking beyond North America, the over-representation of Aboriginal offenders is also typical within other jurisdictions such as Australia (Blagg, 1997) and New Zealand (e.g., Fergusson, Horwood, & Swain-Campbell, 2003). As well, although both males and females were included in the study, the findings may be male-specific. There is a long history in criminology that involves either excluding females from sampling strategies, or simply treating gender as a control variable. Greater attention to within-group differences in female offending patterns and associated risk/protective factors is needed (Odgers et al., 2007). This may require examining offending trajectories specifically for female offenders.

The duration of incarceration associated with the trajectories in the current study must be reflected upon with consideration of how macro and micro-level explanations for jurisdictional variations in sentencing policies may affect study generalizability. At the macro-level, consideration must be given to how Canadian sentencing policies might differ from those in other jurisdictions. For example, Blokland et al. (2005) mentioned that lengths of incarceration in the Netherlands were substantively shorter compared to the United States. Sentence lengths is Kyvsgaard’s (2003) examination of offending severity also appeared to be more similar to those in the Netherlands compared to those in the United States. Andrews and Bonta (2010) noted that Canada’s sentencing philosophy, although formally acknowledging the importance of rehabilitation, was moving more towards the United States’ tough-on-crime approach. As such, a replication of this study within a sample of offenders from the Netherlands or Scandinavian countries may find

trajectories associated with less time incarcerated whereas replications in the United States may find trajectories associated with greater time incarcerated. At the micro-level, consideration must be given to how racial and other prejudices affect sentence severity (Kleck, 1981; Sampson & Laub, 1993)35_{, and what this means for the assumption that}

offenders spending more time in custody are more serious offenders. There was no evidence in the current study that minority status was associated with more punitive sentences, but research in the United States reflects a different conclusion (e.g., Kleck, 1981). Racial prejudices will increase the likelihood of Type II error when studying the relationship between theoretically-informed risk factors and offending severity measured via incarceration.

Measurement of Psychopathy

By using a three factor model to assess the relationship between symptoms of psychopathy and incarceration trajectories, the current study was able to avoid tautological issues associated with the use of delinquent, criminal, and antisocial behavior to score the PCL:YV (e.g., Cooke, Michie, Hart, & Clark, 2004; Dawson, McCuish, Hart, & Corrado, 2012). However, concerns remain about whether the PCL:YV adequately captures the interpersonal and affective deficits associated with the psychopathy construct. Very importantly, as Cooke et al. (2012) discussed, the PCL:YV cannot be equated with the psychopathy construct. As such, the lack of a relationship between interpersonal and affective deficits and a more serious incarceration trajectory may have been moreseo a product of the limitations of the PCL:YV’s ability to measure psychopathy as opposed to the fact that these dimensions of psychopathy are not related to involvement in serious offending. This concern can be addressed in future research by examining other psychopathy instruments, such as the Comprehensive Assessment of Psychopathic Personality (CAPP). The CAPP was developed with the intention of better capturing personality symptoms of psychopathy (Cooke et al., 2004). Sandvik et al. (2012) demonstrated that the CAPP more strongly emphasized affective symptoms of psychopathy compared to the PCL-R.

35 _{This is discussed as a micro-level problem because sentences are ultimately determined by an}

individual or small group of individuals. It is not being argued here that racial prejudice is solely explained at the micro-level.

Capturing the Severity of an Offender’s Criminal Career

Researchers should consider using joint trajectory modeling in future studies to examine, simultaneously, an individual’s trajectory of both incarceration and general convictions (see Brame, Mulvey, & Piquero, 2001 for an example). Compared to the examination of offending severity and offending frequency shown in Table 6.6, joint trajectory modeling may be a more nuanced method of examining the extent to which individuals incarcerated for lengthy periods of time are also more frequent offenders, more serious offenders, or both. As an alternative to using incarceration time to directly measure offense severity, future research could identify the average sentence length for a variety of different offense categories (e.g., Kyvsgaard, 2003). This would allow offenses to be ranked on a scale of increasing severity. In turn, escalation in an offender’s trajectory could be captured where, instead of frequency, yearly outcomes would be defined by an offender’s most serious offense. Thus, using SPGM, trajectories could be evaluated in terms of which individuals showed escalation in their criminal career through adolescence, which individuals committed serious offenses across adolescence and adulthood, and which individuals remained involved in non-serious offenses. For such an analysis, it will be necessary to ensure substantial variation in the range of severity scores in order to accurately capture escalation in an offender’s trajectory. To ensure objectivity in rankings of offending severity, researchers should consult the relevant case law and criminal code legislation. For example, although violent offenses are generally viewed as more serious than property offenses, minor assault may be viewed by the courts as a less serious offense compared to theft of a motor vehicle.

SPGM was considered appropriate for the modeling of incarceration trajectories despite challenges finding the appropriate method in Proc TRAJ for modeling the distribution of months incarcerated over age. The gravity of the limitation of this approach should not be decided upon without first giving consideration to the intent behind the analysis. The intention in this chapter was not to describe the process of incarceration, it was to use incarceration as a proxy for offending severity. As many have previously warned, the trajectories observed here should not be reified (e.g., Nagin & Tremblay, 2005). Rather, SPGM was simply a tool used to help make sense of differences in the severity of criminal careers and as a way to deal with the elusive challenge of incorporating exposure time into Proc TRAJ analyses.

Conclusion

Instead of artificially inflating the degree of exposure time that offenders experienced, which is a typical necessity for studies controlling for exposure time within offender samples (e.g., van der Geest et al., 2009), the current study used incarceration time as the outcome of interest. This approach had the dual benefit of addressing limitations in prior research while also providing an indication of the severity of an offender’s criminal career. Modeling offense severity was missing from prior trajectory analyses, which almost exclusively focused on general offending (Piquero, 2008). By capturing offense severity, the current study contributed to the extant literature by demonstrating that: (1) symptoms of psychopathy were associated with a more serious offending trajectory (interpreted via length of incarceration), and (2) offenders associated with the most serious offending trajectory were not necessarily the most frequent offenders. This latter point supports the conclusion that it is difficult to identify chronic life course persistent offenders because eventually these offenders will receive lengthy custodial sentences that prohibit their involvement in additional crimes. From a desistance theory perspective, attention should be given to the manner in which time incarcerated weakens existing forms of informal social control (e.g., connections to family) or functions to make obtaining informal social controls (e.g., employment) more difficult. Attention should also be given to van der Geest et al.’s (2016) finding that incarceration will only impact employment for offenders with employable skills who are associated with a less serious offending pattern. As such, desistance theories need to be wary of one-size-fits- all policy solutions. For some offenders, consideration should be given to how incarceration will negatively influence their likelihood of employment. For other offenders, consideration should be given to providing treatment/intervention to improve offender deficits that were initially preventing employment and then developing programs that help these offenders establish employable skills.