Psychological factors affecting juvenile delinquency
Table of Contents
Social psychological factors. 7
Personal psychological factors: 9
Abstract
Compared to the previous year’s crime rate is increasing in India day by day but the more shocking thing among all of it is crime by juveniles has raised too. All sorts of criminal cases are being committed by them whether it is killing or stealing crimes which included sexual activities are common in juveniles these days. The term juvenile refers to human beings or children below the age of 18 years. Juvenile crimes have become the topic of national concern not just in India but worldwide because of the terrible action which we witness in our locality or even now in public places such as parks and schools and other crowded places that leads the focus of the majority of people to the hard punishment for them, on the other hand, there is a very little group of people which are concern about the reason why the children of such young age are committing such crimes and what could by the prevention or what is the required intervention. More or less we all must focus on the psychological factors that are affecting juvenile delinquency rather than passing comments and taking action on what is already. What could go wrong in the life of such a young child that they take such a major step which ruins their life forever that must be the question that should we ask and how to stop it. We may have different opinions among us about the committed crime but one thing that we all are going to agree on is that children are the future of our world and if something is going on with their way of living which is affecting them so much then we must look into the matter. (Nourollah, et al., 2015).
Introduction
In today’s India juvenile crime is a harsh reality. Juvenile is those groups of humans who are not attained a certain age and because of that, they can be punished similarly to normal adult human beings. Although there is a difference between minor and juvenile often most of us get confused between these two may be because of a lack of knowledge in this particular topic, but these two legal terms are used in a different context. For your criminals we use juvenile and the term minor is used for the legal capacity of the majority of people.
And more than that some of the most extreme violence is being committed by juveniles and this is today’s reality whether it is murder or gang rape. It is not like a criminal shows his criminality in an early stage of life. Developing such aggressive behavior and using it as the solution for anything in a child’s life is a complex matter. In most children, delinquency is predictable, and similar antisocial behavior is also one noticeable predictive of adulthood crime, it has been observed several times that such behaviors must not be neglected and small crimes must be taken accordingly to avoid any future issues (in most of the cases child with bad childhood end up in the wrong group of people and start committing illegal or activities that are not allowed as per the law of the country.
Children are gods gift that’s what the majority of us consider and as we are adults, society, guardians, and parents have the responsivity that every child must get a healthy environment to live in and get a better life because the future is dependent on the young ones of today, so it is being expected form children to be respectful, obedient, and do possess some good qualities in them. The current article is about what are the psychological factors that affect juvenile delinquency (psychological factors refer to the social influence by which the personality of someone gets affected in many cases it can limit or even control the ways that someone thinks or the way he reacts.
Meaning and deinisiton
Term juvenile delinquency refers to the kid who gets into activities that are illegal based on the law of the country it could be activity or behavior and in a journal, they belong to the age group of 10 to 18 term delinquency refers to the abnormality in which the indivual is not performing a normal social life and causing trouble in the normal equilibrium).
Psychological factors
As we all know that no one is born a criminal infects no one is want to be one in most cases these are the circumstances that influence such young minds to get into such heinous activities, circumstances include both inside and outside the home and it indeed plays a major role in molding and shaping one’s mind and overall personality. Some major factors are written below:
- bad company, 2. Adolescent influence and instability due to that, 3. Eary experience of sex in life,4. Conflicts that may be rising in mind or mental conflicts,5. Extreme social environment, 6. Adventure of love, 7. Motion picture, 8. Dissatisfaction from school, 9. Poor recreation, 10. Street life, 11. Vocational dissatisfaction, 12. Impulses, and physical conditions of all kinds of).
Although there is still much more to learn about the risk of delinquency, only one thing on which we all will agree is there are multiple reasons behind it.
Among all two major factors in terms of the psychological level that cause juvenile delinquency are (A) social factors, ad (B) personality factors.
Social psychological factors
- Broken homes:
In a study conducted by Uday Shankar in India, it was found that approximately 13 % out of 140 delinquents have came from broken houses. Broken in the sense in which it is broken up because of the death of a parent in some cases both father and mother are dead in such scenarios children oftenly gets misguidd and end up in a terrible situation from where they can’t get back without any external help. Both the parents are important for a child but having a mother plays a more important role than only a father because the way of love and nourishment is different. And in the case of divorce a child sufferes from a serious series of trauma in his life.
We can’t say that a broken home directly affects the individual which can lead to delinquency but it does make the surrowning more favorable for a child to get involved in the wrong activity (Nisar, et al., 2015).
- Poverty:
Lack of money to live a decent life in which children even doesn’t get the proper schooling or a better environment in such conditions more often this child gets into the wrong group of people and which leads them to become delinquent. Or in case in which parents have to work outside for long shifts to earn money and this lead child without proper parenting in some cases, both of the parents have to work and children belonging to scuh family have the high possibilities of getting misxed up in wrong activity it all depends on the surrounding in which they are living (Poduthase, 2012).
- Companions and gangs:
A growing child sometimes gets influenced by the wrong people or in some cases it is because of peer pressure. And it has been shown up in many cases that the companion in which a child is growing up determines his behavior also whether it can be good or bad. In every scenario and further below no one can say that this is the direct reason for a child to get on bad path in life but they are indeed working in a favorable environment for such illegal and wrong activities.
- Beggary:
These children mostly come from the very poor family or the family which is having a bad environment to grow in, most of the time what they need is love and support from the surrownding but oftenly they get betrayal and shattered by it and making them commit something bad which they would never do if have provided right support at right age and time.
Personal psychological factors:
(it includes factors such as mental deficiency and emotional disturbance which also lead to juvenile delinquency)
- Mental deficiency:
A child suffering from any kind of mental problem in which it doesnt possess the ability to distinguish between right and wrong and such children are mostly used by the more mature adults to do their illegal work such children do require special care and protection in which they can grow into a good human being and can live its life accordingly (Owusu, 2016).
- Emotional problem:
Inferiority, superiority complexes, and jealousy are also one of the biggest reasonsfor choosing the wrong path. At such early age in which a child finds it difficult to choose right from wrong again leads to the path of terrible ending not only for him but also for the society and surrounding in which he is living. It has been found that mental troubles are also a strong factor in delinquency. Majorly delinquency is children who don’t get the right love and affection from their parents or they just act as a protest against their treatment.
Thus this concludes that the psychological factors are not only from surrounding but sometimes it is also because of the personal reason that child is having (Wallace, 1996).
Suggestions
In recent time there is a large group of people oh wants that the age for juvenile crime must change from 18 to 16 or 15 because the children of today’s age group have more maturity in comparison to the past 10 or 20 years this is maybe because of the easy excess of knowledge from internet and various social platforms. And on another hand, there is another group of people who believes that society is also responsible for not able to provide the right kind of environment to those who really need it just because in some cases we cant treat each other individual accordingly and there must be a way in which the necessary help could be provided the need.
More or less everyone wants a society in which they can live happily to do so everyone has to take responsibility himself to make a change, children suffering from psychological issues must be handled accordingly to make a future of possibilities because punishment is a temporary solution and knowledge is permanent.
Conclusion
Juveniles committing crimes is not just a problem of any particular area with time it has been seen that worldwide it became a serious issue may be because of changes with time which has different effects on every individual the development in surrounding specially rural areas. On the other hand, the thing that keeps checking against any antisocial avitivities is socio-cultural upheaval effects. Even after implementing all sorts of punishment and helping juvenile deviance is keep on rising with each day, it is a situation that has to be checked or there will be no future for anyone it must be checked.
Having different rules and regulation for serious and any small crimes, everyone who is guilty must be punished by the law but the punishment must be to give him less to let him realize that what he/she has done is wrong and cant be excepted in our society and must be corrected. Crimes such as rape and killing are very serious and cant is just ignored but for a juvenile ther must be the same way of handling things in comparison to a full-fledged adult human being because such crimes cant be just ignored like that. And for small crimes such as theft, smuggling, or any other kind of crime belonging to the same category the accused must be sent to a juvenile center where he can be groomed properly.
References
Nisar, M., Ullah, S., Ali, M., &Alam, S. (2015). Juvenile delinquency: The Influence of family, peer and economic factors on juvenile delinquents. Applied Science Reports, 9(1), 37-48.
Nourollah, M., Fatemeh, M., &Farhad, J. (2015). A study of factors affecting juvenile delinquency. Biomedical and Pharmacology Journal.
Owusu, P. K. (2016). Socio-economic factors affecting juvenile delinquency in Ghana. Western Illinois University.
Poduthase, H. (2012). Parent-adolescent relationship and juvenile delinquency in Kerala, India: A qualitative study(Doctoral dissertation, College of Social Work, University of Utah).
Wallace, A. M. (1996). The psychological and familial factors associated with female juvenile delinquency: Concomitants and contributors. The Ohio State University.