The two main sources of information on the extent of juvenile delinquency and who is most likely to engage in delinquency are official arrest statistics and self-report questionnaires. Each has strengths and limitations, and they sometimes provide somewhat conflicting pictures of the extent of delinquency and characteristics of delinquents.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation Uniform Crime Report (UCR) provides the most comprehensive data on arrests of juveniles in the United States. The UCR is a compilation of information from law enforcement agencies throughout the country on crimes reported to police and those cleared by arrest. For all arrests, the UCR includes information on the age, race, and gender of the person arrested. By combining this information with U.S. census data on the demographic composition of the population, the UCR can report arrests in a given year as a rate per 100,000 U.S. residents in various demographic categories (e.g., white girls ages 10 to 17).

The UCR is a valuable tool for determining changes in delinquency over time, but it has limitations, particularly in undercounting the true amount of delinquency, because most delinquent acts never result in any report to police, let alone lead to an arrest. Especially under-represented in the data are status offenses, the most common type of delinquency. Also skewing the data is the fact that youths living in different communities are subject to greatly varying levels of policing, and police often exercise discretion in deciding whether to arrest a delinquent youth or handle the matter informally without making an arrest. Another UCR limitation is that it reports only a few demographic characteristics of arrestees, thereby limiting its usefulness for understanding the causes of delinquency.

Self-report surveys use either self-administered questionnaires or interviews in which respondents are asked to report on their own delinquent behavior. These surveys can also ask respondents about various characteristics and life experiences that may be correlated with their delinquency. Self-report studies, especially longitudinal studies studying the same youth on multiple occasions throughout their childhood and adolescence, are useful for learning about delinquency causes. Conducted on representative samples of U.S. youth and repeated over time, the self-report studies can suggest prevalence of various types of delinquency and assess trends in delinquent involvement. Two widely cited nationally representative survey studies are the Monitoring the Future study of eighth-grade students and high school seniors, and the National Household Survey on Drug Use and Health sample of youth ages 12 to 17. These surveys chiefly concern tobacco, alcohol, and drug use, but they also include questions about other common forms of delinquency.

The major strengths of self-report studies are that they allow estimates of delinquent behavior that do not involve police reports or arrests, and they allow researchers to understand the causes of delinquency. These advantages overcome some of the limitations of arrest data. Self-report studies, however, have their own shortcomings and limitations. Self-report studies rely on the accurate recall and honest report of behavior that respondents may rather not remember or disclose. On the other hand, some respondents may falsely report engaging in delinquent acts not actually committed. Young adolescents, it turns out, are most likely to falsely report delinquency, so researchers have developed a number of techniques for evaluating the reliability and validity of self-reported delinquency. Safeguards include asking respondents whether they ever used a fictitious drug (e.g., "bindro"). Self-reports tend to be more accurate when respondents believe their responses will be anonymous or confidential.

Despite the limitations of both arrest data and self-report studies, their complementary strengths and consistent findings across methodologies allow for reasonably reliable conclusions about the extent, trends, and causes of delinquency.

References:

1) Agnew, Robert. 2004. Juvenile Delinquency: Causes and Control. Los Angeles: Roxbury.

2) Snyder, Howard N. and Melissa Sickmund. 2006. Juvenile Offenders and Victims: 2006 National Report. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

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