| dc.description.abstract | In the year 2017, it has appeared that adolescents between the ages of 12 to 15 years old make up almost a third of all registered suspects of criminal offences in the Netherlands. I find it interesting to discover what causes this peak of crime in adolescence. Therefore I am testing, based on the general theory of crime and social bonds theory, whether socials bonds mediate the relationship between self-control and delinquency, or whether this relationship appears to be spurious. To test for this relationship, a binary logistic regression was used for the direct effects, and Sobel’s test was used to test for the mediation effect. Furthermore, I controlled every relationship for sex, educational level and peer delinquency. I found a significant mediation effect, where self-control affects social bonds, and social bonds affect one’s delinquency. After adding the control variables, the effect became smaller, yet remained significant. | |
