Developmental shifts in parent and peer influences on boys' beliefs about delinquent behavior

This paper examines the relative shifts in parent and peer influences on the development of boys' beliefs regarding delinquency from early to middle adolescence. The paper also explores the influence that beliefs about delinquency have on subsequent changes in these social relationships. Structural equation modeling is used to analyze six annual waves of data for 481 boys from the youngest sample of the Pittsburgh Youth Study. Increased parent-adolescent conflict only predicted changes in beliefs about delinquency in early adolescence, while increases in peer delinquency was associated with adopting more tolerant beliefs about delinquent acts from early to middle adolescence. Changes in boys' delinquent peer group association were initially influenced by increased family conflict. However, in middle adolescence increasingly tolerant beliefs about delinquency were related to subsequent increases in delinquent peers. The potential implications for preventing the formation of beliefs favoring delinquency during adolescence are discussed.