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When the Ties That Bind Unwind: Examining the Enduring and Situational Processes of Change Behind the Marriage Effect

NCJ Number
245293
Journal
Criminology Volume: 51 Issue: 2 Dated: February 2013 Pages: 399-433
Author(s)
Bianca E. Bersani; Elaine Eggleston Doherty
Date Published
February 2013
Length
35 pages
Annotation
Despite the continued growth of research demonstrating that marriage promotes desistance from crime, efforts aimed at understanding the mechanisms driving this effect are limited.
Abstract
Several theories propose to explain why one observes a reduction in offending after marriage including identity changes, strengthened attachments, reduced opportunities, and changes to routine activities. Although mechanisms are hard to measure, the authors argue that each proposed mechanism implies a specific change process, that is, whether the change that ensues after marriage is enduring (stable) or situational (temporary). Drawing on a medical model framework, the authors cast the role of marriage as a treatment condition and observe whether the effect of marriage is conditional on staying married or whether the effect persists when the "treatment" is taken away (i.e., divorce). The authors used 13 years of monthly level data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY97), a nationally representative sample containing close to 3,000 individuals with an arrest history, to examine changes in relationship status and arrest from adolescence into young adulthood. Estimates from multilevel within-individual models reveal greater support for situational mechanisms in that divorce is detrimental particularly for those in longer marriages; yet they also reveal important caveats that suggest a closer examination of the marriage effect. This research adds to the growing body of knowledge regarding the marriage effect by redirecting desistance research away from asking if marriage matters to asking how marriage affects desistance. A better understanding of this change process has important implications for criminal justice policy. (Published Abstract)