Developmental Trajectories and Predictors of Juvenile Detention, Placement, and Jail Among Youth with Out-of-Home Child Welfare Placement

• DOI: 10.1086/676520
• Publication Date: 2014-04-24T20:16:16Z
• Authors: Karen M. Kolivoski; Jeffrey J. Shook; Sara Goodkind; Kevin H. Kim
• Keywords: 05 social sciences; 1. No poverty; 0501 psychology and cognitive sciences; 16. Peace & justice

AbstractYouth who experience out-of-home placement in the child welfare system are more likely to have justice system involvement. However, research has yet to fully address the underlying heterogeneity of trajectories and trajectory groups regarding substantial justice system involvement within this population. Using administrative data from a child welfare placement sample of 794 children and youth in a large, urban county in Pennsylvania, this longitudinal study seeks to identify trajectory groups and their predictors as related to juvenile detention, placement, and county jail involvement. Five groups were identified and labeled as follows: (a) No/Low-Involved (70.7%), (b) Early Age Involvement (5.9%), (c) Late Adolescent/Adult Involvement (7.9%), (d) Short-Term/Highly Involved (7.8%), and (e) Chronically Involved (7.7%). We present descriptive profiles of these groups to highlight their differences. We then use multinomial logistic regression to examine predictors reflecting demographics, child welfa...