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Author: Apel, Robert John
Resulting in 7 citations.
1. Apel, Robert John
Disentangling Selection from Causation in the Empirical Association Between Crime and Adolescent Work
Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Maryland - College Park, 2004. DAI-A 65/07, p. 2774, Jan 2005
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT)
Keyword(s): Child Labor; Crime; Employment, In-School; Heterogeneity; High School; Modeling, Fixed Effects; Substance Use; Variables, Independent - Covariate; Work Hours/Schedule

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Researchers consistently find that youths who work longer hours during high school tend to have higher rates of crime and substance use. On the basis of this and other research showing the negative developmental impact of an "intensive" work commitment during high school, the National Research Council (1998) recommended that federal lawmakers place limits on the maximum number of hours per week that teenagers are allowed to work during the school year. However, recent empirical research demonstrates the possibility of severe bias due to failure to control for unobserved sources of heterogeneity. I take advantage of two unique characteristics of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 to assess the veracity of the claim that longer work hours are causally related to elevated involvement in crime and substance use. First, since the same respondents are followed over a period of five years, I use individual fixed effects to adjust for the omission of relevant time-stable covariates. Second, I exploit state-to-state variation in the restrictiveness of child labor laws governing the number of hours per week allowed during the school year, and the fact that these restrictions are relaxed (and eventually expire) with increasing age. In this model—based on a fixed-effects instrumental variables (FEIV) estimator—identification of the "work intensity effect" on problem behavior is predicated on exogenous within-individual variation in school-year work hours attributable to the easing of child labor restrictions as youths age out of their legal status as minors. The attractiveness of the FEIV estimator is its ability to eliminate bias in the estimated "work intensity effect" due to omitted stable and dynamic variables. The model thus provides an especially powerful test of the thesis that intensive employment during the school year causally aggravates involvement in problem behavior. The empirical results demonstrate that longer work hours are associated with a significant decrease in adolescent crime, contrary to virtually all prior research. The results for adolescent substance use are mixed, suggesting the possibility that longer work hours either increase or have no effect on substance use, depending on whether a fixed-effects or first-differences procedure is implemented.
Bibliography Citation
Apel, Robert John. Disentangling Selection from Causation in the Empirical Association Between Crime and Adolescent Work. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Maryland - College Park, 2004. DAI-A 65/07, p. 2774, Jan 2005.
2. Apel, Robert John
Bushway, Shawn D.
Brame, Robert
Haviland, Amelia
Nagin, Daniel S.
Paternoster, Raymond
Unpacking the Relationship Between Adolescent Employment and Antisocial Behavior: A Matched Samples Comparison
Criminology 45,1 (February 2007): 67-97.
Also: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2007.00072.x/abstract
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: American Society of Criminology
Keyword(s): Behavior, Antisocial; Behavioral Problems; Crime; Employment, In-School; Employment, Part-Time; Substance Use

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

This study reexamines the consistent linkage between first-time employment at age 16 during the school year and problem behaviors. Group-based trajectory modeling is used to stratify youths based on their developmental history of crime and substance abuse. Data (N = 1,185) were taken from the first five waves of the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. Contrary to most prior research, results revealed no overall effect of working on either criminal behavior or substance abuse. There is some indication, however, that work may have a salutary effect on these behaviors for some individuals who had followed trajectories of heightened criminal activity or substance abuse prior to their first-time employment.
Bibliography Citation
Apel, Robert John, Shawn D. Bushway, Robert Brame, Amelia Haviland, Daniel S. Nagin and Raymond Paternoster. "Unpacking the Relationship Between Adolescent Employment and Antisocial Behavior: A Matched Samples Comparison." Criminology 45,1 (February 2007): 67-97.
3. Apel, Robert John
Bushway, Shawn D.
Paternoster, Raymond
Brame, Robert
Sweeten, Gary
Using State Child Labor Laws to Identify the Causal Effect of Youth Employment on Deviant Behavior and Academic Achievement
Journal of Quantitative Criminology 24,4 (December 2008): 337-362
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: Kluwer Academic Publishers
Keyword(s): Academic Development; Adolescent Behavior; Behavior, Antisocial; Child Labor; Crime; Delinquency/Gang Activity; Deviance; High School Dropouts; Legislation; Work Hours/Schedule

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

On the basis of prior research findings that employed youth, and especially intensively employed youth, have higher rates of delinquent behavior and lower academic achievement, scholars have called for limits on the maximum number of hours per week that teenagers are allowed to work. We use the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 to assess the claim that employment and work hours are causally related to adolescent problem behavior. We utilize a change model with age-graded child labor laws governing the number of hours per week allowed during the school year as instrumental variables. We find that these work laws lead to additional number of hours worked by youth, which then lead to increased high school dropout but decreased delinquency. Although counterintuitive, this result is consistent with existing evidence about the effect of employment on crime for adults and the impact of dropout on youth crime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Quantitative Criminology is the property of Springer Science & Business Media B.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts)

Bibliography Citation
Apel, Robert John, Shawn D. Bushway, Raymond Paternoster, Robert Brame and Gary Sweeten. "Using State Child Labor Laws to Identify the Causal Effect of Youth Employment on Deviant Behavior and Academic Achievement." Journal of Quantitative Criminology 24,4 (December 2008): 337-362.
4. Apel, Robert John
Kaukinen, Catherine
On the Relationship Between Family Structure and Antisocial Behavior: Parental Cohabitation and Blended Households
Criminology 46,1 (February 2008): 35-70.
Also: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2008.00107.x/abstract
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: American Society of Criminology
Keyword(s): Behavior, Antisocial; Cohabitation; Delinquency/Gang Activity; Family Formation; Family Structure; Heterogeneity; Household Composition; Parents, Non-Custodial

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

In the last several decades, the American family has undergone considerable change, with less than half of all adolescents residing with two married biological parents. Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997, we construct an elaborate measure of family structure and find considerable heterogeneity in the risk of antisocial and delinquent behavior among groups of youth who reside in what are traditionally dichotomized as intact and nonintact families. In particular, we find that youth in "intact" families differ in important ways depending on whether the two biological parents are married or cohabiting and on whether they have children from a previous relationship. In addition, we find that youth who reside with a single biological parent who cohabits with a nonbiological partner exhibit an unusually high rate of antisocial behavior, especially if the custodial parent is the biological father. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Criminology is the property of Blackwell Publishing Limited and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract.

Bibliography Citation
Apel, Robert John and Catherine Kaukinen. "On the Relationship Between Family Structure and Antisocial Behavior: Parental Cohabitation and Blended Households." Criminology 46,1 (February 2008): 35-70.
5. Apel, Robert John
Paternoster, Raymond
Bushway, Shawn D.
Brame, Robert
A Job Isn't Just a Job: The Differential Impact of Formal Versus Informal Work on Adolescent Problem Behavior
Crime and Delinquency 52,2 (April 2006): 333-69.
Also: http://cad.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/52/2/333
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: National Council on Crime and Delinquency
Keyword(s): Adolescent Behavior; Behavioral Problems; Child Labor; Delinquency/Gang Activity; Employment, Youth; Job Patterns; Substance Use

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

Research consistently demonstrates a positive correlation between hours of employment and problem behavior for adolescents. In response, the National Research Council (1998) proposed limits on youth work involvement, and its recommendation forms the basis for proposed legislation to amend federal child labor provisions. An unanticipated consequence may be to increase the amount of time that youths spend in the informal labor market because child labor laws only govern youth employment in the formal labor market. In this article, the authors attempt to address this policy implication and fill a gap in the extant literature by examining the impact of both formal and informal employment on delinquency and substance use. Because work patterns tend to be very different by gender and race or ethnicity, the authors estimate separate models for these subgroups. The authors use longitudinal data to deal with the possibility that there are unobserved differences between those that work and those that do not.
Bibliography Citation
Apel, Robert John, Raymond Paternoster, Shawn D. Bushway and Robert Brame. "A Job Isn't Just a Job: The Differential Impact of Formal Versus Informal Work on Adolescent Problem Behavior." Crime and Delinquency 52,2 (April 2006): 333-69.
6. Paternoster, Raymond
Bushway, Shawn D.
Brame, Robert
Apel, Robert John
The Effect of Teenage Employment on Delinquency and Problem Behaviors
Social Forces 82,1 (September 2003): 297-336.
Also: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3598147
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Keyword(s): Alcohol Use; Behavior, Antisocial; Behavioral Problems; Cigarette Use (see Smoking); Crime; Delinquency/Gang Activity; Drug Use; Employment, In-School; High School Students; Modeling, Fixed Effects; Variables, Independent - Covariate

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

What happens to high school youths when they take on jobs during the school year, sometimes working long hours, while trying to maintain the role of student? There is a consensus in the empirical literature that teenage employment, particularly what is termed "intensive" employment, results in a constellation of detrimental consequences: lower school grades, diminished educational ambitions, and emotional alienation from parents. There is even more consensus that work and intensive work puts youths at great risk of committing delinquent acts and other problem behaviors such as smoking cigarettes, drinking alcohol, and using marijuana and other drugs. In our view, the conclusion that either work or intensive work has a harmful net effect on youths is based on a thin empirical base. The problem is that previous empirical work has not adequately addressed the issue of possible selection effects. In this article, we reexamine the relationship between intensive employment and delinquency and problem behaviors using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth (NLSY). We conduct two general types of analysis. First, we conduct what we term a traditional analysis wherein we employ observed covariates to capture the selection process. Here we find the same positive relationship between intensive employment and antisocial behavior that others before us have. Second, we conduct both a random and a fixed-effect analysis where we adjust for both observed and unobserved sources of population heterogeneity. In this second analysis, we find that the positive association between work and antisocial behavior observed in the traditional analysis disappears. We discuss the implications of these results both for analyses of the relationship between work and crime in general and for criminological theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
Bibliography Citation
Paternoster, Raymond, Shawn D. Bushway, Robert Brame and Robert John Apel. "The Effect of Teenage Employment on Delinquency and Problem Behaviors." Social Forces 82,1 (September 2003): 297-336.
7. Sweeten, Gary
Apel, Robert John
Incapacitation: Revisiting an Old Question with a New Method and New Data
Journal of Quantitative Criminology 23,4 (December 2007): 303-326.
Also: http://www.springerlink.com/content/a260178u063702lx/
Cohort(s): NLSY97
Publisher: Kluwer Academic Publishers
Keyword(s): Crime; Incarceration/Jail; Propensity Scores

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

We use the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 to obtain estimates of the number of crimes avoided through incapacitation of individual offenders. Incarcerated individuals are matched to comparable non-incarcerated counterparts using propensity score matching. Propensity scores for incarceration are calculated using a wide variety of time-stable and time-varying confounding variables. We separately analyze juvenile (age 16 or 17) and adult (age 18 or 19) incapacitation effects. Our best estimate is that between 6.2 and 14.1 offenses are prevented per year of juvenile incarceration, and 4.9 to 8.4 offenses are prevented per year of adult incarceration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Journal of Quantitative Criminology is the property of Springer Science & Business Media B.V. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts)

Bibliography Citation
Sweeten, Gary and Robert John Apel. "Incapacitation: Revisiting an Old Question with a New Method and New Data." Journal of Quantitative Criminology 23,4 (December 2007): 303-326.