The Relationship of Sociometric Inclusion to Delinquent Behavior in Adolescent Females

Abstract

Maurine Eckloff and James Hullinger (1986) reported the results of some research that ties the social acceptance of females-their sociometric inclusion or lack of inclusion-to later criminal behavior. The two researchers completing this study spent a combined 6 years employed in the state correctional institutions dealing primarily with young females. At a time when correctional institutions are overcrowded, taxpayers are reluctant to· increase funding for such institutions, and society is desperate to find ways of dealing with criminal behavior, this study provides a way of understanding and predicting such behavior and potentially a way to modify it. It is curious that one of the first extensive sociometric studies done by J. L. Moreno and Helen Hall Jennings was at a New York state penal institution for young women.