Attitudes towards youth crime, and willingness to intervene: findings from the 2006 Scottish Social Attitudes survey

Citation

Anderson S & Dobbie F (2008) Attitudes towards youth crime, and willingness to intervene: findings from the 2006 Scottish Social Attitudes survey. Scottish Government Social Research: Education and Training. Scottish Government, 2008. http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/8037/1/0055764.pdf

Abstract
This report presents findings from a module of questions included in the 2006 Scottish Social Attitudes survey and revisits a theme first addressed by survey in 2004, namely public attitudes towards young people and youth crime. The module takes as its starting point the idea that the problem of youth crime is not simply about the number of ‘things that happen’ (e.g. the number of windows broken, people threatened or assaulted, cars stolen) but about the way that as individuals and communities we respond to those acts. As such, it sets out to understand better how the relationship between different age groups might fuel or help to defuse the problem of youth crime. In particular, the 2006 module was intended to shed light on adult willingness to intervene in situations in which young people are either posing a risk or are at risk themselves.