Premium
Measurement of antisocial behaviour in early adolescence and adolescence: psychometric properties and substantive findings
Author(s) -
Bendixen Mons,
Olweus Dan
Publication year - 1999
Publication title -
criminal behaviour and mental health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.63
H-Index - 54
eISSN - 1471-2857
pISSN - 0957-9664
DOI - 10.1002/cbm.330
Subject(s) - psychology , clinical psychology , developmental psychology
Background/Aims This article describes the development of a new self‐report instrument, the Bergen Questionnaire on Antisocial Behaviour , for the measurement of antisocial behaviour in preadolescence and early adolescence, and presents a number of substantive results derived from a multiple‐cohort, longitudinal study involving 2430 Norwegian students in the 10–16‐year age range. Method/Results Internal consistency analyses showed that individual differences in antisocial behaviour could generally be measured more reliably in boys than in girls, at an earlier age, and with a greater number of scales. The relatively high correlation between the high‐prevalence and low‐prevalence scales indicated that students who took part in more serious antisocial acts were to a much greater extent involved in less serious offences as well. We also found substantial correlations between smoking and use of alcohol and the core antisocial scales, suggesting that such behaviour may represent a kind of norm‐breaking, antisocial behaviour in these age‐groups. Conclusions We concluded that individual differences in antisocial behaviour displayed substantial stability over a one‐year interval (disattenuated Pearson correlation around 0.80) and, to a somewhat lesser degree, for a two‐year interval (disattenuated correlation around 0.60) for boys belonging to the oldest cohort. For girls and for students in the younger age cohorts, the stability was somewhat lower. A set of analyses involving expected sex and age differences, differences between self‐reported arrested and non‐arrested subjects, and correlations with a number of conceptually related variables attested to the construct validity of the key scales included in the questionnaire. In sum, the new questionnaire should be a useful instrument for the study of the development, causes and correlates of antisocial behaviour in relatively young populations. Copyright © 1999 Whurr Publishers Ltd.