Dissertation Defense by Ahmet Eker
Analyzing Patterns of Delinquency In Turkey: A Multilevel Approach
Thursday, March 25, 2010 6:00 AM to 8:00 AM EDT
PWC Bull Run Hall, ADJ Suite, Conference Room 312
Dissertation Director: Dr. David B. Wilson
Committee Members: Dr. Adam Dobrin, Dr. Catherine Gallagher, and Dr. Faye Taxman
Abstract:
Prior research and several leading crime theories showed that early prevention of delinquency is vital to reduce overall crime rates. Understanding patterns of delinquency and mapping out the individual and environmental level factors that cause delinquency is the key to develop appropriate policies to reduce delinquency. Some of these factors that prior empirical studies found are delinquent peers, divorce, migration, violent environment, poverty, and inequality. However, most of these studies were conducted in western countries. Thus, first aim of this dissertation is to find out whether these variables can explain variances in delinquency in Turkey that has different culture. Secondly, Turkish policy-makers, media, and public mostly focus on crimes of children who live on the streets, namely “street children” rather than criminal behaviors of all juvenile crimes. I want to test whether this approach is granted or not. Thirdly, Turkish policy-makers mostly make their preventive policies by using city level variables. This dissertation is interested in testing explanatory power of city level variables to explain delinquency. Finally, this dissertation is interested in understanding general patterns of delinquency in Turkey to develop appropriate policy recommendations. To accomplish these goals, I collected secondary data on characteristics of 27 Turkish cities (city level legal and illegal opportunities) and characteristics of 84.639 juveniles (individual level) that were contacted police in 2005 and 2006 as suspects. Since both city level and individual level variables used in some of the analysis, hierarchical linear model was used where appropriate to avoid ecological fallacy. My results showed that patterns of delinquency in Turkey have both similarities and differences than other western countries. Moreover, some of the factors that were found as causes of delinquency in the U.S. had opposite effect in Turkey. Thus, I conclude that researchers should not assume that all crime causation factors are universal; rather, they should pay attention to cultural differences. Secondly, my result did not support the general tendency of Turkish policy-makers, public, and media by finding that most of the delinquents come from intact families. Therefore, I conclude that they should consider all juveniles while developing crime prevention policies rather than focusing only on the street kids. Finally, my results showed that using city level variables was appropriate to explain the variances in juvenile group crime, but their explanatory power was weak to explain most of the crime types. Consequently, I conclude that Turkish officials should use at least neighborhood level data to be able to develop tailor-made prevention policies.
