Gender-specific trajectories of offending from adolescence until age 40 among individuals with experience of out-of-home care: A national cohort study

Abstract

It is well-known that experiences of out-of-home care (OHC; foster-family care and residential care) are linked to criminal behavior. Less is known how criminal activity in the OHC population develops over the life course and to what extent such development is characterized by desistance or persistence. Using population-based longitudinal register data for more than 740,000 Swedish men and women, of which around 2.5% have experience of OHC, followed until age 40, results from group-based trajectory modelling and multinomial regression suggest that OHC-experienced individuals with various timing and duration of placement, especially men first placed as teenagers, have substantially elevated likelihood for persistent offending compared to peers without OHC experience. However, most OHC-experienced followed pathways characterized by desistance. Our findings have implications for understanding the dynamics of offending in OHC populations and underscores the necessity for interventions that can prevent the onset of criminal careers, as well as disrupt or modify the ongoing paths of offending within this disadvantaged group of individuals.