Routine activities and adolescent deviance across 28 cultures

Purpose: The current study tested the links between routine activities and deviance across twenty-eight countries, thus, the potential generalizability of the routine activities framework. Methods: Data were collected as part of the Second International Self-Report Delinquency Study (ISRD-2) from 28 cultures, from seventh, eighth, and ninth grade adolescents (N = 66,859). Routine activities were operationalized as family, peer, solitary, and community activities. Country-level predictors included unemployment rate, prison population, life expectancy, and educational attainment. Results: Three-level, hierarchical linear modeling (individual, school, and country) was used to test both individual and country-level effects on deviance. Findings supported predictions by the routine activities framework, where routine activities explained 3.1% unique variance in deviance, above and beyond effects by background variables as well as low self-control. Models showed that the effects of family activities, solitary activities, and peer activities were stronger in countries with higher life expectancies. In addition, mean educational attainment increased the effect of solitary activities on deviance, while the effect of family activities on deviance was lower in countries with higher levels of unemployment. Conclusions: The routine activities framework generalized across these 28 countries in how it explains deviance; some unique country-level effects were found that conditioned person-context links.