Taking a sociological approach, this text discusses delinquency as it relates to and emerges from the youth's family, neighborhood, school, peer group, social class, and overall cultural and social environment.

The authors incorporate contributions from sociologists, psychologists, social workers, criminologists, and other specialists who have sought to understand, explain, control, and prevent juvenile delinquency.

An up to date, comprehensive, and in depth study of juvenile delinquency a major social problem in the United States.

Features :

Teaches students the ways to understand, explain, control, and prevent juvenile delinquency:

-Through comprehensive coverage of conformity, deviance, causes of delinquency, social control, the juvenile justice system, and the application of abstract theories to concrete strategies for dealing with delinquency.

-Cross-cultural focus on juvenile delinquency in other nations such as England, Australia, Israel, Russia, selected countries of South America, and Africa gives a point of comparison for students in the United States.

-Extensive coverage of explanatory theories and the application of those theories to treatment strategies of juvenile delinquency.

Exposes students to the latest scholarship and research on juvenile delinquency:

-Up-to-date scholarship combined with a student-friendly writing style enhances the learning experience.

-Coverage of current and controversial topics such as adolescent marginality, community policing, gun control, hate crimes, increase in female delinquency, the impact of TV violence, boot camps, capital punishment for juveniles, and the legal age of majority.

-Reports and analyses of contemporary school shootings and other violent youth behavior, throughout the text, provide theoretical explanations of cause and suggest preventative measures. The etiology of this phenomenon will be expanded.

-Coverage of thelatest concepts and theories derived from ongoing research by outstanding scholars from multiple disciplines as well as suggestions and examples for applying these theories to treatment and prevention.

-Chapter 8 covers contemporary integrative and feminist theories of delinquency as well as prospects for future and contemporary theory building. Unique among juvenile delinquency texts, this chapter ties together the major theoretical contributions of the past and focuses the reader on the future.

        William E. Thompson was born and raised in Tulsa, Oklahoma and was the first member of his family to receive a high school diploma.  He received his bachelor’s degree from Northeastern State University, a master’s degree from Missouri State University, and earned his Ph.D. in sociology from Oklahoma State University.  Thompson has authored and coauthored more than fifty articles published in professional journals, including dozens reprinted in textbooks and anthologies.  He is the coauthor of Society in Focus:  An Introduction to Sociology (now in its 7^th edition), one of the leading textbooks in introductory sociology courses, and Juvenile Delinquency:  A Sociological Approach (in its 8^th edition), a leading textbook in the area of delinquency studies.  He also has coauthored an anthology on classic and contemporary readings in juvenile delinquency, a small treatise on sociology and mass media, and is the author of The Glass House, a life-story of his mother’s courageous battle with cancer.