Includes bibliographical references (pages 569-578) and index

pt. 1. Characteristics of juvenile delinquency -- 1. The nature and extent of delinquency -- The differential treatment of juvenile and adult offenders -- The status offender -- The extent of delinquency : statistical trends -- 2. The juvenile court -- Social perceptions -- Self-concept -- The juvenile court system -- The court process -- "Get tough" diversion : from juvenile to adult court -- The juvenile court, due process, and the adversarial legal system -- The adversarial versus the inquisitorial court approach -- 3. Delinquent personality types -- The socialized delinquent -- The neurotic delinquent -- The psychotic delinquent -- The sociopathic delinquent -- 4. Social class and delinquency -- Theory and research -- Lower-class culture as a generator of delinquency -- Self-reporting studies, social class, and delinquency -- Some explanations of middle-class delinquency -- Class differences and delinquency : two portraits -- pt. 2. The juvenile in a violent society -- 5. Violence against children and its impact on their delinquent behavior -- The sociocultural climate of violence in American society -- The mass media impact of juvenile violence : research findings -- Child abuse, the exploitation of children, and juvenile delinquency -- The impacts of child abuse : runaways, suicidal tendencies, and youth violence -- Summary -- 6. Patterns of delinquency violence -- "Normal" juvenile violence -- School murders -- The impact of guns on delinquent violence -- Vandalism as violence -- The rise and impact of "senseless violence" -- A paradigm of patterns of violence -- pt. 3. The gang problem -- 7. The contemporary gang problem -- Types of gangs -- Violent Black and Chicano gangs, in and out of prison -- Gangsters and gangs in prison -- A common bond : the macho syndrome and the machismo characteristic of gangsters -- 8. Theoretical viewpoints on gangs -- Major theorists -- The violent gang as a near-group -- Research issues in the development of gang theory -- What is a gang? -- Gang structure : the gang as a near-group -- Factors that define the violent group as a near-group

pt. 4. Substance abuse -- 9. Growing up in a substance-abusing society -- Juvenile substance abuse -- Defining the substance abuser -- Patterns and trends in substance abuse by delinquents -- The sociocultural context of substance abuse by delinquents -- The effects of quasi-legal substance abuse -- Female substance abuse and delinquency -- 10. Drugs used, their impact, and treatment issues -- Alcohol -- Marijuana -- Hallucinogenic drugs -- PCP : "angel dust" -- Heroin -- Cocaine -- Treatment approaches for juvenile substance abusers -- Basic issues to be confronted in the treatment of juvenile substance abusers -- pt. 5. The causes of crime and delinquency -- 11. The family and the socialization process -- Family impacts on delinquency -- The socialization process -- Criminogenic families and delinquency -- Research on the family and delinquency -- 12. Early theories of crime and delinquency causation and their contemporary development -- Religion and demonology -- Crime and punishment, the classical school of criminology -- The "born criminal" theory, physiological explanations -- The psychoanalytic view -- Reinforcement theory -- Economic determinism -- Radical Marxist theories -- Cultural conflict theories -- George Vold on group conflict theory -- Capitalism, feminism, and delinquency -- 13. Sociological causation theories -- Emile Durkheim on crime and delinquency -- Robert Merton on anomie and delinquency -- Richard Cloward and Lloyd Ohlin on anomie and delinquency -- Strain theory : Ronald Akers and Robert Agnew -- Albert Cohen : delinquent subcultures and delinquency -- William Kvaraceus and Walter Miller on the subculture of delinquency -- Herbert Bloch and Arthur Neiderhoffer : the adolescent striving for adulthood -- Donald R. Taft and Ralph England on the sociocultural forces that cause delinquency -- Milton Barron on American culture and the criminogenic society -- Walter Reckless on containment theory -- Labeling theory and its impact on delinquency -- Edwin Sutherland and Donald Cressey : differential association theory -- Ronald Akers' social learning theory -- Travis Hirschi : social bonding -- Clarence R. Jeffery : social alienation and criminality -- The Yablonsky causation theory : a social-psychological view -- Application of theory to treatment approaches

pt. 6. The prevention, treatment, and control of delinquency -- 14. Community treatment programs for delinquents -- Community child guidance and area programs for delinquency prevention -- The adult-youth association -- The role of local citizen leaders in community projects : two examples -- The detached gang worker approach -- Halfway houses and community treatment -- Probation and parole -- 15. Custodial institutions for delinquents -- Short-term detention institutions -- Detention camps -- Boot camps -- Long-term custodial institutions -- Evaluations of custodial institutions -- Community-based mental hospitals for juveniles : a new direction -- 16. Treatment methods and strategies utilized in community prevention projects and custodial institutions -- Individual counseling and therapy -- Reality therapy -- Group therapy -- Guided group interaction -- Transactional analysis -- The encounter group process for treating drug abusers -- Psychodrama and role training -- pt. 7. Therapeutic communities : an innovative method for the prevention and control of juvenile delinquency -- 17. The history, methodology, and development of the therapeutic community approach -- Therapeutic communities for socializing delinquents -- Group methods utilized in a therapeutic community -- An analysis of the therapeutic community methodology by an ex-addict : Zev Putterman -- 18. The therapeutic community, the experience therapist, and social systems for treating the delinquency problem -- Transformation from gangster to experience therapist -- The experience therapist's role in the creation and administration of therapeutic communities -- The social structure of the therapeutic community -- A summary of the differences between the social structure of TCs and traditional correctional institutions -- The social vaccine concept in treating the delinquency problem -- Appendix. Juvenile delinquency arrest statistics, 1997