The Relationship Between Supportive Friendships, Conflictual Friendships, and Deviance During Emerging Adulthood

As deviant behavior is increasing during emerging adulthood and friends are a driving force behind deviance, the goal of this study is to explore the relationships between friend support, conflict, and crime. Using a large sample of friendship pairs and developmental interpretations of social control and differential association theories, a series of mixed models are estimated, which investigate the roles of support, conflict, and peer deviance on an individual's self-reported property crime. Results demonstrate that high levels of support and conflict relate to less offending in both independent and interdependent ways. However, neither social control nor differential association can provide a clear explanation to these findings, even though support and conflict clearly seem important for offending during emerging adulthood.