Pathways from Neighborhood Factors to Adult Criminality: Intervening Roles of Neighborhood Disorder, Juvenile...

The relationships between neighborhood characteristics, like disadvantage and collective efficacy, and criminal behavior are complex, with few studies examining their longitudinal interplay over the course of adolescence to adulthood. The present study investigated direct, indirect, and interactive effects of neighborhood disadvantage and collective efficacy in adolescence on adult violent and non-violent criminal behaviors (age 16-29), using data from three waves of the Healthy Passages study (N = 663). We tested indirect pathways through adolescent delinquency, exposure to neighborhood violence, and perceived neighborhood disorder. Neither neighborhood disadvantage nor collective efficacy directly predicted adult violent or non-violent criminal behaviors. Results indicated that neighborhood disadvantage was associated with higher adolescent exposure to neighborhood violence and greater perceptions of neighborhood disorder, but not with adolescent delinquency. However, an indirect effect emerged, with neighborhood disadvantage related to a lower likelihood of non-violent criminal behavior via greater perceived neighborhood disorder. Adolescent delinquency robustly predicted both violent and non-violent criminal behaviors in adulthood. No significant interactive effects between neighborhood disadvantage and collective efficacy were observed. Findings underscore the complexity of neighborhood influences on crime development and suggest that adolescents' perceptions of their environments may serve as one potential mechanism linking structural disadvantage to certain long-term behavioral outcomes.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40865-026-00304-0.