Self-Reportedand Officially Defined Offenses in the 1958 Philadelphia Birth Cohort

Abstract

The findings from the first Philadelphia birth cohort study of some 10,000 boys who were born in 1945 and grew up in that city were published in 1972.⁽¹⁾ A few years later that research was continued by following up and interviewing a sample of that cohort. And, in 1990 findings were reported from a longitudinal study of over 27,000 individuals born in 1958 and who also lived in Philadelphia through their juvenile years.⁽²⁾ Herein we offer data developed from an interview of a sample of 777 males and females drawn from the 1958 cohort when they were 30 years old. Additionally, the officially recorded criminal histories of these sample participants were tracked to age 30 at both local and national levels. To insure that out-migration from Philadelphia of cohort members would not have any significant effect on the completeness of adult criminal records and comparability with the earlier juvenile offense data, sample members were traced and contacted, if possible, throughout the United States.