How Children's Educational Outcomes and Criminality Vary by Duration and Frequency of Paternal Incarceration. Issue 1 (May 2016)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Andersen, Lars H.
• Editors: Wildeman, Christopher; Wakefield, Sara; Lee, Hedwig
• Is Part Of: Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. Volume 665:Issue 1(2016:May)
• Page Start: 149
• Page End: 170
• Publication Date: 2016-05
• Subjects: paternal incarceration -- educational outcomes -- criminality -- register data; Social sciences -- Periodicals; Social sciences -- United States -- Periodicals; Political science -- Periodicals; United States -- Politics and government -- Periodicals; 300
• DOI: 10.1177/0002716216632782
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0002-7162

Abstract

Existing studies of the consequences of paternal incarceration for children treat paternal incarceration as a dichotomous event (a child either experiences paternal incarceration or does not), although effects could accumulate with both the frequency and duration of paternal incarcerations. In this article I use register data on Danish children from birth cohort 1991, some of whom experienced paternal incarceration before age 15, to show how educational outcomes and criminality up to age 20 vary by frequency and total duration of paternal incarceration. The high quality of Danish register data also allows me to distinguish between paternal arrest and paternal incarceration and to show results for the total duration of paternal incarcerations conditioned on frequency of paternal incarceration. Results show that educational outcomes and criminality indeed correlate with duration and frequency of paternal incarceration, indicating that treating paternal incarceration as a dichotomous event blurs important heterogeneity in the consequences of paternal incarceration.