English (pdf)
Article in xml format
Article references
Automatic translation
Send this article by e-mail
Cited by SciELO 
Cited by Google 
Similars in
SciELO 
Similars in Google 
Permalink
Introduction
Many studies have been conducted to uncover the factors that contribute to offending including aggression (Wahdan et al., 2014); antisocial behaviour (Newburn, 2011); association with criminal friends, criminal social identity (Boduszek et al., 2013); impulsivity (Kumari et al., 2009; Gordon, & Egan, 2011); role of parenting (Stevens, 2018); psychopathy (Dhingra & Boduszek, 2013; Shagufta, 2020); self-control (Ivert et al., 2018), and many others. The extent to which the above factors might contribute to the commission of crime has been widely investigated, but with mixed results. It has been found that general personality traits are robust correlates of delinquency, criminal behaviour, substance use, risky deriving, and risky sex behaviour (Eysenck, 1997; Fava et al., 2019; Gungea et al., 2017; Kamaluddin et al., 2015).
Understanding of the emotional behavioural styles could help to determine the involvement of the individual in antisocial behaviour (Clarbour et al., 2009; Morizot & Blanc, 2003; Moffitt, 1993). Emotional behavioural styles are parallels to the construct such as emotional regulation. Previous work examined the effects of either expressing or inhibiting emotions, however recent research suggests that emotional regulation is important in moderating the physical and psychological health of individuals during the period of their adolescence (Roger & Najarian, 1989; Nolen-Hoeksema & Girgus 1994).
Previous researchers made a distinction between control and regulation of emotions. Controlling emotions refers to restraining or stopping emotional expression, while emotional regulation is defined as a dynamic process in which emotions are ordered and adjusted (Clarbour & Rogers, 2004; Extremera & Rey, 2015). It has been found that individuals regulate their emotional intensity by using drugs, exercising, and selecting or avoiding situations .
Saarni (1993) explained that strategies to modify expressed emotion that are observed in adults are also used by children. He further suggested that the strategies of minimising and maximising emotions are early strategies that emerge during infancy, while complex strategies such as cognitive distraction appear in middle childhood. Older children can reflect on their affective status and understand the possibility of changing the experience of the emotion consciously. Therefore, it is easy for younger children to cope with a situation by avoiding it, whereas older children can use explicit strategies to cope with situational discomfort triggered by rumination (Meyer et al., 2014).
Individual differences in emotional style are central in the development of personality and temperament (Clarbour & Roger, 2004). Previous studies also indicate that role of emotional regulation is important in determining positive social functioning amongst young children. Those children who can regulate their emotional intensity are more socially competent than those who are unable (Dollar & Stifter, 2012). Furthermore, they are also less likely to experience personal distress when empathize with emotional distresses of others. Therefore, children who are high on emotional intensity but capable of regulating emotions, tend to be more sympathetic towards the emotional pains of others without experiencing distress personally. Caspi’s (2000) longitudinal study provides evidence that early temperamental differences are predictive of future emotional and antisocial behaviour.
Previous research considers the importance of emotional control among adolescents. It has been found that emotional instability is a key risk factor in delinquent behaviour. Emotional regulations among children are important for their mental health during adulthood (Moreira& Goldani, 2010) because those children who can regulate their emotions during their childhood are well-adjusted and are more confident and emotionally stable in their adulthood as characterised by Caspi (2000). Children who are unable to regulate their emotions tend to be more impulsive, aggressive, and restless. Those children who inhibit their emotions tend to be more socially fearful, shy, non-aggressive, and found to be low on problem-focused coping.
Caspi (2002) has identified three categories to describe behavioural pattern among children: well-adjusted, undercontrolled, and inhibited. Well-adjusted children are confident, self-controlled, and emotionally stable. Undercontrolled children are impulsive, restless, and easily distracted from their goals and prone towards externalizing problems such as physical aggression, verbal bullying, defiance, and vandalism in their adolescence period (Caspi, 2002; Eisenberg & Fabes 1992; McDowell et al., 2002). The Inhibited category are described as socially fearful, shy, non-aggressive, and found to be low on problem-focused coping.
Research shows that the stability of the above three temperaments remains well into adulthood (Prokasky et al., 2017; Van Den Akker et al., 2010) and evidence suggests that these temperaments are predictive of antisocial pathways during adulthood (Morizot & Blanc, 2003; Van Lieshout, 2000). It has been found that undercontrolled individuals reported higher externalizing problems, such as higher levels of aggression, impulsivity, personality conflict, drug abuse, and deviant behaviour. Children who are identified as inhibited suffer from internalizing problems and are non-assertiveness, cautious and have a controlled personality style. Furthermore, the role of parental response is important to these individual differences and has great impact on children’s self-concept. Well-adjusted children are emotionally balanced during their adulthood and display appropriate self-control.
A study was conducted in United Kingdom by Clarbour et al. (2009) who assessed emotional behavioural styles among young offenders by using Emotional Behavioural Scale (EBS). Study was conducted on 307 male young offenders and 294 school children. School children endorsed social anxiety items more than delinquents. They were found anxious and exhibited a tendency towards a prosocial behaviour such as sharing, helping, comforting and cooperating with others. The authors found social anxiety factor as a protective factor against antisocial and delinquent behaviour. It has been found that those children who were lower on social self-esteem were more aggressive and had more emotional difficulties. They also found link between low self-esteem and substance abuse. Malevolent aggression was found to be higher in young offenders than controls. Furthermore, they suggested that EBS is a more reliable scale to assess young offenders’ criminal behaviour.
Soomro and Clarbour (2012) conducted a study to assess the relationship between emotional behaviour and academic achievement in middle school children in Hyderabad Pakistan. Emotional behavioural styles were measures by using EBS. Sample was consisted of 146 students of grade 8. They used school records related to academic grads to find the correlation between academic achievement and emotional behaviour measures. Results indicated that academic achievement was negatively associated with malevolent aggression whiles positively associated with social self-esteem. Furthermore, mediating analysis revealed that social self-esteem partially mediated the relationship between malevolent aggression and academic achievement.
The aim of the current study was to extend the findings of Clarbour et al. (2009) and Soomro and Clarbour (2012) to find out the emotional behavioural styles among violent and non-violent juvenile offenders in Pakistan. Considering the above literature review, it was expected that violent juvenile offender would score higher on malevolent aggression and lower on social anxiety and social self-esteem than non-violent juvenile offenders.
Method
Design
Current study is Quantitative in nature since it aims to assess the emotional behavioural styles in students. The study design is non-experimental with a cross-sectional method as all information is collected at a single point in time (Wang & Cheng, 2020).
Participants
Study recruited 725 juvenile offenders including 392 violent and 333 non-violent juvenile male offenders between 11 and 18 years old who were incarcerated in the different prisons of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), Pakistan. The basic purpose of the study was to assess the emotional behavioral styles both in violent and non-violent juvenile offenders.
Measure
Emotional Behavioral Scale (EBS; Clarbour & Roger, 2004) was used to assess the three emotional styles among offenders. The current scale has been used in the present study because previous study has suggested that this scale is more appropriate for identification and treatment of adolescents with a high risk of offending behaviour (Clarbour et al., 2009). EBS is a 65 items scale and consists of three discriminable factors: Malevolent aggression, social anxiety, and social self-esteem. Malevolent aggression measures the tendency to cause harm to others and the desire to take revenge and displacement of antisocial behaviour. Social anxiety refers to an individual’s feelings that he/she is judged by others in the society and the individual is concerned about behaving appropriately in the society. Social self-esteem refers to self-concept and the feeling of self-worth in social settings. Malevolent aggression was assessed by items 1, 5, 7, 10, 13, 16, 19, 22, 25, 28, 31, 34, 37, 40, 43, 46, 49, 52, 54, 56, 58, 60, and 63. Social anxiety was measured by items 2, 4, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 33, 39, 36, 42, 45, 48, 51, 53, 55, 57, 59, 61, 62, 64, and 65. Social self-esteem was assessed by using items 8, 7, 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, 26, 29, 32, 35, 38, 41, 44, 47, and 50.
Procedure
Purposive sampling technique was used to collect the sample. The Emotional Behavioural Scale was developed by Clarbour and Roger (2004) which is self-rated measure. Initially scale was translated from English to Urdu with the help of three academicians then back translated to English by two assistant professors in English department of the university. In the sample, all imprisoned juvenile offenders including both convicted (found guilty) and non-convicted (their decision was in a court of law that they were not guilty of criminal offence) were recruited.
Data Analysis
Statistical analyzes were conducted to determine the extent to which emotional behavior styles could predict violence between violent and nonviolent offenders. T-test and Binary Logistic Regression analysis was performed by using IBM SPSS Version 20. All juvenile offenders were divided into two groups violent and non-violent based on their criminal act. Those juvenile offenders who were involved in committing serious criminal act such as murder, rape, drug trafficking, and robbery were categorized in the violent group, and those who were involved in shoplifting, fighting without harming others, stealing, and violating traffic rules were included in the non-violent category.
Ethical Approval
Ethical Approval has been taken from Advanced Studies Research Board (ASRB) of the university. Those offenders who were able to read and write Urdu language were given the EBS along with demographic sheet with consent letter in an envelope. In Pakistan literacy is defined as: “Ability to read and understand simple text in Urdu language from a newspaper or magazine, write a simple letter and perform basic mathematical calculation” (Sheikh, 2017). Consent was taken from the Superintendent of the prisons for those offenders who were less than 17 years. Their participation was voluntary. All the participants were debriefed that their data would be kept confidential, and they can quit at any time. The participants were requested to complete questionnaires and return them to the Superintendent in sealed envelopes.
Results
In the current study, SPSS 19 Version 20 has been used for the analyses of descriptive statistics, t-test and regression. The present study examines whether violent and non-violent juvenile offenders across Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Pakistan differ with respect to malevolent aggression, social self-esteem, and social anxiety. While similar studies have assessed difference in those constructs in school samples and western countries, the novelty of the current study is the setting (prisons in Pakistan).
Descriptive statistics
Table 1 shows descriptive statistics and reliability for all continuous variables. Violent juvenile offenders showed high levels of malevolent aggression, low levels of social anxiety, and low levels of social self-esteem than non-violent juvenile offenders.
Group differences
Table 2 indicates independent sample T-test result for both violent and non-violent Juvenile offenders on the scale of emotional behavioural styles. Results show that violent juvenile offenders exhibited more malevolent aggression than non-violent juvenile offenders (t(723)= -23.86, p < 0.001, η2 = 0.03). Results suggest that non-violent juvenile offenders scored higher than violent juvenile offenders on socail anxiety (t(723)= 17.49, p < 0.001, η2 = 0.02) and social self-esteem (t(723)= 16.68, p < 0.001, η2 = 0.02).
Table 2 Group Differences between Violent and Non-violent Juvenile Offenders on Malevolent Aggression, Social Anxiety, and Social Self-esteem (N=725).
| Variables | Violent | Non-Violent | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| N | M | SD | N | M | SD | T | P | n2 | |
| Malevolent Aggression | 392 | 21.12 | 7.2 | 333 | 8.04 | 7.4 | -23.86 | 0.001 | 0.03 |
| Social Anxiety | 392 | 7.19 | 6.5 | 333 | 15.84 | 3.1 | 17.49 | 0.001 | 0.02 |
| Social Self-esteem | 392 | 6.23 | 4.4 | 333 | 11.06 | 3.1 | 16.68 | 0.001 | 0.02 |
Binary Logistic Regression
In Table 3, Binary logistic regression was performed to evaluate the impact of malevolent aggression, social self-esteem and social anxiety on the likelihood that violent juvenile offenders would exhibit more emotional behaivoural problems than non- violent juvenile offenders. The model included three factors: malevolent aggression, social anxiety and social self-esteem. The full model contains all predictors that are statistcially significant (χ2 (3, N = 725) = 338.4, p < .001,) and was able to distinguish violent juvenile offenders from non-violent on emotional behavioural styles. The model as a whole explained between 52% (Cox and Snell R square) and 69% (Nagelkerke R square) of the emotioanl behavioural styles and correctly classified 85.5% of cases. As shown in Table 3, all independent variables significantly contributed to the model (malevolent aggression, social self-esteem and social anxiety). Results indicate that malevolent aggression was strongly reported by violent juvenile offenders recording odd ratios of 1.16 than non-violent juvenile offenders. This indicated that violent juvenile offenders reported 1.16 times more malevolent aggression than non-violent juvenile offenders. The OR of 0.91 (p < 0.001) for social anxiety is less than 1, indicating that an increased score on social anxiety was reported by non-violent juvenile offenders as compared to violent juvenile offenders. Similarly, OR of 0.75 (p < 0.001) for social self-esteem is also less than 1 which indicates that offenders who were high on social self-esteem were more likely belonging to the non-violent group.
Table 3 Binary Logistic Regression Model Predicting Likelihood of Emotional Behavioural Styles among Violent (n= 392) and Non-violent (n= 333) Juvenile Offenders.
| 95% Confidence Intervals for odds ratio | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Variables | B | SE | Odd ratio | Lower | Upper |
| Malevolent Aggression | 0.153 | 0.013 | 1.16*** | 0.02 | 0.03 |
| Social Anxiety | -0.091 | 0.015 | 0.91*** | 0.01 | 0.09 |
| Social Self-esteem | -0.274 | 0.029 | 0.75*** | 0.04 | 0.02 |
***P<0.001
Discussion
The main objective of the research was to assess the emotional behavioural styles among violent and non-violent juvenile offenders located in the different prisons of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Previous studies have been conducted to assess the psychological and adjustment problems and their relationship to academic achievement in Pakistan (Hussain, & Munaf, 2012; Samad et al., 2005; Soomro & Clarbour 2012; Syed et al., 2007). The same emotional behaviour styles have also previously been investigated among young offenders in western countries (Clarbour et al., 2009). The current research extends the investigation of juvenile delinquents in Pakistan to assess emotional behavioural styles in violent and non-violent juvenile delinquents. Descriptive statistics, t-test, and Binary logistic regression were used to analyse the data. T-test revealed that there were significant differences among violent and non-violent juvenile offenders on three emotional style factors: malevolent aggression, social self-esteem, and social anxiety.
Binary Logistic Regression analysis indicated that violent juvenile offenders exhibited higher levels of malevolent aggression and lower levels of social anxiety and social self-esteem than the non-violent group. Consistent with the previous study, violent juvenile offenders reported higher levels of malevolent aggression and lower levels of social anxiety (Clarbour et al., 2009). These findings suggest the EBS distinguishes between those offenders who are persistent in their criminal acts as emphasized by Moffitt (2006), who make distinction between life-course-persistent offenders and adolescents-limited offenders. Life-course persistent offenders are more violent and display high psychopathic traits and found it difficult to modify their behaviour by using empathy-based intervention. Results reveal that violent offenders scored higher on malevolent aggression factor than the control group which suggests that violent offenders are least empathetic. The group differences on malevolent aggression found here are also consistent with a previous study (Clarbour et al., 2009) which found that violent juvenile offenders are more malevolently aggressive than non-violent offenders.
Furthermore, non-violent young offenders were higher on the social anxiety scale than violent youth offenders, indicating that non-violent offenders were comparatively more concerned about the opinion of others and displayed more prosocial emotional response styles than violent juvenile offenders. Social anxiety may act as an inhibitory factor in committing violent crime and buffer antisocial behaviour in incarcerated youth offenders’ population.
Violent juvenile offenders were also found to be lower on social self-esteem than non-violent juvenile offenders. A previous study found an association between lower scores on social self-esteem and substance abuse (Fergusson & Horwood, 1999). Another study found those students who scored lower on social self-esteem were intended more towards drug taking behaviour than those with higher scores (Wild et al., 2004). Another study found adolescents with low scores on social self-esteem who were reported by their teachers as having more emotional difficulties to solve their problems and were less prosocial (Clarbour & Rogers, 2004).
The results of the current study may provide empirical evidence for distinguishing between the violent and non-violent juvenile offenders on the basis of emotional behavioural styles and suggested empathy-based behaviour modification interventions for non-violent juvenile offenders. Furthermore, intensive multimodal CBT and anger management programme are recommended to modify the behaviour of violent juvenile offenders.
The present study has many limitations. The alpha values of the subscales: social anxiety (a = .67) is comparatively low (but still acceptable). Data was gathered by using a self-report measure and was not validated by interview or observational data due to the limited access to prisons. The study was cross-sectional, therefore, all the relationships mentioned here are correlational, and it might be possible that outside factors contributed for the relationship mentioned here. A longitudinal study is suggested for future assessment.
