Late-Blooming Offending

AbstractThis chapter highlights the phenomenon of late bloomers, those who only start to offend frequently after adolescence. First we briefly review the extant empirical evidence with regard to late-blooming offending. Second, we address the explanations life-course criminology has offered to account for late-blooming offending. Finally, we use three different datasets to examine the prevalence of late blooming in samples at different risk of offending, assess the extent to which late blooming is a recent phenomenon, and scrutinize the individual and background characteristics associated with late-blooming offending. Though we find evidence for a late-blooming trajectory in several datasets, and for both male and female offenders, late blooming does not seem a particularly recent phenomenon and the risk factors associated with late-blooming trajectories do not readily correspond to those proposed by extant life course criminological theory. Avenues for future research are discussed.