Crime and justice research Youth offenders

The Youth offending research brief outlines some of the reasons why children are treated differently to adults by the criminal justice system. The findings discussed in the brief show that:

• childhood and adolescence are periods when offending tends to escalate
• children have less mature psychological and cognitive systems when compared with adults
• children in contact with the criminal justice system tend to present with more risk factors associated with offending behaviour than adults in contact with the system.