Research Report: Patterns of Offending Behaviour in Relation to Time Spent In and Out of Care

Published by Child & Family Social Work, June 2017

SUMMARY

Carol Hayden and Sam Graves of the Institute of Criminal Justice Studies at the University of Portsmouth wanted to find out more about the relationship between the length of time children spend in care and their offending behaviour. They also wanted to see if different groups of children displayed different patterns of behaviour and whether looked-after children were more likely to commit offences while they were in care or at other times.

Government data on children in care and offending does not include information on children who spend less than a year in care. This leads to a mismatch between government figures, which show only five per cent of looked-after children offend in a particular year, and claims from bodies such as the Prison Reform Trust that between a quarter and a half of children in the secure estate have been in care.