The Effect of Family Pathology on Taipei’s Juvenile Delinquents

Abstract

In the past juvenile delinquency was not thought to be a serious social problem in Chinese communities. A study carried out by Murphy (1963) in Singapore, for example, demonstrated a low level of delinquency in Chinese as compared with Indian youths. Two decades ago, however, Lin (1958) reported a rapid increase of t’ai-pau, a nickname for juvenile delinquents, in Taiwan, and attributed this development to post World War II urbanization which spored, among other things, a modern subculture of uprooted youths. Lamson (1935), working in China prior to 1949, regarded this and other forms of social deviance as the result of social disintegration, including breakdown of traditional family structure. Murphy (1963), along with other behavioral scientists, held that Chinese familism protects children from developing deviant behavior. But he recognized that this same family system, when it came into specific conflicts with broader social interests, also could foster delinquency. Although increasing rates of juvenile delinquency have been reported in recent years for Chinese in Hong Kong and the United States (Allard 1975), according to reports of the Police Bureau, delinquency in Taiwan remains low, with annual rates of 3.3 to 4.0 offenders per 1,000 juvenile population (ages 12 to 18) throughout the past decade. Increased numbers of youths in the island’s population are responsible for a rise in the total number of delinquents, however. In addition, a change has occurred to a slight extent in some types of delinquent behavior. For example, cases of robbery and drug abuse have increased.