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The Origins and Development of Problem Behavior Theory pp 89–109Cite as

Problem Behavior Theory and the Problem Behavior Syndrome

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Part of the book series: Advancing Responsible Adolescent Development ((ARAD))

Abstract

Earlier bivariate findings suggested that diverse problem behaviors, including problem drinking, illicit drug use, delinquent-type behavior, and precocious sexual intercourse, may comprise a single behavioral syndrome in samples of normal adolescents. A multivariate test of this possible syndrome was carried out through a series of maximum likelihood factor analyses based on self-report data from several samples of adolescents and youth. Analyses were performed by sex on four waves of panel data from a high school cohort and a college-age cohort, using their adolescent/college-age data as well as their data from young adulthood, and on multiple random subsamples of adolescents who participated in the 1978 National Study of Adolescent Drinking (Rachal et al., 1980). Results of the analyses consistently showed that one common factor accounts for the correlations among the different problem behaviors. The findings lend support to the notion of a syndrome of problem behavior in both adolescence and young adulthood.

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Donovan, J. E., & Jessor, R. (1985). Structure of problem behavior in adolescence and young adulthood. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 53(6), 890–904.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Alcohol use, cigarette smoking, marijuana use, and the use of other illicit drugs have been shown to be correlated among adolescents; that is, teenagers who are heavily involved with one of these drugs tend to be involved with others as well (Bachman, O’Malley, & Johnston, 1980; Block & Goodman, 1978; Hindelang, 1971; Huba, Wingard, & Bentler 1981; Hundleby, 1979; Istvan & Matarazzo, 1984; Jessor, Donovan, & Widmer, 1980; Jessor & Jessor, 1977; Johnson, 1973; Johnston, 1973; Miller et al., 1983; Single, Kandel, & Faust, 1974; Weitman, Scheble, Johnson, & Abbey, 1972; Zucker & Barron, 1973; Zucker & Devoe, 1975).

    Marijuana use and other illicit drug use have also been found to correlate with problem drinking, a particular pattern of alcohol use that is characterized by frequent drunkenness and negative personal and social consequences (Donovan & Jessor, 1978; Jessor, Chase, & Donovan, 1980; Jessor, Donovan, & Widmer, 1980; Jessor & Jessor, 1977; Prendergast & Schaefer, 1974; Wechsler, 1976; Wechsler & Thum, 1973; Zucker & Barron, 1973; Zucker & Devoe, 1975).

    Alcohol use, problem drinking, cigarette smoking, and illicit drug use also correlate with involvement in self-reported delinquent behavior (Donovan & Jessor, 1978; Hindelang, 1971; Hitachi 1969; Hundleby, 1979; Jessor, Donovan, & Widmer, 1980; Jessor & Jessor, 1977; Zucker & Barron, 1973; Zucker & Devoe, 1975) and with precocious involvement in sexual intercourse (Hundleby, 1979; Jessor & Jessor, 1977; Zucker & Barron, 1973; Zucker & Devoe, 1975).

    Only a few of the studies have been concerned with the structure underlying the observed correlations. Their attention has been limited, however, to alcohol and drug use behavior (Hays, Widaman, DiMatteo, & Stacy, 1987; Huba, 1983; Huba & Bentler, 1979, 1982; Huba, Wingard, & Bentler, 1981). Delinquent or deviant behavior and precocious sexual intercourse have not been included in those analyses.

  2. 2.

    In 1972, the fourth year of testing, 483 students completed questionnaires. This group comprised 82 % of the sample who participated in the first year of the study. Of these 483, 432 had taken the annual questionnaires in all 4 years. Comparisons on a variety of personality, social environment, and behavior measures assessed in 1969 showed that these 432 students were not different on most measures from those who participated in the research for fewer than 4 years (see Jessor & Jessor, 1977, pp. 46-47).

  3. 3.

    A total of 226 young people participated in the fourth year of testing in 1973, when they were either seniors, transfer students, graduates, or college drop-outs. This group comprised 82 % of those who took the questionnaire in the first year of the study. Of these 226, 205 had completed all four annual questionnaires. Comparisons between this 4-year sample and those who participated only 1 or 2 years demonstrated that there were no real differences in conventionality between these groups in the 1970 data (see Jessor & Jessor, 1977, p. 51).

  4. 4.

    For these analyses, scores on the Times Drunk in the Past Year measure were recoded from blank to zero for abstainers and noncurrent drinkers. A similar strategy was also used for reported frequency of marijuana use. Adolescents who had never used marijuana or hashish or who had not used it in the past 6 months received scores of zero on the measure rather than a blank.

  5. 5.

    The variety of behaviors in the General Deviant Behavior scale were dealt with as a summative scale rather than as separate items in the factor analyses because of the greater reliability of the scale and the restricted variances on the individual behavior items.

  6. 6.

    Some of the behaviors occur so infrequently for most adolescents that standard short-term recall periods would result in scores with very low means. For this reason, Frequency of Marijuana Use asks about a shorter time period than do Times Drunk and General Deviant Behavior. The question on sexual intercourse was limited to reports of ever experiencing it because of the sensitivity of this question for the high school population.

  7. 7.

    The 4918 students in the national sample divided equally into 10th, 11th, and 12th graders. Of the 3279 students in the two older grade cohorts, 1540 were men and 1739 were women. When students who were missing scores on any of the behavior measures to be examined in the factor analyses were deleted from the sample, there were 1208 men (78 % of those in Grades 11 and 12) and 1444 women (83 % of those in Grades 11 and 12) remaining with complete data on the seven behavior measures.

  8. 8.

    Involvement in each of these problem behaviors has been shown to be associated with the following psychosocial attributes : lower value on academic achievement; higher value on independence; greater value on independence relative to achievement; lower expectation for academic recognition; lower religiosity; greater tolerance of socially disapproved behavior; greater weight placed on the positive relative to the negative reasons for drinking, drug use, and sex; greater orientation toward friends than toward parents; less perceived compatibility of interests and values between parents and friends; greater perceived parental approval of problem behavior; and greater friends’ approval and models for involvement in problem behavior.

  9. 9.

    In Study I, these loadings were statistically significant only for Church Attendance Frequency in the college sample analyses. In seven of the eight analyses, the chi-square tests indicated that the correlations among the problem behaviors and conforming behaviors could be accounted for by a single factor. In Study II, factor analyses in eight new random subsamples found that the conforming behaviors loaded negatively on the common factor in all cases. The chi-square tests , however, indicated a lack of fit with the single-factor model in three of the four male subsamples and in one of the female subsamples, which suggests that the conforming behaviors may constitute a correlated second factor for the men. In Study III, Church Attendance Frequency loaded negatively on the common factor in all eight analyses, and the chi-square tests showed that the single-factor model accounted for the data in all cases.

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Acknowledgments

This research was carried out as part of a larger project, the Young Adult Follow-Up Study (R. Jessor, principal investigator), which was funded by National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Grant A A03745. The research was carried out under the aegis of the Research Program on Problem Behavior in the Institute of Behavioral Science of the University of Colorado at Boulder.

We would like to acknowledge the contributions of Frances Costa and Lee Jessor to the planning and collection of the young adult data used in this study. We thank J. Valley Rachal, who directed the 1978 National Study of Adolescent Drinking, for providing us with a copy of the raw data. We are grateful to Frances Costa, John Finney, and Ron Hays for their suggestions on an earlier draft of this article.

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  1. University of Pittsburgh, School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, USA

    John E. Donovan

  2. Institute of Behavioral Science, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO, USA

    Richard Jessor

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Correspondence to Richard Jessor .

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Donovan, J.E., Jessor, R. (2016). Problem Behavior Theory and the Problem Behavior Syndrome. In: The Origins and Development of Problem Behavior Theory. Advancing Responsible Adolescent Development. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-40886-6_6

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