Why do the Crime-reducing Effects of Marriage Vary with Age?

The Cambridge Study in Delinquent Development is a prospective longitudinal survey of 411 South London males from age 8 to age 48. In this survey, it was previously found that men who marry relatively early reduce their offending behaviour after marriage, unlike those who marry relatively late. Further analyses confirmed that the original findings were not caused by regression to the mean. Comparisons between those who married at age 25 or older and those who married at age 18-24 on risk factors at age 8-32 suggest that the later-married men tended to be more nervous, more likely to have experienced a broken home, to be drug users and binge-drinkers, to maintain aggressive attitudes from age 18 to 32, and to continue to go out with their male friends after marriage. The later-married men tended to marry older women who had less influence than younger women on their offending behaviour. They were more likely to be long-term low-rate offenders than those who married early.