Parents' involvement in youth justice proceedings: perspectives of youth and parents

Conclusion and Future Directions

Clearly, the present study represents merely a first step in exploring the important issue of parental involvement in youth justice proceedings. Further research is necessary in order to gain a better understanding of the extent and nature of parents' roles in their adolescent children's youth justice experiences. In this regard, larger samples, particularly of parents, will help to address the problem of low statistical power encountered in this study. Increasing the sample of parent-child matched pairs will also allow for a more extensive and rich examination of parents' involvement.

The present study focused on young people's youth justice experiences from police contact through the court process. However, it would be desirable to focus more in depth on parents' involvement from the pre-disposition phase through post-disposition. For example, parents potentially serve a number of important functions, including monitoring and supervision of young people's activities and adherence to probation conditions, etc., as well as facilitating assessments and treatment that may be deemed necessary. It will be important to explore their role and perceptions around facilitating and ensuring that necessary conditions are met and services obtained.

The YCJA also emphasizes alternatives to formal court processing - extrajudicial measures. Whether and how parents are involved after a youth is detained by police may have an impact on the likelihood that the young person will be given the opportunity for such extrajudicial measures. For example, willingness of parents to be involved in supervision and monitoring of adolescents, as well as is other aspects of extrajudicial measures, may influence police and crown attorneys in their recommendations and decisions with respect granting such opportunities. It will be important to explore how police and crown attorneys perceive parental involvement, or lack thereof, in this regard. It will also be important to talk to parents in such contexts in order to explore their understanding of the nature and implications of extrajudicial measures.

Exploring parental involvement from the perspective of police, lawyers, and judges will also add depth to the information obtained from youth and parents. In addition, using the data obtained in the current study as a starting point, youth, parents, police, lawyers, and judges can be useful resources in discussing the barriers to parental involvement and generating solutions that protect young people's rights and facilitate meaningful consequences that ultimately serve to reduce youth crime.