Youth Gang Involvement: A Case Study

Youth gang involvement has as a major concern in many countries. There are different social factors that indulge youth to join a gang. A gang is a distinctive group of members associated with adolescents or youth who due to the negative effect of various social factors. This paper argues the three social elements that leads youth to join a gang are parental, neighbourhood, and school influence. A gang includes the undisciplined youth gang or street youth gang whose only identity is to involve in an unlawful action.

However, the first social factor that leads the youth to join a gang is the parental influence. Parental influence includes lack of control or supervision that leads youth to join a gang (Gilman et al. 2014: 205). Gilman et al. (2014) argue that the youth join a gang when family does not act as a primary socialize agent to monitor their children. Howell and Egley (2005) argue that the poor parental supervision predicts a gang membership in early adolescence. Also, the poor social control leads youth to join a gang more frequently than the children with parental control (Bell 2009:367). Bell (2009) argues that the youth with strong social bonding with families are less likely to join a gang than others.

Family structure also includes the family members who are already involved in the gang group. This creates a delinquent

Gilman et al. (2014) argue that the neighbourhood availability of drug influences the youth to get involved into a gang which results in a high crime rate. Also, neighbourhood drug uses like marijuana and alcohol influences youth to get involve more into a gang (Howell and Egley 2005:339). This develops the violence and abusive neighborhood environment that enforce youth to join a gang. Alleyne and Wood (2014) also argue that the existing delinquent gang member in the neighborhood tends to enforce youth to get involve in a