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Trauma and Delinquency: Ten Critical Points
by Kristine Buffington, MSW, Carly B. Dierkhising, MA, and Shawn C. Marsh, Ph.D.

Juvenile justice courts are tasked with protecting society, safeguarding the youth and families that come to its attention, and holding delinquent youth accountable while supporting their rehabilitation. In order to meet these sometimes contradictory goals, juvenile court judges must understand the constellation of underlying factors that often affect the lives of system-involved juveniles and their families. One of the most pervasive of these factors is exposure to trauma. To be most effective in achieving its mission, the juvenile court must both understand the role of traumatic exposure in the lives of children and engage resources and interventions that address child traumatic stress. Accordingly, we present ten critical points about trauma that judges should be familiar with in order to best assist traumatized youth who enter the juvenile justice system.

1. A traumatic experience is an event that threatens someone's life, safety, or well-being.
Traumatic events can include being the victim of or witnessing emotional, physical, and sexual abuse; neglect; physical assaults; family, school, or community violence; war; racism; bullying; acts of terrorism; fires; serious accidents; serious injuries; intrusive or painful medical procedures; loss of loved ones; abandonment; and separation. A key condition that makes these events traumatic is that they can overwhelm a person's capacity to cope, and elicit intense feelings such as fear, helplessness, and despair.

2. Child traumatic stress can lead to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
Criteria for a diagnosis of PTSD include having been exposed to a threatening event, experiencing an overwhelming emotional reaction, and developing symptoms causing severe distress and interference with daily life. Further, individuals also must experience a sufficient number of the following three symptoms for more than one month: avoidance (i.e., avoiding reminders of the trauma), hyperarousal (i.e., being emotionally or behaviorally agitated), and re-experiencing (e.g., nightmares or intrusive memories).

3. Trauma impacts a child's development and health throughout his or her life span.
The experience of either acute trauma (single event of limited duration) or chronic trauma (multiple events over time) has the potential to impact children in all areas of their social, cognitive, and emotional development throughout their lives. Youth who experience traumatic events may struggle with problems such as mental and physical health issues, difficulties learning, and challenges maintaining healthy relationships. Research also suggests that the impact of trauma can persist into adulthood and can increase risk of serious diseases, health problems, and early mortality.

4. Complex trauma is associated with risk of delinquency.
The effect of trauma is cumulative: the greater the number of traumatic events that a child experiences, the greater the risks to a child's development and his or her emotional and physical health. Youth who have experienced complex trauma have experienced a series of traumatic events that include interpersonal abuse and violence, often perpetrated by those who are meant to protect them. This level of traumatic exposure can contribute to a deep distrust of and disregard for adults and rules set by adults, which places youth at a much greater risk for delinquency and other inappropriate behaviors.

5. Traumatic exposure, delinquency, and school failure are related.
Truancy and academic failure are factors that increase the risk of delinquency. Success in school requires confidence and focus, the ability to regulate emotions and behaviors, and the skills to understand and negotiate social relationships. When youth live in unpredictable and dangerous environments they often operate in a state of hypervigilance. Attitudes and behaviors associated with hypervigilance (e.g., abnormal arousal, constantly assessing for threats, etc.) fundamentally conflict with the skills and focus needed to succeed in school academically, socially, and behaviorally.

6. Trauma assessments can reduce misdiagnosis, promote positive outcomes, and maximize resources.
Often youth who are exposed to chronic or complex trauma receive a diagnosis of Attention Deficit Disorder, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, Conduct Disorder, or other mental health disorders. These diagnoses are predominantly based on observable behaviors and symptoms. When there is a lack of thorough assessment, youth are provided treatment based on these behavioral diagnoses, without addressing the traumatic experiences that are contributing to the symptoms. In order to avoid this disconnect, trauma screenings and standardized assessments should be implemented early and often.

7. There are mental health treatments that are effective in helping youth who are experiencing child traumatic stress.
Evidence-based practices (EBPs) are practices that have been evaluated through rigorous scientific studies and have been found to be effective. Referrals for treatment must be made to service providers that use trauma-focused EBPs, so that youth may receive both the best care and the most positive outcomes. The Centers for Disease Control indicates that the most highly effective treatments for traumatic stress are cognitive behavioral treatment models. [Please visit www.nctsnet.org for more information on evidence-based treatments.]

8. There is a compelling need for effective family involvement.
Youth who are at higher risk of violence and prolonged system involvement are those who do not have helpful and consistent family support. If juvenile courts are to enhance their success in rehabilitating youth who commit delinquent acts, they should work to develop meaningful involvement of biological parents, extended family members, kinship caregivers, adoptive families, foster parents, and others – and educating them about traumatic stress and effective treatments.

9. Youth are resilient.
Resiliency is the capacity for human beings to thrive in the face of adversity – such as traumatic experiences. Most practitioners approach enhancing resiliency by seeking both to reduce risk factors and increase protective factors in the lives of the youth and families with whom they work. Some of the ways youth resiliency can be enhanced include: proactive efforts to protect them from further trauma, expanding their support systems, providing them with positive adult role models, and finding ways to successfully engage their talents to enhance development of self-efficacy. [Please visit www.search-institute.org for more information on developmental assets.]

10. Next steps: The juvenile justice system needs to be trauma-informed at all levels.
Trauma-informed systems of care understand the impact of traumatic stress both on youth and families, and provide resources that prevent, address, and ameliorate the impact of trauma. A trauma-informed juvenile justice system makes system-level changes to improve a youth's feelings of safety, reduce youth's exposure to traumatic reminders, and helps equip youth with supports and tools to cope with traumatic stress reactions (e.g., by providing safety, trauma-informed assessments, and referral to evidence-based treatments).

The majority of youth in the juvenile justice system have experienced traumatic events; the juvenile court is disadvantaged if this fact is overlooked. Juvenile justice courts can benefit from understanding trauma, its impact on youth, and its relationship to delinquency. By becoming trauma-informed, juvenile justice personnel aid the juvenile court in its mission of protecting and rehabilitating traumatized youth while holding them responsible for their actions. Rehabilitation resources also can be maximized by utilizing effective assessment and treatment strategies that reduce the impact of childhood trauma. Ultimately, such efforts will help promote improved outcomes for youth, families, and communities most in need of our help.

Resources
For details about the resources used to develop this article, or for more information about trauma, delinquency, or other issues of interest to juvenile and family courts, please contact the National Child Traumatic Stress Network (NCTSN) at or the NCJFCJ at .

Kristine Buffington, MSW is the Vice President of Mental Health Services for A Renewed Mind.

Carly B. Dierkhising, MA is the Program Coordinator for the Service Systems Program at the National Center for Child Traumatic Stress (NCCTS).

Shawn C. Marsh, Ph.D. is the Director of the Juvenile and Family Law Department of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.

NOTE: This article is based on Buffington, K., Dierkhising, C. B., & Marsh, S. C. (2010). Ten things every juvenile court judge should know about trauma and delinquency. Reno, NV: National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges.

Copyright 1999-2012, National Association of State Judicial Educators
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