Exploring Whether Neuropsychological Functioning Moderates the Association Between Delinquent and Criminal Involvement and the Likelihood of Arrest

Not all criminal offenders are apprehended for their crimes and subsequently processed through the criminal justice system. Although a line of research has examined reasons why there is differential processing of offenders, there remain significant gaps in this body of research. We used this omission in the knowledge base to examine whether variation in neuropsychological functioning may differentially account for why some offenders escape criminal justice processing whereas others are successfully apprehended. To do so, we analyze data drawn from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health). The results of our analyses did not reveal much evidence that neuropsychological functioning moderated the association between self-reported crime and delinquency and the odds of being arrested. Specifically, across multiple measures of nonviolent and violent delinquency collected across three waves of data, only one of the six multiplicative interaction terms between neuropsychological functioning and self-reported delinquency predicted the odds of being arrested. We speak to what these findings mean for the role of neuropsychological functioning in criminological and criminal justice theory and research.