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POISONED DEVELOPMENT: ASSESSING CHILDHOOD LEAD EXPOSURE AS A CAUSE OF CRIME IN A BIRTH COHORT FOLLOWED THROUGH ADOLESCENCE

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ROBERT J. SAMPSON
ROBERT J. SAMPSON
ROBERT J. SAMPSON
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Alix S. Winter at Columbia University
Alix S. Winter
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CrimRxiv
POISONED DEVELOPMENT:
ASSESSING CHILDHOOD
LEAD EXPOSURE AS A
CAUSE OF CRIME IN A
BIRTH COHORT FOLLOWED
THROUGH ADOLESCENCE
ROBERT J. SAMPSON ALIX S. WINTER
Published on: Feb 20, 2018
DOI: https://doi.org/10.21428/cb6ab371.237f996a
License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
License (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0)
CrimRxiv POISONED DEVELOPMENT: ASSESSING CHILDHOOD LEAD EXPOSURE
AS A CAUSE OF CRI ME IN A BIRTH CO HORT FOLLOWED THRO UGH
ADOLESCENCE
2
ABSTRACT
The consequences of lead exposure for later crime are theoretically compelling, but direct evidence from
representative, longitudinal samples is sparse. By capitalizing on an original follow-up of more than 200
infants from the birth cohort of the Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods matched to
their blood lead levels from around age 3 years, we provide several tests. Through the use of four waves of
longitudinal data that include measures of individual development, family background, and structural
inequalities in how lead becomes embodied, we assess the hypothesized link between early childhood lead
poisoning and both parent-reported delinquent behavior and official arrest in late adolescence. We also test for
mediating developmental processes of impulsivity and anxiety or depression. The results from multiple
analytic strategies that make different assumptions reveal a plausibly causal effect of childhood lead exposure
on adolescent delinquent behavior but no direct link to arrests. The results underscore lead exposure as a
trigger for poisoned development in the early life course and call for greater integration of the environment into
theories of individual differences in criminal behavior.
... The research on the "lead-crime hypothesis" began alongside IQ, and has grown extensively over the past 20 years (e.g. Masters et al., 1998;Mielke & Zahran, 2012;Sampson & Winter, 2018), but it became more notorious due to growing interest in the unexplained, dramatic reduction of US urban homicide and crime, cut by half since 1980 (Higney et al., 2022). On a graph, the crime reduction curve looks like a 30-year shadow trailing lead's removal from gasoline, just enough time for a new generation to grow up with notably less lead exposure. ...
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... Controlling for fifteen other explanations for crime, they found a statistically significant relationship between lead pollution and homicide across counties (see also Stretesky & Lynch 2004). These results have also been discovered at lower levels of aggregation in the cities of Chicago (Barrett 2017, Sampson & Winter 2018, Winter & Sampson 2017 and St. Louis (Boutwell et al. 2016). Much research remains to be performed on the effect of pollution on behavior. ...
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  • Crit Criminol
Ultra-realism is a relatively new theory that attempts to explain crime as a product of neo-liberal capitalism through various complex processes. While the perspective has brought a much-needed energy to critical criminological discourse, it is not without its issues. This analysis presents three interrelated concerns. First, the theory’s causal claims rooted in transcendental materialism are fundamentally unverifiable. Second, the theory’s causal logic threatens to veer into tautology. Finally, once the problematic elements are jettisoned from the theory, it may not offer much beyond what is already provided by other criminological theories.
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