SUBJECTIVE DESISTANCE AND THE TRANSITION TO ADULTHOOD.

This paper introduces two new conceptualizations of desistance based on individuals' personal assessments of their own movement away from crime. Drawing from qualitative accounts of changes in offending, we develop survey items indexing subjective desistance and reference group desistance. We then use a representative community sample of young adults to compare these new conceptualizations of desistance against more established measures derived from changes in arrest and self-reported crime. The results indicate that the prevalence and the predictors of desistance vary with these alternative conceptualizations. While relationship quality is consistently related to each desistance measure, the effects of prior crime, peer relationships, race, gender, and parental status depend upon the outcome under consideration. These results show both the generality of the desistance process and the utility of comparing subjective accounts of this process alongside official and self-reported behavioral measures.