Delinquent boys at increased risk of premature death and disability by middle age

Men who have a history of delinquency in childhood are more likely to die or become disabled by the time they are 48, and not just from the obvious consequences of antisocial behaviour, new research indicates.

The UK study, published in the December issue of the Journal of Public Health, is the first to examine how a wide range of early antisocial behaviours, as well as parental factors, affect various health outcomes 40 years later.

The study found that among boys who engaged at age 10 in antisocial behaviour such as regularly skipping school or being rated troublesome or dishonest by teachers and parents, and who then went on to be convicted of a crime by the age of 18, 16.3% (1 in 6) had died or become disabled by the age of 48. That compared with 2.6% (1 in 40) of the boys from the same lower socioeconomic South London neighbourhood who were not delinquent or offenders - an almost seven-fold difference.