Running Head: SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND CRIME: TESTING THE LINK 1 Satisfaction with life and crime: Testing the link Jeremy Olsona*, Randy L. Martinb, and Nadine M. Connellc aCriminal of Justice, Penn State University Wilkes-Barre, Dallas, PA, USA; bSchool of Graduate Studies and Research, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Indiana, PA, USA; cCriminology and Criminal Justice, Griffith University Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia Correspondence about this article should be addressed to Jeremy Olson, Criminal Justice, Penn State University Wilkes-Barre, 44 University Drive 108 B Science Dallas PA 18612. Contact: (570) 675-9255 or [email protected], ORCID 0000-0001-8501-7714 Jeremy Olson, Assistant professor, Criminal Justice, Penn State University Wilkes-Barre. Randy L. Martin, Dean, Graduate Studies and Research, Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Nadine M. Connell, Associate Professor, School of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Griffith University. 11558 words SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND CRIME 2 Satisfaction with life and crime: Testing the link Abstract This study tests the hypothesis that higher perceptions of satisfaction with life (SWL) are related to lower engagement in crime and deviance. The results can inform prevention, intervention, and policy efforts based on deterrence, general strain, and restorative justice within the criminal and juvenile justice systems. Using a sample of students at two Pennsylvania universities, data were collected using a paper-based, self-reported survey that included measures for their perceptions of SWL, feelings of strain, and engagement in past acts of deviance and crime. Data analysis included independent samples T-tests and logistic regression estimates. Results of the t-tests supported the hypothesis for nine of 16 acts of deviance/crime. Logistic regression models supported the hypothesis, with SWL having significant associations alone, and with SWL eliminating the relationship to strain alone when SWL covaried with strain. Based on these results, the study offers recommendations to further test the satisfaction with life-crime link, to incorporate SWL interventions into the criminal justice system, and to study SWL interventions for evidence of success. Keywords: crime, delinquency, happiness, satisfaction with life, subjective well-being SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND CRIME 3 Introduction In their seminal works, upon which much of criminal justice is built, both Bentham (1781) and Beccaria (1764) clearly note the influence of pain and pleasure as motivators of human behavior. Bentham felt so strongly about the role of these two factors that he wrote ‘(i)t is for them alone to point out what we ought to do, as well as to determine what we shall do’ (Bentham, 1781, p. 1). Accordingly, the goals of our system of punishments should be to increase pleasure associated with people’s compliance to the laws and to increase pain in response to their violations of the law. Like the goals espoused for criminal justice, psychology also holds that both pleasure and pain are fundamental to human behaviors. Speaking to mental processes, Sigmund Freud wrote that ‘…any given process originates in an unpleasant state of tension and thereupon determines for itself such a path that its ultimate issue coincides with…avoidance of “pain” or with production of pleasure’ (Freud, 1922, p. 1). Thus, pleasure has long been associated with motivation. Historically, however, these two disciplines have focused primarily on pain’s role in offending. Criminal justice has largely attempted to achieve the goal of reducing crime by increasing pain felt, or anticipated, upon violations of law. Psychology has traditionally focused on deficits within the person, particularly those associated with pain, for example, skills for managing emotions or shifting distorted thinking. Here, we attempt to switch that emphasis to understanding the role of pleasure, or satisfaction with life (SWL). Recently, the absence of strategies to increase life satisfaction as an intervention strategy has led to calls for focus on SWL’s role in preventing and countering deviance (Nikolic- SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND CRIME 4 Ristanovic, 2014; Seligman, 1999). Heeding these calls, researchers are now investigating whether satisfaction with life and crime are linked (Alfaro-Beracoechea, Puente, Costa, Ruvalcaba, & Paez, 2018; Buunk, Peiro, Rocabert, & Dijkstra, 2016; Dixon, Nastally, & Waterman, 2010; Eryilmas, 2018; Harris, Pedneault, & Willis, 2019; Maccagnan, Taylor, & White, 2019; MacDonald, Piquero, Valois, & Zullig, 2005; McCarthy & Casey, 2011; Moore, Huebner, & Hills, 2012; Suldo & Huebner, 2004; Tang & Chan, 2017; Tweed et al., 2011; Valois, Paxton, Zullig, & Huebner, 2006; Valois, Zullig, Drane, & Huebner, 2001; Vashisht, Tanwar, & Tanwar, 2018). Additionally, work has begun to integrate SWL into practice. The General Strain Theory (Agnew, 1992, 2005; Agnew & White, 1992), the Risk-Needs- Responsivity Model (Andrews & Bonta, 2010; Andrews & Dowden, 2007), the Good Lives Model (Ward & Brown, 2004; Whitehead, Ward, & Collie, 2007), and work on resilience (Griffin, 2005; Johnson et al., 1996; Ortega, Beauchemin, & Kaniskan, 2008; Pierce & Shields, 1998; Tugade & Fredrickson, 2004) seek to address SWL or related factors. As is expected at this point, extant literature supporting an SWL-crime association is sparse. Many of the available studies rely on proxies for both satisfaction with life and deviance, often they are questions that are “close-enough” and available for secondary analysis of datasets collected for other purposes (Aishvarya et al., 2014; MacDonald et al., 2005; Valois et al., 2006; Valois et al., 2001). The present study addresses these concerns by analyzing primary self-report data from a sample of college students using the Satisfaction with Life Scale (Diener, Emmons, Larsen, & Griffin, 1985) and an adapted version of the Self-Reported Delinquency, General Delinquency Scale (Elliott, Ageton, & Huizinga, 1985). We test the hypothesis that higher satisfaction with life is associated with a lower probability of reporting criminal and deviant acts. SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND CRIME 5 Finding support for this hypothesis will help efforts to further inject SWL into traditional and contemporary offender interventions. Literature Review While happiness has been a topic of interest to the human good at least since the time of Aristotle (cf. Aristotle, 1999), the scientific study of happiness began in the 1970s with a focus on uncovering its demographic correlates (Baumgardner & Crothers, 2009; Diener, 1984; Diener & Seligman, 2004). That initial round of research led to the general finding that most people were happy regardless of their ages, races, ethnicities, sexes, income levels, educational attainments, and countries of residence (Argyle, 1987; Campbell, Converse, & Rodgers, 1976; King & Napa, 1998; Myers & Diener, 1995, 1997). These surprisingly universal findings helped lead researchers to begin scientific studies into the origins of happiness within people. The second wave of happiness research uncovered three components to human happiness. These are positive affect, negative affect, and satisfaction with life. Positive and negative affect appear to be personality-based, generalized emotional reactions to events in the world. While they experience both positive and negative affect, humans tend to experience one of these emotional reactions more often than the other. People who tend toward positive affect generally experience eustress and people who tend toward negative affect generally experience distress (Baumgardner & Crothers, 2009). The third component of happiness is satisfaction with life (SWL). SWL is the conscious awareness one has to the circumstances of his or her life overall (Baumgardner & Crothers, 2009; Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, & Stone, 2004). People who believe their life is going well will report high levels of SWL (Diener, 1984; Diener & Diener, 1996; Diener et al., 1985). SATISFACTION WITH LIFE AND CRIME 6 These three components of happiness can work together to influence people’s perceptions of life events. People with greater positive affect and higher SWL tend to view the outcomes of events positively while the opposite is more likely to occur in people who have greater negative affect and lower SWL (Argyle, 1987; Baumgardner & Crothers, 2009). These components can also work to influence each other. The Dynamic Model of Affect (Zautra, Affelck, Tennen, Reich, & Davis, 2005) posits that as people experience multiple negative outcomes and emotions, damage to all three components occurs; not only does negative affect increase, but both positive affect and SWL decrease. But, where people experience more positive emotions from behaviors and situations, they increase two of these components- positive affect and SWL- over time. In turn, happier people can engage in more complex reasoning and are more likely to take risks necessary to improve their lives (Dunning, Fetchenhauer, & Schlosser, 2017). While more complex reasoning and positive risks may not always lead to less offending, one’s efforts to start this positive chain of events could start with SWL. Satisfaction with Life Satisfaction with life (SWL) is sometimes interchangeably referred to as ‘subjective well- being’ (SWB), ‘life satisfaction,’ or ‘quality of life’ in the happiness literature. SWL is the extent to which a person feels satisfaction with the conditions of their life. It is determined by reflection on the social, historical,