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This data collection effort, initiated by Dr. Donald J. West and continued by Dr. David Farrington, was undertaken to test several hypotheses about delinquency. The investigators examined socioeconomic conditions, schooling, friendship, parent-child relationships, extracurricular activities, school records, and criminal records. They also performed psychological tests to determine the causes of crime and delinquency. Information in the survey includes reports from peers, family size, child-rearing behavior, job histories, leisure habits, truancy, popularity, physical attributes, tendencies toward violence, sexual activity, and self-reported delinquency.

This data collection focuses on 354 male narcotic addicts who were selected using a stratified random sample from a population of 6,149 known narcotic abusers arrested or identified by the Baltimore, Maryland, Police Department between 1952 and 1976. Variables include respondent's use of controlled drugs, including marijuana, hallucinogens, amphetamines, barbiturates, codeine, heroin, methadone, cocaine, tranquilizers, and other narcotics. Also of interest is the respondent's past criminal activity including arrests, length of incarceration, educational attainment, employment history, personal income, mobility, and drug treatment, if any.

The first goal of this study was to identify the incidence of partner violence among Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) recipients over a three-year period. The second goal of this study was to examine the impact of partner violence on women's labor force participation over time. A final goal of this research was to explore the short and longer-term consequences of victimization on women's employment and economic well-being, as well as their physical and mental health. This study used the first three years of data from the Illinois Families Study (IFS). The first of the annual surveys was administered between November 1999 and September 2000, the second between February 2001 and September 2001, and the third between February 2002 and September 2002. The three data files contain very similar information including such items as a household roster, housing and neighborhood characteristics, employment, literacy and skills, parenting, and children. There is also information related to the respondent's history, health, self-efficacy, life events, experiences with domestic violence, civic participation and social support, income resources, and experiences with welfare. The Part 1 (Wave 1 Data) data file contains 1,323 cases and 942 variables. The Part 2 (Wave 2 Data) data file contains 1,183 cases and 763 variables. The Part 3 (Wave 3 Data) data file contains 1,072 cases and 778 variables. Additional information about the Illinois Families Study (IFS) is available on the IFS Web site.

For this data collection, information on police-citizen encounters was collected to explore the peacekeeping functions of the police and their handling of encounters with mentally ill persons. The data were gathered for part or all of 270 shifts through observations by researchers riding in police cars in two Chicago police districts during a 14-month period in 1980-1981. In Part 1 (Shift Level), information was collected once per shift on the general level of activity during the shift and the observer's perceptions of emotions/attitudes displayed by the police officers he/she observed. The file also contains, for each of the 270 shifts, information about the personal characteristics, work history, and working relationships of the police officers observed. Part 2 (Encounter Level) contains detailed information on each police-citizen encounter including its nature, location, police actions and/or responses, citizens involved, and their characteristics and behavior. A unique and consistent shift identification number is attached to each encounter so that information about police officer characteristics from Part 1 may be matched with Part 2. There are 1,382 police-citizen encounters involving 2,555 citizens in this collection.

The National Institute of Justice sponsored this study of 1,065 prison inmates in Louisiana, Pennsylvania, and Washington. Respondents were administered an academic achievement test, the Tests of Adult Basic Education, and an individual intelligence test, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R). Other screening tests were also given to certain respondents, including the Mann-Suiter Disabilities Screening Test and the Adaptive Behavior Checklist. Data for each inmate includes offenses committed, prior institutionalization, juvenile adjudication, years of formal education, academic and vocational participation while incarcerated, previous diagnoses, childhood home situation, death of parents, number of siblings, and any childhood problems. Information on demographic characteristics, such as age, sex, race, employment history, and physical condition, is available for each respondent.

The National Longitudinal Survey of Youth,1997 (NLSY97) is a longitudinal project that follows the lives of a sample of American youth born between 1980-84; 8,984 respondents were ages 12-17 when first interviewed in 1997. This ongoing cohort has been surveyed 15 times to date and is now interviewed biennially. Data are available from Round 1 (1997 survey year) to Round 15 (2011 survey year).

This study is an evaluation of the National Supported Work Demonstration project, a transitional, subsidized work experience program for four target groups of people with longstanding employment problems: ex-offenders, former drug addicts, women who were long-term recipients of welfare benefits, and school dropouts, many with criminal records. The program provided up to 12-18 months of employment to about 10,000 individuals at 15 locations across the country for four years. In ten of these sites -- Atlanta, Chicago, Hartford, Jersey City, Newark, New York, Philadelphia, Oakland, San Francisco, and Wisconsin, 6,600 eligible applicants were randomly assigned either to experimental groups (offered a job in supported work) or to control groups, and an evaluation was conducted on the effects of the Supported Work Program. At the time of enrollment, each respondent was given a retrospective baseline interview, generally covering the previous two years, followed by up to four follow-up interviews scheduled at nine-month intervals. Two public use files were originally distributed for this data collection: Supported Work Employment and Earnings File, and Supported Work Deviant Behavior File. Each file contained data for up to five interviews, a cross-document dataset and an Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) recipients follow-up. The Employment and Earnings File contains data from all interview modules except the drug and crime sections, and the Deviant Behavior File contains all variables on the Employment and Earnings File as well as additional information on drugs and crime. Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) recipients were further asked about children in school and welfare participation, while all non-AFDC respondents were questioned about any extralegal activities. Demographic items specify age, sex, race, marital status, education, number of children, employment history, job search, job training, mobility, household income, welfare assistance, housing, military discharge status, and drug use. Each respondent has up to six logical, fixed-length records, with each record corresponding to a completed interview (up to five) and one additional short "cross-document" record. A User's Guide describing the collection and its components is available and should be read before the collection or any part of it is ordered.

This study served as a controlled research evaluation of the New York City Court Employment Project (CEP) as it stood in 1976-1979. At the time of the study, CEP was an independent corporation under contract to New York City's Human Resources Administration. The ultimate aim of CEP was to change the income-generating behavior of its participants to reduce their subsequent criminal activity. CEP did this by diverting accused offenders from routine court procedures (criminal prosecution, sentencing, and possible incarceration) and instead placing them into jobs, training, or vocationally-oriented counseling services. Eligible defendants agreed to attend mandatory counseling sessions, to devise and execute individual plans for securing training and employment, and to avoid arrest and conviction during their participation. Charges were dismissed by the court if, at the end of six months, CEP counselors determined that the defendant had participated successfully. Research goals for this study were to accumulate data in order to: (1) assess the impact of diversion on recidivism and personal stability, (2) ascertain the outcome of court cases without diversion, and (3) assess the relationship of these outcomes to the social services aspect of diversion programs. The study compared a control group of non-CEP offenders with an experimental group of CEP participants to assess the program's effectiveness in helping offenders find and maintain employment or training and avoid criminal activity. Data were collected on 666 subjects, 410 in the experimental group and 256 in the control group. Three interviews were conducted at six-month intervals with each subject, initially to record self-reports about education, training, employment history, reliance on public assistance, criminal history, illegal activities, lifestyle, and utilization of social services, and then to maintain current information about their school, employment, income, and court processing status. In addition to the three personal interviews, official records data were obtained from a variety of agencies to gather information including criminal history, disposition of the case on which the defendant entered the research, information related to subsequent arrests, and (for members of the experimental group) information about participation in CEP. Other variables include attendance at counseling sessions, type of employment found, job attendance, self-evaluation of important life events and life satisfaction, social services programs utilized, and drug and alcohol use, as well as defendant's and defendant's parents' age, sex, and race.

The Project on Human Development in Chicago Neighborhoods (PHDCN) was a large-scale, interdisciplinary study of how families, schools, and neighborhoods affect child and adolescent development. One component of the PHDCN was the Longitudinal Cohort Study, which was a series of coordinated longitudinal studies that followed over 6,000 randomly selected children, adolescents, and young adults, and their primary caregivers over time to examine the changing circumstances of their lives, as well as the personal characteristics, that might lead them toward or away from a variety of antisocial behaviors. Numerous measures were administered to respondents to gauge various aspects of human development, including individual differences, as well as family, peer, and school influences. The Employment and Income Interview was an atypical measure in that its primary concern was not to evaluate the developmental circumstances but rather to assess the economic circumstances surrounding the subjects. The Employment and Income Interview was administered to the subjects' primary caregivers for Cohorts 0, 3, 6, 9, 12, and 15 and to the subjects themselves for Cohort 18. The Employment and Income Interview was developed specifically for the PHDCN Longitudinal Cohort Study with the intent of combining the employment and income data obtained with educational status data to create socioeconomic stratifications for the respondents. The Employment and Income Interview sought to obtain data describing the respondent's current or most recent employment and that of his or her partner. The Employment and Income Interview also sought information regarding primary income and additional sources of income as well total working hours, proximity to work, and means of transportation to work for both the respondent and his or her partner.

The study was designed to explore the relationship between employment and involvement with the criminal justice system. Males arrested primarily for felony offenses were interviewed at the central booking agency in Brooklyn, New York, at the time of their arrests in 1979. A subsample of 152 arrestees was reinterviewed in 1980. The data include information on labor market participation, arrests, periods of incarceration, and the respondents' demographic characteristics. The labor market information spans a two-year period prior to those arrests. Arrest history and other criminal justice data cover the two years prior to arrest and one year following the arrest. Additional variables supply information on employment and occupation, social and neighborhood characteristics, and perceptions of the risk of committing selected crimes.

The Transitional Aid Research Project (TARP) was a randomized field experiment conducted in Texas and Georgia in 1976-1977 that was designed to reduce recidivism among ex-prisoners by lowering incentives for re-engaging in property crime through provision of minimal levels of income support and extension of some unemployment insurance coverage to released prisoners. This study evolved out of an earlier LIFE (Living Insurance for Ex-Prisoners) study conducted in Baltimore, Maryland in the early 1970s. In the LIFE study, 500 prisoners with a high probability of re-arrest were randomly assigned at release from prison to experimental and control groups which varied by the amount of money received (contingent upon employment or unemployment and job placement services provided). The results showed that ex-prisoners receiving payments were less likely to be re-arrested for property theft-related crimes than those who received only job placement or no services or payments of any kind. The United States Department of Labor commissioned the TARP experiment, designed to replicate the LIFE experiment while providing a larger and more representative sample of prisoners, greater variation in treatment conditions, and administration of payments and job placement services through existing agencies rather than by a special purpose project staff. Texas and Georgia were the states chosen for the experiment, and stratified random samples of inmates were assigned, at the time of release from prison, to experimental and control groups. The groups varied in the amount of money and job placement services they received upon their release. Originally, the data were recorded in nine files for each state corresponding to each of the nine different sources of information for each TARP case. The ICPSR data collection combines these into one file for each state: Part 1 for Texas, and Part 2 for Georgia. Each file contains over 1,500 variables, clustered in nine topic areas for each inmate: (1) prison history (e.g., background information, psychological and aptitude test data, and prior criminal and present incarceration activity), (2-5) data from four personal interviews (conducted at the prerelease, three-month, six-month, and 12-month stages and that include living arrangements, employment history, and financial status), (6) state arrest data, (7) records of TARP payments received, (8) social security wages, and (9) parole records.