Adolescents With Learning Disabilities (Research Paper Example)

Adolescents with learning disabilities face a multitude of challenges. One of those challenges is trying to fit into an environment where their disabilities are not considered. There is a significant relationship between juvenile delinquency (JD) and learning disabilities. The higher delinquency rates in those with learning disabilities may be attributed to poor academic achievement, social rejection, or socially troublesome characteristics (Keilitz & Dunivant, 1986).

The high prevalence of adolescents with learning disabilities in the juvenile justice system insinuates there may be a transparent connection between a disability diagnosis and delinquent conduct (Rucklidge et al., 2009). There has been a profound keenness or interest to learn about students who evince deviant behavior and those who have an LD. Rucklidge et al. (2009) proclaimed that 1 out of the 129-delinquent youth in a U.S. state establishment was performing at the proposed grade level, and approximately 26% of this sample were determined to have a learning problem implicating that there is indeed a high predominance of learning disabilities in incarcerated adolescents.

To further explore the nature of the relationship between learning disabilities and JD, Keilitz, and Dunivant (1986) conducted two studies composed of 973 teenage boys from public schools who had no prior record of official delinquency, 970 teenage boys from the juvenile courts, and youth correctional facilities. In the first study, adolescents with LD had a 220% higher chance of being adjudicated than non-LD adolescents (Keilitz & Dunivant, 1986). The second study aimed to see if learning disabilities were linked to JD by looking at whether learning disabled boys had higher increases in delinquent conduct and adjudications over time than non-learning-disabled boys (Keilitz & Dunivant, 1986). It consisted of 351 from the first study of 973 teenage boys with no history of official delinquency before the outset of the research. Learning disabilities made a significant direct contribution to increases over time in illegal activities, suggesting that the intellectual and personality impairments associated with LD play an essential role in producing delinquent behavior (Keilitz & Dunivant, 1986).

A significant hypothesis offered as a clarification for the connection between learning disabilities and JD is the susceptibility hypothesis. It puts forward that youth with learning disabilities have psychological, neurological, and intellectual barriers that bestow to anti-social and delinquent practices and place them at more serious risk for juvenile court involvement (Mallett, 2013). Consequently, notwithstanding their learning incapacities, adolescents may likewise be tormented with low social aptitudes, impulsivity, hyperactivity, suggestibility, and lower capacity to anticipate the results of their illicit behavior (Mallett, 2013).