Notes on juvenile delinquency and the psychologist role

Abstract

Thearticle atempts to emphasize some ideas considered important concerning the role played by psychologists in the field of juvenile delinquency. It begins with the concept of crime and its penal and legal character by examining different . theoretical and legal conceptions about juvenile delinquency. Different profiles of this delinquency are described, after having made a distinction between «known» and «unknown» delinquency. We refer to «primary» or diffuse social control and to «secondary» or institutionalized control, both applied to delinquency. The most important characteristics and loopholes of the Spanish 4/1992 Organic Law which regulates the attributions and procedures of the Juvenile Court were analyzed. This law is the main legal instrument for the institutionalised control of the delinquency of those adolescents who have not reached the age of criminal responsibility. Next, we examined some of the questions prior to the possibility of considering the intervention of social workers (specially psychologists) in Juvenile Courts. Some possible fields of intervention are pointed out. We describe the main functions included in the role «assigned» to the psychologists, which seems to coincide with the role «assumed. by the professionals working in the Technical Support Teams of the Juvenile Courts. We pay special attention to the role assigned to psychologists in the Juvenile Courts' Law. Finally, we discuss the need to analyze the role into which psychologists (and, by extension, the other social workers) are being incorporated within the Legal System, and possible alternatives.