Analysis of parenting styles in a municipality governed by usos y costumbres and its relationship with minor criminal behavior in adolescents

Abstract

Crime rates in Mexico are a constantly growing problem. For this reason, they are usually approached by multidisciplinary studies, among which forensic psychology stands out, which provides valuable theoretical frameworks that try to explain the role of identity, social relationships, and parenting styles of offenders. However, all these studies have concentrated more on urban societies. The municipalities governed by usos y costumbres, which in Oaxaca, Mexico, reach approximately 80%, have not received the same attention from the scientific community. Theoretically, these community organization systems are based on strong native identities, close social relationships, and traditional parenting styles. Therefore, an investigation was carried out with a qualitative and exploratory approach to identify the parenting styles received by three young delinquents from the municipality of San Lorenzo Cacaotepec, Oaxaca, Mexico, who committed minor offenses in this municipality. The main findings suggest that, contrary to assumptions, communication channels between family members are scarce, there is an absence of one of the parents, and groups outside the family, such as sports teams, are risk factors to ingest prohibited substances. This suggests that the municipalities that are governed by usos y costumbres maintain a sense of community and tradition with political effects, but not family or personal ones. In this sense, there would be no reason to consider that fewer petty crimes are committed in these communities than in urbanized societies.