Life satisfaction and delinquent behaviors among Korean adolescents

The purpose of this study was to use a four-year longitudinal dataset to examine the long-term effects of life satisfaction (LS) on delinquent behaviors (DBs) among Korean adolescents. The study also investigated the potential moderating role of early LS on the associations between early DBs and later DBs. The participants were 3079 adolescents who participated in the Korean Youth Panel Study. Self-report measures of LS and DBs were administered annually for four years. The main findings were as follows. First, DBs decreased during mid-adolescence, but then increased thereafter. Second, the unidirectional model between LS and DBs was a better fit than the bidirectional model. In addition, adolescents with high levels of LS at Wave 1 reported less DBs at Wave 4 than adolescents with low levels of LS at Wave 1. Further, DBs at Wave 1 was more strongly associated with DBs at Wave 4, particularly for adolescents with high levels of LS at Wave 1. The results of this study contribute to the positive psychology literature by revealing the effects of LS on DBs using longitudinal data. Additionally, the findings highlight how high levels of earlier LS might be dysfunctional in the context of DBs.