Gang membership, race, and social class: a test of the group hazard and master status hypotheses

This article examines the extent to which gang membership, race, and social class affect a youth's chances of being arrested, independent of their sel f-reported delinquent behavior. We couple the concepts of group hazard and master status to frame our theoretical predictions. Using data from the Sea ttle Youth Study (Hindelang, Hirschi, and Weis 1981), we find that the odds of being arrested are roughly similar for gang and nongang members, contro lling for the nature and level of self-reported delinquency. While being a gang member does not pose a group hazard to being arrested, a youth's maste r status based on race and social class is associated with arrest risk. Bot h being black and lower class increases a youth's odds of being arrested, i ndependent of delinquency. Neither race nor class effects can be accounted for by the frequency with which youth hang out with their best friends. We propose several recommendations for reducing race and class profiling.