@phdthesis{01K8MYVC6BAKWVRA63DTT30W2W,
  abstract     = {{Violent crime tends to follow recognizable patterns that unfold not only across space and time, but 
also through social relationships. While prior research has primarily emphasized environmental and 
situational explanations for the spread of (violent) crime, such perspectives often overlook the social 
processes that shape offending behavior. A growing body of work highlights the importance of 
interpersonal relationships and peer influence in the development and persistence of criminal 
behavior, suggesting that violence may diffuse through social ties rather than solely through spatial or 
temporal proximity. Over the last decade, researchers have increasingly turned to social network 
approaches to examine how crime, and particularly violent crime, may be transmitted through 
interpersonal connections. Co-offending networks, in which individuals are connected through jointly 
committed offenses, offer a valuable context to study these dynamics. Co-offending is often embedded 
in pre-existing social ties and shaped by group processes that can reinforce criminal behavior. These 
networks thus serve not only as an organizing structure for criminal collaboration, but potentially also 
as a medium for the diffusion of violent behavior.
Despite these recent insights, the question of how violent offending behavior spreads through cooffending networks remains unexplored. Existing studies tend to examine violence either as a 
situational outcome of group offending, a risk factor for victimization, or a behavioral tendency shaped 
by exposure to violent peers. While each line of research offers important contributions, they often 
operate in isolation and overlook how violence may diffuse across the structure of co-offending 
networks. In particular, little is known about how offenders’ network positions, the nature of their cooffending interactions, and the criminal profiles of their associates might influence their own violent 
offending trajectories. This doctoral research addresses these gaps by adopting a network-based 
perspective to examine to what extent structural and interpersonal dynamics within co-offending 
networks help explain the transmission of physically violent offending behavior.
To achieve this, this research draws upon complementary theoretical frameworks. The social structure 
social learning model, building on differential association and social learning theories, posits that 
violence is learned through interactions with others within social structures, particularly through 
mechanisms like reinforcement. The rational choice perspective enhances this by emphasizing 
offenders' agency in selecting co-offenders and weighing risks and rewards, offering insights into how 
violent ties may form. Finally, network criminology bridges these perspectives, providing a structural 
lens to understand how the positions and relationships within co-offending networks influence the 
spread of violent behavior. Together, these frameworks offer a comprehensive understanding of how 
violent offending behavior may propagate and evolve within criminal networks.
Due to the limited literature on how violent offending spreads within co-offending networks, this 
dissertation first presents an integrative literature review (n = 39 studies) on adolescent peer networks. 
This review explored how social network compositions shape the transmission of deviant behavior, 
offering insights into peer influence mechanisms relevant to criminal behavior. By identifying key 
concepts, patterns, and gaps in the literature, this review lays the groundwork for the subsequent 
empirical analyses of violent offending behavior within co-offending networks.
The first empirical study focused on how the structure of co-offending networks facilitates or hinders 
the spread of violent behavior, emphasizing the role of violent homophily among offenders. Using a 
police-recorded crime dataset of 33,815 offenders, the study examined whether violent offenders 
VI
were more likely to co-offend with others of similar violent backgrounds, finding a pattern of 
behavioral homophily. The analysis further showed that violent behavior was more likely to spread 
within certain subcomponents of the co-offending network, rather than being uniformly distributed 
across the entire network. These findings highlight the importance of both behavioral homophily and 
network structure in shaping the transmission of violent offending within co-offending networks.
The second empirical study focused on the extent to which co-offending interactions influence the 
persistence of violent offending behavior. Conducting two binary logistic regressions on policerecorded crime data (n = 20,203 offenders), the study examined the impact of the violent nature of cooffenders and co-offenses on future (violent) offending behavior. A prominent finding was that cooffending in violent acts significantly heightened the likelihood of future violent offending, indicating 
that direct participation in violence may be a critical mechanism in the transmission of violent 
offending behavior. While co-offending with violent individuals generally increased the likelihood of 
reoffending, violent co-offenses strongly influenced the persistence of violent offending in particular. 
These findings highlight the importance of both the type of co-offender and the nature of co-offenses 
in shaping the continuity of violent offending behavior within co-offending networks.
The third empirical study focused on how violent behavior and co-offending interactions shape 
offenders' network positions within a co-offending network. Using police-recorded crime data (n = 
1,693 offenders), the study examined the impact of violent offending and co-offender characteristics 
on offenders' centrality and importance within the network through three multinomial logistic 
regressions. Key findings showed that offenders who predominantly engaged in violent offenses were 
more likely to become less central, while severe violence increased prominence. In addition, cooffending with accomplices in intermediary positions increased an offender’s prominence, whereas 
those exclusively co-offending with violent individuals experienced greater instability in their position. 
The results underscore the role of both violent behavior and co-offending interactions in shaping 
offenders’ network positions.
Together, the findings of this dissertation provide insights into the transmission of physically violent 
offending behavior within co-offending networks. By examining both structural and interpersonal 
dynamics, this research enhances our understanding of the mechanisms through which violent 
offending behavior may spread. The findings emphasize the critical role of network topology, 
highlighting how specific positions within a co-offending network may facilitate or hinder the diffusion 
of violence. Additionally, the research underscores the importance of the nature of co-offending 
relationships. The interconnectedness of structural and interpersonal dynamics also reveals how 
network positions can be shaped by offenders' criminal relationships. This doctoral research provides 
a more comprehensive framework for studying the transmission of violent offending, suggesting 
avenues for future research and informing the development of targeted interventions and policies 
aimed at disrupting violent crime transmission within criminal networks.}},
  author       = {{Geeraert, Joke}},
  keywords     = {{violence,co-offending,social network analysis}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  pages        = {{XVI, 155}},
  publisher    = {{Ghent University. Faculty of Law and Criminology}},
  school       = {{Ghent University}},
  title        = {{Of feathers and birds : the role of offending peers in the transmission of violent offending in offender networks}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}