rushes with the law. One study revealed that 33% of all the boys and 14% of the girls born in 1958 had at least one contact with the police before reaching their eighteenth birthday. Indeed, some forms of serious delinquent behavior such as drug and alcohol abuse, are far more frequent than the stereotypical delinquent behavior of gang fighting and vandalism and appear to cut across "class and gender lines."
             Studies that take from youth themselves the volume of their delinquent behavior consistently suggests that large numbers of adolescents engage in at least "some form of misbehavior" that could result in their arrest. As a consequence, it is largely "trivial misconduct," rather than the commission of serious crime, that shapes the actual nature of juvenile delinquency. One national study of youth aged 15-21, for example, noted that only 5% reported involvement in a serious assault, and only 6% reported having participated in a gang fight. In contrast, 81% admitted to having used alcohol, 44% admitted to having used marijuana, 37% admitted to having been publicly drunk, 42% admitted to having skipped classes, 44% admitted having sexual intercourse, and 15% admitted to having stolen from their families.
             Indeed, an important point to understand about the nature of delinquency, and particularly female delinquency, is that youth can be taken into custody for both criminal acts and a wide variety of what are called "status offenses." These offenses allow for the arrest of youth for a wide range of behaviors that are violations of parental authority: "running away from home," "being a person in need of supervision," being "incorrigible," "beyond
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