There is evidence that in juveniles' development less serious forms of delinquency precede the onset of more serious delinquent acts. This reflects the basic hierarchical and developmental feature of psychopathology -- less serious manifestations precede the more serious manifestations of deviance (Cicchetti, 1990). This was a common finding in earlier research on sequences in the development of delinquency undertaken by Huizinga (1995) and Elliott (1994) in their analysis of longitudinal data from the National Youth Survey and by Le Blanc, Côté, and Loeber (1991) in their analysis of longitudinal data from Quebec. Unlike the Pittsburgh Youth Study, these studies did not seek to elucidate developmental pathways between nondelinquent disruptive behaviors and various forms of delinquency.

The development of problem behavior is more than just a sequence of behaviors that are independent of each other. Instead, investigators must focus on whether developmental sequences in problem behavior represent systematic changes in behavior of individuals over time. Such a conceptualization of pathways has the following features:

• Most individuals who advance to behaviors down a pathway will have displayed behaviors characteristic of the earlier stages in the temporal sequence.

• Not all individuals progress to the most serious outcome(s); typically, increasingly smaller numbers of individuals reach more serious levels within a pathway.

• Individuals who reach a more serious level in a pathway tend to continue to display behaviors typical of earlier levels, rather than replace them with the more serious acts (Loeber, 1991).

At this point in the Pittsburgh Youth Study analysis, the researchers attempted to combine all of the behaviors sequenced in figure 4 into a single composite pathway for disruptive and delinquent behavior, employing what they termed an "empirical atheoretical approach." The researchers then sought to identify individual subjects whose behavioral sequence matched the composite. The researchers found a group of subjects who fit the main developmental sequence, but also a large remainder group who did not. For that reason, the researchers investigated whether the data could fit multiple pathways.

Next, the researchers took a theoretical approach, going back to their earlier work in which authority conflict, covert, and overt problem behaviors were distinguished: Would three pathways prove better than one in accounting for actual behavioral sequences in the lives of individual youth? The following three conceptually distinct pathways are depicted in figure 5.

• Authority Conflict is the first and earliest pathway. The pathway begins with stubborn behavior (stage 1) and can be followed by defiance (stage 2), such as refusal and disobedience. This, in turn, can be followed by authority avoidance (stage 3), such as truancy and running away from home. The authority conflict pathway applies to boys prior to age 12, because after that age some youth are likely to enter the pathway at the highest levels with behaviors such as truancy and staying out late at night.

• Covert acts and their escalation are addressed in the second pathway. This pathway tends to start with minor covert behaviors (stage 1), such as lying and shoplifting, and can be followed by property damage (stage 2), including vandalism and firesetting, and later by more serious forms of property crimes (stage 3), such as burglary.

• Overt or increasingly aggressive acts make up the third pathway. This sequence starts with minor aggression (stage 1), such as annoying others and bullying. This can be followed by physical fighting (stage 2), including gang fighting, and then by violence (stage 3), such as attacking someone, strong-arming, and rape.

The researchers hypothesized that individuals may proceed along one or more pathways toward serious antisocial behavior. Each of the three proposed pathways represents major dimensions of disruptive behavior. The pathways differentiate between behaviors that result in conflict with or avoidance of authority figures (authority conflict pathway), property loss (covert pathway), and physical harm to others (overt pathway).

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