The relationship between drugs and crime differs by age.

The ‘age-crime curve’ suggests that people are more likely to commit crimes in their late teens, and that this declines as they reach their early 20s. But does this apply to all crimes? In new research, Wanda Leal and Carrie Mier find that while there are higher rates of some crimes among juveniles over the adult population, young people and adults’ drug use differs. They write that there are differences between drug use and crime based on age and that different drugs seem to matter for different types of crime within a certain age group.