The Jack-Roller

Clifford Shaw pursued his interest in the development of the delinquent pattern in the individual boy and its links with the geography of the city and community disorganization by making the `life history' a key element of the work of the Institute for Juvenile Research. The Jack-Roller is based on `Stanley'. But can we be really sure where Shaw's own story ends and Stanley's begins? I explore the origins of `Stanley's' story in Shaw's own life and suggest that Shaw perhaps misses out the influence of his own biography in his analysis. The broader aim is to suggest that personal reflexivity on the part of the researcher (or what elsewhere is described as a psychosocial approach) is critical to an understanding of research.