Theories to explain criminal behavior have been around along as recorded history.
Aristotle
: poverty is the parent of revolution
and crime. (An environmental view of
the antecedents of crime)
Sir Francis Bacon
(1600’s) : “Opportunity makes a thief”
, pointing out the power of the
situation to affect behavior.
Voltaire &
Rousseau (1700’s) : free will,
hedonistic decision making, and the failure of the social contract in producing
criminal behavior. These explanations
are at the core of the classical theory
of criminology.
According to classical theory , people choose to behave wrongly when they
believe the benefits outweigh the costs.
Classical theorists
argued for making fair and proportionate punishment and reforming Draconian
punishment.
Our Bill of Rights
protection against “cruel and unusual punishment” is a result of this
movement’s conceptualization of criminal behavior.
Positivist School of Criminology : Emphasizes the
understanding of criminal behavior by uncovering factors which account for
criminal behavior.
Positivists use the scientific method and empirical data to aid in their understanding of crime.
Psychological Explanations
Biological Explanations
Sociological Explanations
Sociological
Theories of Crime
Examines social and
cultural forces that contribute to criminal behavior.
Structural Explanation
: certain groups within a society have
less opportunities to achieve the goals most valued by a society.
When individuals are prevented from
achieving their goals (prosperity, success, education) through legitimate
paths, they turn to illegal methods of reaching these goals.
Society places demands on people to reach
these goals, but limits the methods seen as acceptable for reaching these
goals.
Differential Opportunity
within society is seen as a key factor contributing to criminal behavior.
Nettler (1974)
Rational Crime : Explains crime as a
function of criminal opportunity :
1. Crimes where
objects are easy targets for thefts.
2. Crimes associated
with legitimate business.
3. Crime as a
preferred livelihood.
4. Business which
offer illegal services.
Subcultural
Explanations for crime.
Focus on the discrepancy between societal
norms and values and the norms and values of a specific subculture.
Walter Miller (1958)
Theory of Focal Concerns . Describes
the criminal behavior of lower SES teen age gangs in terms of the values and
expected norm of the Gang subculture.
Miller listed 6 basic
characteristics which were highly valued by the gang. Since these are highly
valued, there is normative pressure for gang members to display these qualities
on a regular basis.
Trouble
Toughness : physical
prowess, skill
Smartness : being
able to con others
Excitement : risk and danger
Fate : Being “lucky”
Autonomy : freedom from authority
Criminal behavior is
directed towards living up to these values ;
Adolescents fight to show they are tough, steal to demonstrate cunning, crimes show autonomy and love for
excitement.
The greater the
discrepancy between the dominant culture’s values and the subculture’s values,
the more opportunity for norm violating behavior.
Some of the earliest
positivists were convinced that criminal behavior was a result of genetic
abnormality.
Lombroso :
advanced notion of atavism , which stated criminals represented a savage, earlier
form of humankind.
Hoorten (1939)
: Claimed to have found important
biological differences in criminals and noncriminals.
Burglars have : short heads, blond hair, and nonprotruding
jaws.
Robbers have : long wavy hair, short ears, and broad faces.
Sheldon (1949) : His
Somatic Typology listed three major somatatypes (or body types).
Endomorphs : Obese, soft, and rounded people. Fun loving
and sociable
Mesomorphs :
muscular, athletic people. Assertive, vigorous, and bold.
Ectomorph :
Tall, thin, and well developed brain.
Introverted, sensitive, and nervous
Sheldon thought that mesomorphs were most likely to become
criminals.
Despite the apparent
ridiculousness of the above two theories, more recent research has replicated
this perceived link between physique and criminal behavior.
Olweus (1995) : Examined the factors which turn elementary
school boys into bullies.
Why ? because boys
classified as “bullies” in grades 6-9 (Norway) are four times as likely to be arrested repeatedly as adults, compared
to ‘nonbullies’.
Olweus’ prototypical
bully :
Physically Stronger, Hotheaded Temperament
Commonalities in
Family Life :
Family lacked warmth
Permissive towards
aggressive behavior at home
Physical punishment
used as discipline.
The link between
overall physique and behavior is probably best explained as creating a
different expectation for success within physical conflicts.
Twin Studies
: Researchers examine both fraternal
and identical twins and examine concordance
rate for criminal activity.
Concordance Rate
: The % of pairs of twins sharing the same behavior.
Dizygotic Twins
: Fraternal Twins
Monozygotic Twins
: Identical Twins
Discordant Monozygotic Twins : Identical Twins who were raised apart.
DiLalla and Gorresman
(1990) : did a metanalysis of 4 decades
of twin research into criminality
Concluded the average
concordance rate for fraternal twins was 22% and for identical twins, 51%.
Influence of heredity
is higher for property crime than it is for violent crime. (Cloninger &
Gottesman, 1987)
Adoption Study of
Cloninger et al (1982) : Examining children whose biological parents were
criminals, Crime rate for children was 4 times greater if bio. Parents were
criminals, 2 times greater if adopted parents were criminals (12% and 6%,
respectively)
Freud : Rejected the
“degeneration” theory popular at the turn of the 19th century.
Freud thought
criminal behavior is representative of an ID that operates unchecked by the ego
and the super-ego.
Freud states that
improper resolution of the Oedipal conflict (in which the son must learn to
identify with the father, instead of having sex with his mother)
Criminals suffer from
enormous guilt, and perform criminal acts in order to get punished, which will
temporarily relieve them of their guilt feelings.
Other psychoanalytic
positions on the origin of crime
Alexander :
Criminals ignore the “reality principle”, which is responsible for the delaying
of gratification.
Bowlby (1953)
Criminal activity is a substitute for love and affection. Bowlby thought that disruptions in the
mother-son bond were at the root of most criminal careers.
Do Criminals Think Differently than ‘normal’ people ?
Yochelson & Samenow
(1976, 1984) have studied the cognitive styles of criminals to look for patterns
or aberrations in how they process information.
These researchers
believe thought patters are more important than biology or environment in
determining who becomes a criminal.
Yochelson & Samenow
described the criminals in their research sample as being ‘master
manipulators’, compulsive liars, people in control of their own behavior.
They claim that
criminal thinking had an internal logic and is consistent, but is erroneous and
irresponsible.
A serious discrepancy
exists between a criminals view of reality and societies shared view of
reality.
They developed this
profile based on one-n-one interviews with hardened and psychologically
disturbed criminals. (limited generalizability)
Personality Defects as Explanations for Criminal Behavior.
Maybe criminals are
just not nice people.
Psychopaths : people who engage in frequent, repetitive
criminal activity. Psychopaths are
manipulative and deceitful, seem to lack any social conscience. Psychopaths show little remorse when
caught. Psychopaths are superficial,
arrogant, and seem unable to learn from experience.
Antisocial Personality Disorder : a psychopathic
diagnosis much more commonly assigned to men.
Psychopaths commit
only a small percentage of all crime, but a disproportionate amount of violent
crime
Possible Causes of
Psycopathy:
Reduced Anxiety :
Psychopaths have very low levels of anxiety, may prevent formation of cause and
effect relations with respect to negative outcomes.
Unable to Inhibit
Behavior : psychopaths suffer from an executive function decrement, which
leaves them ill-prepared to plan-out and execute behavior while being aware of
the possible consequences.
Stimulation Seeking :
desire physiological arousal and seeks arousal in non approved ways.
Observational, or
vicarious learning is key to picking up criminal behavior.
Bandura (86) : Claims that violent role models exist in
home, media, and subcultures (gangs)
According to Bandura,
Most human behavior is learned by observing others model a particular behavior.
Bandura (1973) Aggression : A Social Learning Approach
Family Influence
: Discipline provides vivid examples of coercion and aggression as a means of
control and conflict resolution. Child
Abuse and verbal abuse of spouses and also expressions of family aggression.
Subcultural Influences : certain subcultures (teenage gangs) promote aggression and value certain antisocial acts.
Symbolic Models : Media provides a steady diet of violence. Average child sees 8000 murders and a 100,000 other violent acts by the time they turn 18.
Heroes must typically
resort to violence in order to resolve conflict.
Examining biological,
sociological, and psychological theories of criminal behavior, we can develop a
cross-discipline approach to the development of criminal behavior.
Four Categories under
consideration :
Distal Antecedents : Biological, psychological and
environmental factors which can predispose an individual towards criminal
behavior
Early Indicators
; because antisocial behavior is stable across time, some signal are given very
early. Conduct Disorder, ADHD, and oppositional defiant disorder are 3 early
indicators.
Developmental Processes
: How early delinquency is dealt with can help determine whether an individual
reforms or continues criminal conduct.
Maintenance Variables : If
short term payoff seem more profitable than possibility of punishment, criminal
behavior will continue. Polarization
effects
also contribute