Ch 9. Psychological Theories of Crime Flashcards
Examines criminality through theories of personality or learning that account for a person’s behaviour in a specific situation
Psychological Theories of Crime
What two assumptions does most psychological theories have?
- Assumption of offender deficit (psychologically wrong w the offender)
- Assumption of discriminating traits (offenders and non-offenders have different traits)
Community Psychology 4 levels of analysis
- Individual Level
- Small Group Level
- Organizational Level
- Institutional/Community Level
Social problems are defined as individual deficits, created by group functioning deficits, problems in organization, or created by institutions.
Associated with Freud (though he did not apply his theory to criminality).
Crime happens because of Neurosis. Individuals who commit crimes feels guilt/anxiety and uses punishment to elevate this feeling (warren + hiderland)
Psychoanalytic Theory
What are the five stages of psychoanalytic theory where people seek pleasure/pain?
- Oral
- Anal
- Phallic
- Latency
- Genital
What are the three forces of personality in the psychoanalytic theory?
- ID: Biological/Instinctual needs
- EGO: regulates the id and superego
- SUPEREGO: conscience/moral principles internalized from society
(psychoanalytic theory)
Crime results when the ego and superego are unable to control…
…the primitive, aggressive, antisocial instincts of the id.
(psychoanalytic theory) Criminality is caused by a person’s failure to progress the…
… ego and superego satisfactory through the early stages of development, making the individual is susceptible to antisocial behavior
Seeks to understand human behaviour from a Darwinian perspective of natural selection.
Evolutionary Theory
- It normalizes and excuses criminal behaviour.
- It is too deterministic.
- The explanations are hypothetical, given our lack of knowledge of early human behaviour.
Critiques of evolutionary theory
Criminal behaviour understood by focusing on how we develop (or fail to develop) a sense of morality and responsibility. Jean Piaget (1932) is a big contributor to this theory.
Theories of Moral Development
- Preconventional: driven by rewards/punishment
- Conventional: accepts/upholds rules of society - conformity
- Postconventional: critically examines customs/rules of society. Few attain this.
Kohlberg’s stages of moral development
Rewards and Punishments can increase the probability of a given response. Reward reinforces a behaviour while punishment weakens a behaviour. B.F. Skinner
Operant Conditioning
Diagnostic Label: a pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation of, the rights of others that begins in childhood or early adolescence and continues into adulthood (3%M 1%F)
Antisocial Personality Disorder
Antisocial Personality Disorder is not…
…mental illness.
The prevalence of mental disorder among those in correctional facilities is greater…
…than in the general population. Having said that, most people with mental illnesses do not commit a crime, and the assumption that all crime is a symptom of mental illness is wrong.
In recent years, there has been an increased involvement of those with mental illness in the…
…CJS. Police are increasingly encountering mentally ill individuals.
what are the two most common mental illness related to crime?
Schizophrenia
Substance Abuse
In 1999 the Supreme Court of Canada laid the foundation for…
….NCRMD (not criminally responsible on account of mental disorder)
Unable to present a defence during the proceedings due to mental disorder. Based on the inability to understand the nature or object of proceedings, understand the possible consequences of the proceedings, or communicate with counsel.
unfit to stand trial
(they are unable to receive an absolute discharge.)
- Makes a strong case for a situational approach to understanding criminal behaviour
- argues for less focus on defective properties of the individual
- places more emphasis on situational pathologies or environmental stressors that may alter an offender’s psychological state
Psychological Theories of Crime
research focused on the moral lives of children.
- Young children are egocentric
- 11-12 stage of cooperation
he concluded that schools should teach moral reasoning by allowing students to work out the rules through problem-solving in the classroom.
Piaget’s Theory of Moral Development
What does the Evolutionary Theory refer to, to account for high rate of criminal offending among young men?
Reproductive Fitness Variance (range of possible offspring one can produce). Men are less risk-averse than women, esp during late adolescent and early adulthood years when competition for mates is most intense.
Personality theories are based on ideas of classical conditioning which says that deviant behaviour is inherently…
…reinforcing, so children will only refrain if punished. (punishment = deterrence)
Eysenck’s theory of crime and personality says that which three traits in an individual make them more likely to be delinquent/criminal?
Extroversion (excitement/impulsiveness/weak conscience)
Neuroticism: difficult to condition positively
Psychoncism: violence
The central concept to this theory is cognitive functioning: the ability to think & make choices and how people learn new behaviours through modeling
Social Learning Theory
From Social Learning Theory, Bandura said that aggression is learned from what three sources?
Family
Subcultural Influences
Symbolic Modelling
