Criminal behviour Flashcards
How does Sutherland (1949) describe gender roles in society?
He states that society encourages boys to be tough and strong while keeping girls sheltered and submissive, which gives boys more opportunity for crime
What does Cohen (1955) say about gender role models?
Children, especially boys require a same sex role model to express their masculinity. Without a similar characteristics role model, boys often reject their mother to express their masculinity in gangs or peer groups, which leave them more vulnerable to crime.
Describe how gender roles affect women in society
The patriarchal society makes it harder for women to succeed and gives them less chance to commit white collar crimes, with 5% of males in prison committing WCC and only 2.5% in women (Ministry of justice 2014)
How does gender socialization influence children?
With separate bathrooms, clear differences in gender marketing and different sport opportunities in schools, children understand early on that the genders are not equal, which makes them act differently depending on the gender of a person, which plays into mother rejection and social control.
What did Sutherland believe about differential association?
Sutherland believed you could predict whether someone would turn to crime based on the frequency, duration and intensity of their social contacts
How are criminal attitudes learned?
An individual may be positively reinforced for criminal or deviant behaviour by associates with pro-criminal attitudes, or they may be negatively reinforced and turn to crime to avoid social rejection or isolation.
What is vicarious reinforcement?
Leaning through others.
Name 2 of Sutherlands differential association principles
- Criminal behaviour is learned through communication of others
- The process of learning criminal behaviour by association with criminal and anti-criminal patterns involves all of the mechanisms that are involved in any other learning.
- The specific direction of motives and drives is learned from definitions of the legal codes as favourable or unfavourable. (i.e. learning to be for or against crime)
What did Osborne & West (1979) find?
Found that where there is a father with a criminal conviction, 40% of the sons had committed a crime by age 18 compared to 13% of sons of non-criminal fathers.
What did Akers et al (1979) find?
surveyed 2500 male and female adolescents in the US to investigate drinking and drug behaviour. Findings showed that the most important influence on this behaviour was peer association, reinforcement and imitation which all combined to account for 68% of marijuana use and 55% alcohol use
Briefly describe Eysenck’s criminal personality theory
The theory that criminals have a particular personality type based on three disorders, neuroticism, psychotism and extraversion.
What % of personality are inherited/biological (Eysenck?)
67%
Explain extraversion
their nervous system is underactive or under aroused, so seek external stimulation to increase their biological arousal (introverts are innately over aroused so seek to reduce stimulation)
Explain neuroticism
has a very reactive nervous system, primarily during fight or flight, so they react or get upset quite easily (The stable personality has an unreactive nervous system so they are calm under pressure) - Over-reactive to situations of threat
Explain Psychoticism
has been related to higher levels of testosterone which men are more likely to have this dimension - Lack empathy, increased aggression
What is a cognitive distortion?
an exaggerated or irrational thought pattern where what a person perceives does not represent reality,
leading an offender to deny or rationalise their behaviour.
What is hostile attribution bias?
Drawing a negative conclusion based on someone’s actions
What is minimalization?
Under-exaggerating actions or a situation to down play the seriousness. e.g blame the victim
What are Kohlbergs 6 levels of reasoning?
Preconventional level: 1. Avoiding punishment 2. Aiming at reward Conventional level: 3. Good boy/girl attitude 4. Loyalty to law and order Postconventional level: 5. Justice and the spirit of the law 6. Universal principles of ethics
At which two levels of Kohlbergs levels of reasoning are you more likely to commit crime?
1 and 2, pre-conventional, Individuals are more likely to break the law at these levels because they believe breaking the law is justified if the rewards outweigh the costs.
Which two levels of Kohlbergs levels of reasoning are more likely to break the law to maintain a relationship or society?
3 and 4, conventional level, individuals at this level value relationships more than the law.
How do cognitive explanations explain crime?
COGNITIVE DISTORTIONS that lead an offender to rationalise or deny their criminal behaviour;
HOSTILE ATTRIBUTION BIAS, where someone has a greater likelihood of thinking and assuming the worst and these negative interpretations then lead to more aggressive behaviour;
MINIMALIZATION, where the consequences of a situation/actions are under-exaggerated which reduces negative interpretations of behaviour before and/or after a crime has been committed.
LEVELS OF MORALITY, criminal behaviour will be mostly found in those who remain in the pre-conventional level of moral reasoning as they believe that breaking the law is justified if the rewards outweigh the costs.
What is a transactional vice?
Being involved in victimless offences where there is a willing exchange of goods or services
When does a behavior become criminal?
When it breaks the law, do not confuse deviance with criminality
List Farr and Gibson’s (1990) criteria to categorize crime
Property
- Property predatory crime (Burglary)
- Property fraudulent crime (Fraud)
Violence
- Interpersonal violence general (Murder)
- Interpersonal violence sexual (Rape)
Victimless
- Transactional vice (Prostitution)
- Order disruption (Rioting)
Mundane
7. Folk/Mundane crime (Fishing with no license)
What does This acronym stand for?
Perpetrators Violate Victims Merrily
Property Violence Victimless Mundane
Farr and Gibson’s 1990 types of crimes
What does MAOA-L stand for?
Monoamine oxidase low (deficient)
this is also known as the warrior gene and causes build up of serotonin, norepinephrine and other neurotransmitters and has been associated with low intelligence and high impulse aggressive behavior
How do genetics explain crime?
Diathesis + stressor = criminal behavior
Combinations include: High stressor + low vulnerability
High vulnerability + low stressor
How can you combat criminal genes?
Epigenetics and nurture
What are epigenetics?
Epigenetics is the study of how your behaviors and environment can cause changes that affect the way your genes work. Unlike genetic changes, epigenetic changes are reversible and do not change your DNA sequence, but they can change how your body reads a DNA sequence
Explain the findings of Emil Coccaro et al (2007)
Coccaro found that the that the amygdala was overactive in IED (intermittent explosive disorder) patients when viewing angry faces, proving an association with the amygdala and anger processing and therefore criminality
What is the amygdala?
A structure of grey matter located in the medial lobe and part of the limbic system, it has been associated with environment and threat assessment
Describe fear conditioning and symptoms of dysfunction
Children learn through associating fear with punishment, if the amygdala is dysfunctional, they cannot correctly determine emotions and associate expression with punishment. This can result in an individual seeming fearless, overly aggressive and anti-social.
Describe the research by Gao et al (2010)
Longitudinal study of 1795 participants, tested for fear conditioning at age 3, measured by sweating, 20 years later they found out the participants who became criminal, those who committed crimes had shown no fear conditioning when they were 3 and were effectively ‘fearless’. This shows a casual relationship with amygdala dysfunction and criminal behavior.
