Differential Association Theory Flashcards
What did Sutherland suggest?
People learn their values and techniques for criminal behaviour from those around them, their association- family and friends.
What were the two factors that results in learning values and criminal behaviour from those around?
Imitation- acquiring criminal skills by observing those around them
Learned attitudes- socialisation in a group influences a person norm’s and values so if a person has more criminal association than law abiding citizens then they are more likely to have a favourable attitude to a criminal behaviour as it becomes ‘normal’ and they will commit crimes themselves. Pro criminal attitude.
What did Osbourne and West investigate and then found?
looked at sons of criminals and non criminals and found that where the father had a criminal conviction, 40% of the sons acquired one by the age of 18. This shows that criminal behaviour can be learned because of the association with criminals.
What are evaluations of the differential association theory?
Strengths- the fact we have crime families supports the theory of learned social norms.
Limitation- not everyone who is exposed to criminal behaviours becomes a criminal.
