Dispositional Explanation

Question 1

What does the dispositional explanation suggest about aggression in prisons?

Answer 1

It focuses on the characteristics of the prisoners themselves, arguing that they are violent and aggressive people and therefore bring the aggression into the prison with them

Question 2

What is an example of a dispositional explanation?

Answer 2

Importation model

Question 3

Who created the importation model?

Answer 3

Irwin and Cressey

Question 4

What does the importation model suggest?

Answer 4

Prisoners import their aggressive tendencies into prison with them and therefore the aggression that is evident in prison is no different to how the offenders act when they are in their home environment. For example dependency or addiction to substances

Question 5

What is the first prison sub culture?

Answer 5

Criminal and thief sub culture

Question 6

What does the criminal and thief sub culture suggest?

Answer 6

This advocates a criminal code of honour such as not telling on inmates. This promotes honour, trust and loyalty as key values. The members are hardened criminals and repeat offenders

Question 7

What is the second prison sub culture?

Answer 7

Convict sub culture

Question 8

What does the convict sub culture suggest?

Answer 8

This has a strong power hierarchy and this is deemed necessary to exercise power over other inmates. Members of this sub culture are often from deprived areas and familiar with gang culture

Question 9

What is the third sub culture?

Answer 9

Conventional or straight sub culture

Question 10

What does the conventional or straight sub culture suggest?

Answer 10

Members of this sub culture will be new to prison and are likely to be one time only offenders. They will try to keep clear of the other sub cultures and have more in common with the prison guards. These are not generally aggressive prisoners

Question 11

Who conducted the first piece of research into the importation model?

Answer 11

Kane and Janus

Question 12

What did Kane and Janus find?

Answer 12

Found that the number of violent offences was related to the learned history of the offender. If the prisoner had lower levels of education and more time unemployed they were more likely to be violent and aggressive in prison. This shows that violence may have been imported due to previous experience

Question 13

Who conducted the second piece of research into the importation model?

Answer 13

Kane and Janus

Question 14

What did Kane and Janus find in their second study?

Answer 14

Race and age influenced levels of aggression in prisons and they found that non whites and younger inmates were more likely to be aggressive. This supports the importation model as all prisoners experience the same conditions yet there are different levels of aggression so it’s due to the individual

Question 15

What are two strengths of the importation model?

Answer 15

• it looks at prisoners in a more idiographic way as it argues that the effects of experience influences aggression and why some offenders are violent and others are not
• the model has practical applications by suggesting that rehabilitation should consider the home environment and the individual which reduces the chances of reoffending

Question 16

What is a strength/limitation of the importation model?

Answer 16

Delois et al found that gang membership doesn’t influence prison violence as there was no correlation. However the findings could have been due to the fact that violent gang members are kept separate from the mainstream prison population restricting their opportunity for violence

Question 17

What is a limitation of the importation model?

Answer 17

Poole and Regoli found that pre institutional violence is the best predictor of inmate aggression in juvenile correctional institutions however this was not replicated in adult prisons so therefore the findings cannot be generalised