Forensic Psychology : L5 Eysenck's Criminal Personality

Question 1

Eysenck’s Theory of The Criminal Personality

Answer 1

• According to Eysenck (1947) our personality traits are biological in origin and come about through the type of nervous system we inherit from our parents
• Offenders have distinctive inherited/genetic personality traits, they are high in neuroticism, extraversion and psychoticism.

Question 2

High Extraversion score

Answer 2

impulsive and seek sensation which
draws them to the thrill of criminal behaviour.

Question 3

High Neuroticism score

Answer 3

• unstable and unpredictable
• inherited a nervous systems that made them difficult to
  condition, as a result they will not learn easily from their mistakes.

Question 4

High Psychoticism

Answer 4

• Cold, lack empathy and are prone to
  aggression.

Question 5

(-) Evaluation

Answer 5

• Several studies and reported that offenders tended to score higher on psychoticism, but NOT on extraversion and neuroticism, when compared to non-offenders.
• Heavily criticised as being simplistic. Crime is too varied and complex a behaviour to be due to one single personality type (murder vs robbery).
• Eysenck ‘s theory is out of step with modern personality theory. Digman’s (1990) Five Factor Model of personality suggests that openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness are important personality dimensions, in addition to extraversion and neuroticism.
• Bartol and Holanchock (1979) looked into cultural differences. They studied Hispanic and African-American offenders in a maximum security prison in New York and divided them into six groups based on their criminal history and the nature of their offences. All six groups were found to be LESS extravert than non-criminal control groups. This means Eysenck’s theory could beculturally biased.