Introductory Criminology Flashcards
What is Criminology?
Body of knowledge regarding crime as a social phenomenon
-Making laws, breaking laws, reacting towards breaking laws
Law, Crime, Treatment
What is Criminal Justice?
Body of knowledge to understand how police, courts, and corrections operates.
-Often with the aim of making the systems more effective
What is Deviance?
Body of knowledge to understand why people engage in deviant behavior and reactions to it.
-Deviant behavior: goes against social norms.
-Not all deviant behavior is criminal and not all criminal behavior is deviant
What was criminal behavior attributed to in the middle ages?
It was attributed to witchcraft due to violating societal and religious norms
What happened during classical criminology?
Utilitarianism
-People choose to act criminally or lawfully
-People choose based on which has less work for a larger payoff
-Fear of punishment can be used to distinctiveness and control criminal behavior
What happened to criminology in the 19th century positivism?
-External factors were believed to be a function of human behavior
-Use of scientific method to explore and solve problems…like crime
What was the main points during positivist criminology?
-Applied positivist thinking to understanding crime
-Namely biological and psychological explanations (biological determinism)
-Phrenology
-Atavistic anomalies (traits)
What did Emile Durkheim feel about Sociological Criminology?
-Spurred by industrial revolution, increasing urbanization, and beginning of sociological thought
-Cartographic School: mapping social factors and crime
-Acknowledged omnipresence of crime
-With move to an industrialized society, people are unsure of their social order and norms.
What were the concerns for the Chicago School?
-Social ecology – urban mapping, social disorganization
-Concentric Zone of Deviance
-Socialization: how relationships impact crime and deviance
What were the main ideas of Conflict Criminology?
-Based on Marxist thinking
-Society is structured to develop and produce goods, and the exploitation of the working classes leads to conflict
-Crime is a product of economic inequality
What are the forces of each era of Criminology?
Classical - Situational Forces
Biological/Psychological - Internal Forces
Structural - Ecological Forces
Process - Socialization Forces
Conflict - Economic and Political Forces
Integrated - Multiple Forces
What are some ways for social control (not punishment)?
-Money
-Propaganda
-Social Media
-Education
-Work
What are 5 ways a crime can be defined?
-Reported to police
-Charges
-Successful conviction
-Reported in victimization survey
-Self reported criminal activity in anonymous crime survey
What 5 factors affect crime rates?
-Report sensitive
-Policing sensitive
-Definition sensitive
-Media sensitive
-Actual trends in data
What does Uniform Crime reports feed into?
It feeds into the Crime Severity Index
What kind of data is used for uniform crime reports?
Aggregate data
How is uniform crime reports collected in 4 different ways?
-Records founded crimes
-Raw figures ( counting number of crimes)
-Percentage change over time (50% increase, 10% decrease)
-Crime rate (x/100,000 people)
What 5 things affect the accuracy of the uniform crime reports and crime severity index?
-Reporting practices
-Law enforcement practices
-Changes in legal definitions
-Media practices
-Methodological issues
What is the crime severity index?
The Crime Severity Index (CSI) measures changes in the level of severity of crime in Canada from year to year. In
What are self report surveys?
-Asks people about their experiences of crime ( as victims and perpetrators)
-Anonymous questionnaires
-Can ask about behavior, intent, attitudes
What are victimization surveys?
-Subset of self-report surveys, asking about victimization
-General Social Survey (victimization is a part of the cycle)
What is a benefit of self-report surveys?
Better at showing distribution of criminal behavior
What are 5 ways we can get information to measure crime?
-Commissions of inquiry
-Meta-analysis
-Systematic review
-Data mining
-Crime mapping
What is correlation?
A statistical measure that expresses the extent to which two variables are linearly related
What is causation?
The relationship between cause and effect
What are a few things that have been linked to crime?
-Ecology
-Social problems
-Age
-Gender
-Race and Indigenous peoples
-Culture
-Guns
-Economy
-Drugs
-Justice
-Policies
What is ecology?
The study of the relationships between living organisms, including humans, and their physical environment;
What is the ecology of crime?
-Day/season/climate
-Temperature
-Population density
-Region
What are some correlations between age and crime?
-People tend to age out of crime
-Early onset criminality leads to chronic criminality
-Young adults commit the most crime
What are 4 correlations between gender and crime?
-Men have higher crime rates than women
-Women have higher involvement in prostitution, fraud, theft
-Men have higher involvement in sexual assault, weapons, B&E
-Trends in offending and victimization are different across gender
What is victim precipitation theory?
Some people initiate the confrontation that leads to injury/death/victimization
What is active precipitation?
“direct, positive precipitator” in the crime
What is passive precipitation?
Personal characteristic that threatens / encourages victimization
What is lifestyle theory?
Some lifestyles increase exposure to potential victimization
What is the main ideas of Equivalent Group Hypothesis?
-Victims and criminals are equivalent groups – same group
-Conditions that predispose people to criminality also predispose them to victimization
-Victim-offender overlap
What is the main idea of the proximity hypothesis?
-Exposure and association with high-risk people in high-risk places at high-risk times increased risk of victimization
-“Wrong place at the wrong time”
What is the main ideas of the deviant place hypothesis?
-There are natural areas for crime, and crime will be here regardless
-“Transitional areas” that bridge commercial and residential
-Deviant Places
What is routine activity theory?
-Attempts to combine the interaction of the lifestyle theories
-Place, victim, offender
-Explains predatory crime
What are the 3 things needed for crime to happen according to routine activity theory?
-Lack of capable guardians (No police presence, absence of homeowners, no security systems)
-Motivated criminals (Teenage boys, unemployed, addict population)
-Suitable targets (Unlocked homes, expensive cars, easily transportable goods)
What are 5 things included in the victims right movements?
-Social programs
-Victim-impact statements
-Compensation
-Victim supports – court and crisis response
-Restorative justice
What are 6 things Criminologists study?
-Criminal Statistics
-Sociology of Law
-Theory Construction
-Criminal Behavior Systems
-Penology
-Victimology
What are 6 form of research for Criminology?
-Survey Research
-Longitudinal Research (cohort)
-Aggregate Data Research
-Experimental Research
-Analyzing Policy
-Observational and Interview data (ethnographic)
What are 3 characteristics of consensus view?
-The law defines crime
-Agreement exists on outlawed behavior
-Laws apply to all citizens equally
What are 4 ideas of the conflict view?
-The law is a tool of the ruling class
-Crime is a politically defined concept
-“Real crimes” are not outlawed
-The law is used to control the underclass
What are 3 ideas of the Interactionalist view?
-Moral entrepreneurs define crime
-Crimes are illegal because society defines them that way
-Criminal labels are life-transforming events
What is quantitative victimology?
UCR can give an indication, victimization surveys show more accurate, and higher rates of crime
What is qualitative victimology?
Victimization studies can describe experiences of crime, moving through the CJS, and ongoing impacts
What are the costs of victimization?
-Victim costs (Personal loss, Medical care, Property, Earnings and Economic)
-CJS costs (Police, Legal, and Community Programs)
-Crime Career Costs (Loss of Legal Activities)
-Intangible (Pain and suffering, Quality of life, Psychological costs)
What is victim blaming?
Putting some/all of the responsibility of the crime onto the victim and away from the perpetrator
What is the main idea of positivist victimology?
Criminal behavior as a product of social, biological, psychological and economic forces
What is the main idea of critical victimology?
Criminal behavior is caused by economic inequality, and law defined by those in power
What are 4 personal responses to victimization?
-Recognize that people have reasons (valid ones) for not reporting
-Target-hardening… Crime displacement
-Fighting back “stand your ground” laws
-Community organization (transformative justice)
What are Rational Choice Theories?
The idea that people rationally decide the benefit outweighs risk of being caught and punished
What is the micro perspective of rational choice theory?
Micro perspective – Individual decisions to commit crime or deviant acts
What is the macro perspective of routine activity theory?
Macro perspective – social and economic reasons to explain crime
What is Jack Katz idea about crime?
“Crime is Sexy”
-Crime has an emotional appeal
(Getting away with it, thrill of the chase, control over a victim, power)
What are 2 problems with situational crime prevention?
-Motivated criminals can adjust to the “new normal” – extinction
-Motivated criminals move somewhere else – crime displacement
What are 2 benefits of situational crime prevention?
-Can reduce other crimes – diffusion of benefits
-Can impact other surrounding areas - discouragement
What 2 things does Situational Crime Prevention do?
-Prevent crime by removing, or making targets less suitable
-Prevent crime by increasing guardians
What is general detterence?
Preventing crime by convincing potential offenders that the pains outweigh the benefits
What 3 things can create deterrence?
-Certainty of punishment
-Severity of punishment
-Celerity of punishment
Who founded psychoanalytic theory?
Freud
What are the main ideas of psychoanalytic theory?
-Development of unconscious personality in childhood affects lifetime behavior
-Criminals have weak egos and damaged personalities
-Linked to conflict that occurs during stages of development
What is a psycho-dynamic perspective?
Criminality viewed as a psychosis that prevents people from seeing affect on victims and controlling impulses
What theory did Bandura become the founder of?
Social Learning Theory
What is Social Learning Theory?
We are not born violent, but learn to be violent through behavior modelling. If we see people being rewarded for certain acts, we will copy them (and vise versa for punishment)
Who played a role in the idea of Cognitive Theory?
Kohlberg
What is Cognitive Theory?
-Moral development: serious offenders have different moral orientations than law-abiding citizens. Focuses on reasoning processes, and how we perceive the world
-Information processing – violence-prone people encode information incorrectly.
Learned problematic scripts that emphasize aggression
