Criminological Theory Exam 1

Classical School

Enlightenment era

Utilitarianism

Greatest good for greatest number of people

Hedonistic Psychology

Individuals (with their behavior) try to maximize pleasure and minimize pain —> behavior is a choice

criminal justice system

• People are morally responsible for their behavior

• Deterrence is the goal

• Written law (people need to know what they’re avoiding)

• Beccaria and Bentham (Beccaria was against capital punishment)

Positive School

Positivism (philosophy) as applied to criminal justice

Context of declining church power/ rising science

positivism says knowledge is acquired through the study of nature and that one can discern the laws that govern phenomenon —> humans part of nature —> discover laws that govern human behavior

Principles of Positive School

Limited moral responsibility**

Focus on the individual criminal and causes of their behavior

Consequences based on cause

GOAL = TREATMENT

classical assumption

rationality // utilitarianism and hedonistic psychology

positive assumption

determinism // discover laws of behavior and change behavior

equal vs variable application

classical - equal

positive - variable

classical school theories…

• assume rationality

• investigate why we DON’T do crime

positive school theories…

• assumption of determinism

• why we DO crime

American Crim Thought

late 19th c- lots of urbanization/industrialization —>

perception that crime was rampant in urban areas

shift to sociological approach

American timeline:

1910-1955: - research relied on official data

- theories on institutions/groups

-social disorganization/strain theories

1950-1970: development—> self report data

-individual level thoeries

1980s: discovery of career offenders

-small % of offenders commit a disproportionate amount of crime

-demanded extended theories—> integrated, developmental, and life course theories

1990s: genetic code/DNA

-resurrection of biological factors with a socio-biological approach

What is a theory?

Ideas about why/explanation

purpose to understand/explain

theory: guides research and suggests applied functions of the explanation

theory definitions

Kubrin: systematic way of stating our ideas of the how and why of social phenomonenon (so that it can’t be misinterpreted/misconstrued) (findings should be replicated)

deduction

generating testable propositions from more abstract statements/propositions

components of a theory

concepts- an abstract or generic idea inferred from specific instances

prediction- assertions or propositions linking concepts

assumptions- stated and unstated

scope conditions- geography, gender, size conditions, type of crime

operational definitions- definitions of concepts that provide guidance on measuring the variables

ways to evaluate a theory

Are the concepts well defined?

structure/logisitcal consistency?

scope/applicability? (does it try to explain all crime?)

testability? (can it be disconfirmed?)

empirical validity

tautology

true by definition- making a theory unnecessary

correlation

the relationship between two variables

exogenous variable

a variable that precedes another in the causal chain

endogenous variable

a variable that comes after some other in the causal chain

Establihsing causal order

relatonship between two variables

time order (one precedes the toher)

lack of spuriousness 9the relationship between a nd b is not due to a third variable C)

multivariate analysis

putting 1+ variable into the statistical analysis- allows you to compare the effects of more than one variable on a third variable

statistical significance

the probability that your finding is beyond a chance result

statistical power

ability to find significant difference when its there - related to sample size (the larger the sample the greater the ability to find the effect)

experimental research

control of extraneous variables when applied to treatment (ex. vignette storytelling// milgrim experiment with the shocks behind the screen)

quasi-experimental

something that happens that serves as an experimental treatment

Naturalistic/ Participant Observation

police ride alongs/ joining deviant groups (ex. piliavin and briar study of police/juvenile encounters —> takes a long time, dangerous, not always applicable to a broader group —> direct info)

Historical methods

history/development of laws (viewing primary sources/ legal records)

Secondary Data Analysis

MOST POPULAR: using data collected for another reason to examine crime —> UCR and census data (but no control over variables or measuring them)

Survey Research

Asking people questions - paper. digital, interview

(ex. Rochester youth development study) lots of data, but how valid is it? people may lie —> random error vs systematic error

sample selection

is the sample representative of the larger population? random allows us to generalize the larger population

measurement validity

does it measure what the construct means? truthfulness

measurement reliability

are answers consistent? test/retest

Social Control Theory Assumptions

• deviance is attractive

• We would if we could

• Classical school notion - rationality

—> why DONT we do things not why we do them

—> look for something that constrains us

Chicago School

Chicago’s industrialization/urbanization/immigration

Old traditions being replaced

Early sociology

Robert Park and Ernest Burgess

Influenced by German Conflict Theory and Plant Ecology to form:

Concentric zones

Concentric Zones

1) Central Business District

2) Transitional Zone **

3) working class zone

4) residential zone

5) commuter zone

Zone of Transition

Deteriorated housing, factories, abandoned buildings

• invasion of businesses

• impact on land value

• new arrivals

• immigrants not making much money

• ppl want to leave

Social Disorganization

Inability of neighborhoods to organize to improve the neighborhood

• weak social institutions (schools, churches)

• Lack of solidarity among residents

• Lack of informal social control

Macro level neighborhood factors

Poverty, ethnic diversity, residential mobility (always cycling in new people)

These lead to lack of social integration which leads to crime

Research finds that zone of transition

Has highest crime rate over years (no matter which ethnic group moves in)

Problems with social disorg

—> didn’t measure intervening variables

Multicollinearity (variables too related)

Static vs dynamic analysis

1980s Sampson and Groves study measures what with social disorg

Measures intervening mechanisms

Collective Efficacy

Social ties/networks necessary but not sufficient for social control

—> Residents need to be willing to take action- mutual trust and solidarity

Social Control Theory assumptions

Deviant behavior is attractive, (a-motivational, there is no need to explain motivation behind crime), why DONT we commit deviant behavior

Constraint

Operates at different levels: neighborhood, individual, group/institutional

Social Bonding Theory

Travis Hirschi (Emil Durkheim inspo)

we refrain from committing deviant behavior because we are bonded to conventional society (only when the bond is broken or weakened do we feel free to commit deviant behavior)

4 elements of the social bond

1) Attachment - the tie we have with others

—> parents:

• the quality of relationships

• Monitoring/supervision

• Psychological presence

—> Peers (although this part is problematic if these peers also engage in delinquency)

2) Commitment - to future conventional goals and current activities

3) Involvement- in conventional activities

4) Belief- in general values of conventional society

if any of those are weakened or broken a person is “in a position to deviate”

Techniques of Neutralization

Sykes and Matza explain how the element of belief can be temporarily cast aside in advance of committing delinquency

1) denial of responsibility (ex. Getting drunk and blaming your crime on being drunk)

2) denial of harm (ex. Shoplifting won’t hurt a big company)

3) denial of victim (victim ‘deserves’ the crime)

4) appeal to higher loyalties (ex. You rob a bank to pay for a friend’s surgery)

5) condemnation of the condemners (the police are corrupt so it doesn’t matter if you do crime)

ALL cognitive pre-justifications to alleviate guilt

Research on social bonding finds:

Moderate to weak support BECAUSE it doesn’t account for motivation

—> more effective for less serious behaviors

Self Control Theory

Gottfredson and Hirschi (unusual to have a theorist known for two theoretical perspectives):

Begin with premise that you can learn from characteristics of crime (identify those as immediate gratification, easy to do, exciting, risky, little skill, resulting in pain or discomfort) and from those come to the conclusion that

People who commit crime have low self control: impulsive, insensitive, physical, risk-taking, non-verbal, short sighted

Self control in Hirschi’s terms

Developed early in life and tends to remain consistent

comes from ineffective child rearing (parents don’t monitor, parents fail to recognize deviant behavior, behavior goes unpunished and escalates)

Self esteem theory

More likely to commit delinquent behavior if you put yourself down ( less research supported)