Criminology and Victimology Lecture Notes

Vocabulary flashcards generated from criminology and victimology review notes.

Victimology

A field of criminology that examines the role the victim plays in precipitating a criminal incident and the impact of crimes on victims.

Classical Criminology

A criminology that views behavior as stemming from free will, that demands responsibility and accountability of all perpetrators, and that stresses the need for punishments severe enough to deter others.

Positivist Criminology

A criminology that views behavior as stemming from social, biological, and psychological factors. It argues the punishment should be tailored to the individual needs of the offender.

Criminogenic

Canines, strong jaw lines and high cheekbones were factors thought to bring about criminal behavior in an individual.

Biological Explanations

Explanations of crime that emphasize physiological and neurological factors that may predispose a person to commit crimes.

Psychological Explanations

Explanations of crime that emphasize mental processes and behavior.

Sociological Explanations

Explanations of crime that social conditions that bear on the individual as causes of criminal behavior.

Social Structure Theories

Theories that attribute crime to the existence of a powerless lower class that lives with poverty and deprivation and often turns to crime in response.

Anomie

A breakdown and its disappearance of the rules of social behavior.

Social Process Theories

Theories that see criminality as normal behavior. Everyone has the potential to become a criminal depending on influences that impel one toward or away from a crime.

Learning Theories

Theories that see criminal behavior as learned, just as legal behavior is learned.

Theory of Differential Association

The theory that people become criminals because they encounter more influences that might view criminal behavior as normal and acceptable than influences that are hostile to criminal behavior.

Control Theories

Theories holding that criminal behavior occurs when the bonds that tie an individual to society are brokened and weakened.

Labeling Theories

Theories emphasizing that the cause of criminal behavior are not found in the individual but in the social process that labels certain acts as deviant or criminal.

Social Conflict Theories

Theories that assume criminal law and the criminal justice system are primarily a means of controlling the poor and the have-nots.

Life Course Theories

Theories that identify factors affecting the start, duration, and nature, and end of criminal behavior over the life of an offender.

Psychopath

A person characterized by profound lack of empathy, a lack of remorse or guilt, emotional superficially, and a persistent pattern of antisocial or criminal behavior.

Lifestyle Exposure Model

A model whose main elements are Demographics, Adaptions, Lifestyle, Associations (To crime), and Exposure.

Classical School Assumptions

Assumes criminal behaviour is rational, and fear of punishment will prevent crime.

Positivist School Assumptions

Assumes crime is not the choice, but the criminal is the product of social, biological, and psychological factors.

Lombroso's Theory

Theory stating criminals were born criminals with traits such as big canine teeth, strong jaw line, and high cheek bones, with acquired traits including alcoholism, epilepsy, and syphilis.

Justice for All Act Rights

Provides rights in federal criminal cases including the right of being protected from the reasonably accused, court attendance, speaking, notification of prisoner release, full and timely restitution, and respect for dignity and privacy.

Most Victimized Group (Violent Crime)

Teenage African americas genders that change every year.

Least Victimized Group (Violent Crime)

Elderly white women.

Crime Committed by Nonstrangers

Sexual assault or rape.

Crime Committed by Strangers

Robbery.

Impacts of Crime

Fear, financial cost, emotional cost, life-style restrictions.