Life Course Perspectives on Crime

Week 8 Overview

  • The lecture is pre-recorded to accommodate travel during the mid-semester break and a public holiday.
  • A blog exercise is associated with this lecture.
  • Last week's discussion focused on social bonds and Hirschi's bonding theory, which suggests that connections to conventional society deter crime.
  • A critique of Hirschi's theory is that social bonds change over time.
  • This week's topic explores how these bonds evolve, introducing the life course perspective, which acknowledges the importance of social bonds and their changes over time.

Case Study: Robert Thompson and John Venables

  • In February 1993, Robert Thompson and John Venables, both 10 years old, abducted two-year-old James Bulger from a shopping center in Bootle, England.
  • Two days later, James' mutilated body was found near a railroad track, approximately four kilometers from the abduction site.
  • Thompson and Venables had been truant from school and were seen on CCTV watching children in the shopping center, suggesting premeditation.
  • They also engaged in theft, stealing sweets, lollies, and toys.
  • Approximately 30 people saw James with Thompson and Venables, but only two questioned them. They claimed James was their brother, which led to them being left alone.
  • James suffered fatal injuries from beatings and physical and sexual torture.
  • Thompson and Venables were arrested for murder, becoming the youngest people in the UK to be arrested for such a crime.
  • The case raised questions about childhood, intent, and how to respond to such behavior in young people.
  • Thompson and Venables spent their youth in prison until they turned 18.
  • Society believes that children who commit crimes are still salvageable.
  • Upon release, they were given new identities and moved to secret locations. One may have moved to Australia.
  • Anonymity may help them escape stigma and avoid further criminal activity.
  • Barriers to reentry into society include societal norms and expectations.
  • Criminologists ask how to ensure a successful and safe reentry into society.
  • The lecture focuses on how people desist from crime and reintegrate into society, using the age-graded or life course perspective.

Life Course and Developmental Theories of Crime

  • The age-crime curve shows that most offending occurs between ages 15 and 30, after which it declines.
  • This pattern is consistent across cultures, countries, and time periods.
  • This natural decline in offending with age is a starting point for understanding desistance from crime.

Moffett's Developmental Taxonomy

  • Moffett, with a psychology background, distinguishes between two types of offenders, impacting criminological understandings of life course perspectives.
  • She identifies: adolescent-limited offenders and life-course-persistent offenders.
  • Her work is macro-level, focusing on aggregate groups and patterns over time.
  • It aligns with a consensus perspective, reflecting broad social agreement on offending behavior.

Adolescent-Limited Offenders

  • The onset of delinquency occurs in early adolescence, with a decline in criminal behavior as individuals mature into early adulthood.
  • Desistance refers to breaking free from or decreasing delinquent behavior.

Life-Course-Persistent Offenders

  • A smaller group with more serious and pervasive offending behavior.
  • Early signs of behavioral or conduct issues in childhood.
  • They engage in increasingly serious misconduct, which continues from adolescence into adulthood.

Features Distinguishing the Two Groups

Adolescent-Limited Group:
  • No significant biological causes.
  • Driven by societal patterns related to adolescence, breaking away from parental control, and exercising independence.
  • Peer influence has the greatest impact.
  • The largest group of offenders.
  • Offending is expected to decrease as they mature, but negative turning points can transition them into the life-course-persistent group.
Life-Course-Persistent Group:
  • Additional risk factors include low verbal ability, hyperactivity, and impulsivity.
  • Combination of environmental, biological, and genetic causes.
  • Peer influence is less impactful.
  • The smallest percentage of offenders but responsible for the majority of crime, offending at a higher rate.

Sampson and Laub's Age-Graded Theory of Informal Social Control

  • Builds on Moffett's work, focusing on life transitions and their impact.
  • Life transitions can alter the trajectory of a criminal career, either positively or negatively.
  • A 1993 study examined employment and marriage as turning points.
  • Marriage and full-time employment increase conventional bonds and pull individuals away from criminality, lowering reoffending rates.
  • These turning points increase involvement, commitment, and attachment to conventional society, aligning with Hirschi's bonding theory.

Impact of Full-Time Employment:

  • Increases involvement by occupying more time, reducing opportunities for crime.
  • Increases commitment by investing in a career.
  • Increases attachment to others.

Impact of Marriage:

  • Increases time spent with a spouse, shifting from peer influence.
  • Controversial claim that it is a better deterrent for men than women.
  • Argument that men tend to "marry up" (marry women less involved in crime), while women "marry down" (marry men more involved in crime).
  • This is based on heterosexual marriages, which needs to be updated with more inclusive research.
  • Important life events influence who we associate with, where we spend time, and how much time we spend.

Other Life Events:

  • Having children.
  • Loss of a partner or loved one.
  • These events can alter social bonds and relationship to criminality or deviance.

Current State of Life Course Perspectives

  • Stem from social bonding and self-control perspectives, addressing the critique that self-control and social bonds do not remain constant.

Nine Key Conclusions:

  1. Offending peaks in late teen years.
  2. Criminal onset is between 8 and 14 years old.
  3. Desistance occurs between 20 and 29 years old.
  4. Earlier onset of criminal behavior increases the likelihood of it continuing into adulthood.
  5. A small group of offenders is responsible for the largest amount of crime.
  6. Offenders do not tend to specialize in specific types of crime.
  7. Offending behavior is connected to antisocial behavior and conduct problems in childhood.
  8. Peer influence is strongest during adolescence, diminishing in adulthood, when criminal behavior is often performed alone.
  9. Life course perspectives can incorporate learning perspectives, social bonds, self-control, and social stressors.

Policy Implications

  • Early intervention is critical, targeting children showing early signs of antisocial behavior.
  • Interventions should involve education, socialization, and treatment.
  • Intervention should also target parents and families, providing education and support.
  • Family support programs involving social workers and nurses are most effective.

Evaluation of Life Course Perspectives

Strengths:

  • Broad scope: Applies to all forms of deviant and offending behavior.
  • Empirical validity: Research supports the life course approach.
  • Provides clear direction for prevention, particularly early intervention.

Weaknesses:

  • Not parsimonious: Involves many variables, making it complicated.
  • Difficult to foresee and measure all potential turning points.
  • Requires longitudinal data to track individuals over a substantial part of their lives.

Additional Resources

  • SBS Insight Episode: "Breaking Free" (02/2017). Three stories of former offenders in Australia.
  • TEDx Talk by John Lonigan: Argues that education, rather than punishment, is the most effective way to control crime. Highlights early intervention and education.

Blog Post Assignment (Due Friday, April by Midnight)

  • Based on the TEDx talk by John Lonigan and the assigned conversation piece.
  • Identify the protective factors that prevent people from engaging in criminal behaviors despite risk factors.
  • Consider whether protective factors change over the life course and why.
  • Analyze whether these protective factors are linked to specific life events.
  • Limit answers to three paragraphs.

Big Takeaways for Today

  • Early intervention and education are critical for preventing crime, especially for the life-course-persistent group.
  • Criminologists have a role in elevating the need for education and early intervention programs.

Preview of Week 9

  • We'll return to inequality and stress. We will look at institutions like family, education, criminal justice, and economic institutions. We will be asking big picture questions: What is Anomie? What is Alienation? What impact do chaos or ineffective government have on society?

Mid-Semester Break

  • Encouragement to recharge and take a break.