Lecture 2: Individual Theories

Individuals possess three basic characteristics:
- Free Will: Actions are voluntary.
- Rationality: Acts involve conscious, voluntary, and deliberate processes.
- Manipulability: People are driven by the hedonistic principle (maximize pleasure, minimize pain).

Deviant acts are voluntary, resulting from rational decisions balancing benefits and costs.
Situational Choice Theory: Environmental factors influence decision-making; attractive situations increase benefits and minimize costs.
- Target hardening: Securing targets or making them less available decreases deviant acts, potentially leading to crime displacement.

Illegal activities feed upon legal routine activities, affecting the location, type, and quantity of illegal acts.
Structural changes influence crime rates by affecting the convergence of 3 minimal elements for direct-contact predatory violations:
- Motivated Offender
- Suitable Target: Defined by value, physical visibility, access, and inertia.
- Absence of Capable Guardians: Someone or something capable of preventing the event.
Convergence of these elements in time and space can increase crime rates without changes in individual motivation.
Other premises:
- Exposure: Increased exposure leads to increased victimization risk.
- Proximity: Closer proximity of targets to motivated offenders increases victimization risk.
- Properties of Crimes: Less certain material gains from crime make exposure, proximity, and guardianship more critical.
- Household and family activities entail a lower risk of criminal victimization.
Higher victimization expected for:
- Single-adult households
- Those employed outside the home
- Younger individuals
- Single individuals

Looking-Glass Self: Our self-perception reflects what we think others think of us; the self is a social construction.

Child develops self-sense through gestures and symbols, giving meaning to others' communication.
Taking the Role of the Other: Ability to view oneself from another's perspective, a lifelong process where negative early labeling can have adverse long-term effects.

Labeling of juvenile acts, then the juveniles themselves.
Dramatization of Evil: Labeling leads to ostracization, association with other labeled individuals, increasing continued involvement in delinquency.

Lemert's 2 stages of deviance:
- Primary Deviance: Minor norm violations; formal response (e.g., arrest) applies a deviant label.
- Secondary Deviance: Publicly known primary deviance leads to negative labeling, prompting further deviance as a response.
Becker's Deviance as a Social Creation:
- Social groups create deviance by making rules, applying them, and labeling individuals as outsiders.
- 3 stages:
  1. Act/behavior is defined as deviant.
  2. An actor is defined as a deviant person.
  3. Actor accepts the deviant label and defines self as deviant (most important).

Process of accepting negative judgments from others.
Individuals unable to establish a positive self-sense may seek alternate means (e.g., gangs) for self-esteem.
Related to stigmatization and disintegrative shaming.

The community disapproves of the behavior but maintains respect for the individual.
Values the offender as a person and aims for reintegration into society (rehabilitation over retribution).

Strong bonds to social groups reduce the likelihood of deviant acts, based on 4 elements:
- Attachment: Affection for and sensitivity to others.
- Commitment: Rational investment in conventional society (stake in conformity).
- Involvement: Participation in conventional activities.
- Beliefs: Acceptance of societal rules and obligation to obey them.

Low self-control + opportunity = crime (immediate gratification).
Focuses on childhood socialization producing enduring low self-control.
Self-control levels remain stable over the life course.
Low self-control consists of the followingthe following traits:
1. Impulsivity
2. Preference for simple tasks
3. Risk-seeking
4. Preference for physical activity
5. Self-centeredness
6. Temper (low frustration tolerance, weak verbal conflict resolution)
Crime opportunity: Situations where force or fraud yield immediate, easy pleasure with low risk of detection or resistance.
Motivation to commit a crime is not a variable; differences among individuals are level of self-control and access to opportunities.

Examines the emergence, persistence, and desistance of deviant activities.
Trajectories: Long-term patterns of behavior throughout life (e.g., marriage, work, criminal behavior).
Transitions: Short-term events embedded in trajectories (e.g., getting married, new job, prison).
Transitions can lead to turning points by changing the social bond between the individual and society, especially for criminals (increased bonding to conventional society decreases criminal behavior).
Strengthened social bonds lead to increased social capital (positive relationships with society/institutions) and decreased involvement in crime/deviance (more to lose).