Booklet A – Turning to Crime Upbringing Cognition Biology

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Booklet A Turning to CrimeUpbringingCognition
Biology
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Upbringing Disrupted families (Farrington et
al. (2006) Learning from others (Sutherland
(1934) Poverty and disadvantaged neighbourhoods
(Wikström Tafel (2000)
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Disrupted familiesKey Study Farrington et al.
(2006)

• Aims
• To document the start, duration and end of
  offending behaviour from childhood to adulthood.
• To investigate the influence of life events
• The risk and protective factors predicting
  offending and anti-social behaviour.
• The intergenerational transmission of offending
  and anti-social behaviour.
• The influence of family background.

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Design

• In the latest report on the group, data were
  gathered from interviews at age 48 and searches
  of criminal records.
• Participants
• The study was based on 411 boys, 8- and
  9-years-old, from the registers of six state
  schools in East London who were born in 1953/4.
• The boys were predominantly white working class.

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Selected results

• At age 48, of 404 individuals searched in the
  criminal records, 161 had convictions.
• The number of offences and offenders peaked at
  age 17, closely followed by age 18.
• Those who started criminal careers at age 1013
  were nearly all reconvicted at least once.
• Self-reported crime not covered by official
  statistics indicated that 93 per cent admitted
  committing one type of offence at some stage in
  their lives.

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Selected results (cont.)

• A small proportion of the study males (7) were
  defined as chronic offenders.
• Most of these chronic offenders shared common
  childhood characteristics they were more likely
  to have a convicted parent, be high daring, a
  delinquent sibling, a young mother, low
  popularity, a disrupted family and a large family
  size.
• The proportion of men leading successful lives
  increased from 78 per cent at age 32 to 88 per
  cent at age 48.

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Learning from others Key study Sutherland (1934)

• Sutherlands theory is based on two core
  assumptions
• Deviance occurs when people define a certain
  human situation as an appropriate occasion for
  violating social norms or criminal laws.
• Definitions of the situation are acquired through
  an individuals history of past experience.

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1. Criminal behaviour is learned.

• Sutherland believed that criminal behaviour was
  not inherited or a result of any other biological
  condition.
• 2. Criminal behaviour is learned in interaction
  with other persons in a process of communication.
• Sutherland believed such communication usually
  involved verbal interaction.

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3. The principle part of the learning of criminal
behaviour occurs within intimate personal groups.

• Sutherland felt that intimate personal groups
  provided the largest influence on the learning of
  criminal behaviour.
• 4. When criminal behaviour is learned, the
  learning includes the techniques of committing
  the crime.
• A criminal has to learn the techniques of the
  trade from someone. They also learn the attitudes
  taken and excuses made for behaving in a criminal
  fashion.

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5. The specific direction of motives and drives
is learned from definitions of the legal codes as
favourable or unfavourable.

• Groups of people may see certain laws as
  pointless or discriminatory and therefore feel
  they can flaunt them or that it is right to break
  them, for example under-age drinking laws.
• 6. A person becomes delinquent because of an
  excess of definitions favourable to violation of
  law over definitions unfavourable to violation of
  law.
• This is the principle of differential
  association. Individuals become criminal due to
  repeated contacts with criminal activity and a
  lack of contact with non-criminal activity.

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7. Number of contacts with criminals over
non-criminals may vary in frequency, duration,
priority, and intensity.

• According to Sutherland, a precise description of
  the criminal behaviour of a person would be
  possible in quantitative form by analysing the
  number of contacts with criminals.
• 8. The process of learning criminal behaviour by
  association with criminal and anti-criminal
  patterns involves all of the mechanisms that are
  involved in any other learning.
• In this point, Sutherland claims that criminal
  behaviour is learned just like every other
  behaviour.

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9. While criminal behaviour is an expression of
general needs and values, it is not explained by
those general needs and values.

• A thief generally steals in order to obtain
  money. However, such an action is no different
  from the work of an honest labourer so this need
  in itself cannot explain theft.

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Poverty and disadvantaged neighbourhoods Key
study Wikström and Tafel (2000)

• Design
• A cross-sectional study.
• Sample
• Nearly 2000 Year 10 (14 to 15year-old) pupils.
  
• Methodology
• Interview and data collection.

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Selected findings

• 44.8 per cent of the males and 30.6 per cent of
  the females had committed at least one crime.
• 9.8 per cent of the males and 3.8 per cent of the
  females had committed a serious crime of theft.
• One in eight offenders were reported to or caught
  by the police for their last committed crime.
• Offenders were more often victimised than
  non-offenders.
• Offenders were more often drunk and more often
  used drugs than other youths.

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Explanatory factors

• The study covers a wide range of factors that may
  predispose to criminal activity
• family social position
• individual characteristics
• social situation
• lifestyle and routine activities
• community context.

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Explanatory factors (cont.)

• Youths with many individual risk factors offend
  frequently, while youths with many individual
  protective factors rarely offend.
• Of these, the most important were the youths
  individual characteristics and the way they lived
  their lives, which strongly affected their
  involvement in crime.

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Conclusions

• The findings suggest the presence of three groups
  of adolescent offenders.
• Propensity-induced
• These youths have an enduring propensity to
  offend.
• Lifestyle-dependent
• Offending by this group appears to be highly
  dependent on their lifestyle.
• Situationally-limited
• These are individually well-adjusted youths who
  may occasionally offend if their lifestyle
  exposes them to high levels of situational risk.

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Upbringing overall conclusions

• Crime appears to run in families although the
  mechanism by which this happens is unclear
  genes, SLT, Differential Associations
• There are risk factors in the family that
  predispose individuals to crime including
  convicted parent, delinquent sibling, large
  family, family social position and community in
  which you are raised
• There are also individual factors that contribute
  to offending

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Upbringing possible section a questions

• Describe research into the influence of the
  family in turning to crime.
• Describe how upbringing contributes to criminal
  behaviour
• Outline the relationship between poverty
  neighbourhood turning to crime

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Upbringing possible section b questions

• Discuss the difficulties of conducting research
  into the effect of upbringing on turning to crime
• Discuss the usefulness of research into the
  effect of upbringing on turning to crime
• Compare individual and situational factors in
  upbringing explanations of turning to crime

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Cognition

• Criminal thinking patterns (Yochelson Samenow
  (1976)
• Moral development and crime (Palmer Hollin
  (1981)
• Social cognition (Gudjonsson, G. H. and Bownes,
  I. (2002)

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Criminal thinking patterns Key study Yochelson
and Samenow (1996)

• Aims
• To understand the makeup of the criminal
  personality.
• To establish techniques that could be used to
  alter the personality disorders that produce
  crime.
• To encourage an understanding of legal
  responsibility.
• To establish techniques that can be effective in
  preventing criminal behaviour.

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Participants

• The study was based on 255 male participants from
  various backgrounds blacks, whites, those from
  the inner city, those from the suburbs, wealthy,
  poor, etc. were all evaluated.
• The population of studied offenders was composed
  of those confined to the hospital who had been
  found not guilty by reason of insanity, as well
  as a roughly equal number of convicted criminals
  who were not confined to the institution.
• Methodology
• A series of interviews was conducted with the
  participants over a period of several years.

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Selected findings

• Criminals
• are very restless, dissatisfied and irritable.
• consider requests from their teachers and parents
  as impositions.
• continually set themselves apart from others.
• want to live a life of excitement, at whatever
  expense.
• are habitually angry.
• are lacking empathy.
• feel under no obligation to anyone or anything
  except their own interests.
• are poor at responsible decision-making, having
  pre-judged situations.

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Selected findings (cont.)

• Thirty completed the programme of interviews, but
  only nine genuinely changed as a result.
• Yochelson and Samenow acknowledge that the
  patients lied and gave the answers they thought
  would help their situations improve when the
  doctors began the study.
• Many of the thinking errors they found would be
  part of a modern-day diagnosis of anti-social
  personality disorder, which is generally
  considered to be exceptionally difficult to treat.

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Conclusion

• In all, 52 thinking patterns were distinguishable
  in the criminal personality.
• These were considered to be errors in thinking.
  Although not unique to criminals, they were
  displayed more by criminals.
• Though criminals may differ in the types of
  crime that they commit, and their modus operandi,
  they exhibit identifiable and classifiable
  paralleled errors in thinking

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Moral development and crime Key study Palmer
Hollin

• Aim
• To see whether the development of moral reasoning
  among male delinquents is delayed compared to non
  delinquents
• Participants
• Midlands
• 97 convicted male offenders age 13-21
• 77 non offenders, male female, age 12-24

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Methodology

• Correlation moral reasoning self reported
  delinquency
• Quasi as comparing 2 naturally occurring groups
• Moral reasoning
• Socio moral reflection measure short form
• 11 hypothetical dilemmas
• Self reported delinquency
• 46 item checklist of offences

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Results

• SRMSF
• Male offenders had least mature moral reasoning
  Kohlberg preconventional
• Female non offenders showed more mature moral
  reasoning than male non offenders
• The majority of non offenders were using
  conventional level reasoning
• CONCLUSIONS
• Delinquents seem to have deficits in their moral
  reasoning and interventions aimed at raising
  levels of moral reasoning in areas related to
  delinquent behaviour could lead to a decrease in
  offending behaviour.

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Social cognitionKey study Gudjonsson and Bownes
(2002)

• Aim
• To examine the relationship between type of
  offence and the attributions offenders make about
  their criminal act.
• Method
• Using the Gudjonsson and Singh 42 item Blame
  Attribution Inventory (GBAI) to measure the
  offenders type of offence and attribution of
  blame.

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Participants

• 80 criminals who were serving sentences in
  Northern Ireland.
• 20 subjects had committed violent offences
  including homicide and grievous bodily harm
  (GBH). Their mean age was 29.
• 40 sex offenders included rapists and paedophiles
  and those committing a sexual assault. Their mean
  ages varied from 41 for the paedophiles down to
  28 for the other offenders.
• 20 had committed property offences including
  theft and burglary and their mean age was 29.

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Results

• Those who had committed sexual offences showed
  the most remorse about their behaviour this was
  followed by those who have committed violent acts
  against the person.
• Those who have committed violent offences have
  the highest mental element scores on the GBAI,
  followed by the sex offenders.
• With regard to external attribution (blaming
  others/situation), highest scores were found for
  violent offenders and lowest for sex offenders.

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Conclusion

• Offenders attribute blame for their crimes
  differently according to their type of crime.

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Cognition Overall Conclusions

• Criminals have differences in their thinking
  patters which may explain why they turn to crime.
  These include
• Lower level of moral thinking
• Thinking errors
• Differences in remorse and external attribution
  depending on the type of criminal
• However, many of these thinking patterns are
  shown by non criminals too

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Cognition section a possible questions

• Describe thinking patters shown by criminals
• Describe research which demonstrates a link
  between morality and crime
• Outline the attributions of blame used by
  criminals

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Cognition possible section b questions

• Evaluate the validity of research into cognitive
  explanations of turning to crime.
• Evaluate the generalisability of research into
  cognitive explanations of turning to crime
• Discuss to what extent cognitions provide an
  explanation of turning to crime

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Biology

• Brain dysfunction (Raine, A. ( )
• Genes and serotonin (Brunner et al. (1993)
• Gender (Daly Wilson (2001)

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Brain dysfunctionKey study Raine (1997)

• Aim
• Previous research has suggested that brain
  dysfunction may predispose individuals to violent
  behaviour but no-one has tried to confirm which
  particular areas may be involved. So the aim is
  to directly assess brain functioning in violent
  individuals
• Hypotheses
• Seriously violent individuals will have
• Brain dysfunction in the prefrontal cortex,
  amygdale, hippocampus, thalamus and corpus
  callosum (all previously linked with violence)
• No brain dysfunction in other areas of the brain
  which have been related to psychiatric disorder
  but not violence (e.g. cerebellum)

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Procedure

• Quasi experiment
• 41 NGRI 39 Male, 2 female mean age 34.3
• Murder / manslaughter
• Referred for assessment due to schiz, head
  injury, affective disorder, epilepsy, learning or
  personality disorder
• Medication free 2 weeks checked urine test
• Control group, matched age sex and schiz

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Procedure contd

• Injection of radioactive tracer
• CPT
• PET scan

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Results

• The murderers had
• Reduced brain activity in prefrontal cortex
  corpus callosum
• Increased brain activity in areas not previously
  linked with violence e.g. cerebellum
• Abnormal asymmetries i.e. reduced activity on
  their left and increased activity on the right in
  some of the areas linked to violence e.g.
  amygdale, thalamus hippocampus

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Conclusion

• There are some differences in the brain
  metabolism of murderers pleading NGRI
• The differences are in areas that are typically
  associated with aggressive behaviour

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Genes and serotonin Key Study Brunner et al.
(1993)

• Aim
• To explain the behaviour of a large family in the
  Netherlands where the males are affected by a
  syndrome of borderline mental retardation and
  abnormal violent behaviour.

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Participants

• The study was based on five affected males from
  the family.
• Method
• Data were collected from analysis of urine
  samples over a 24-hour period.

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Results

• The tests showed a deficit of the enzyme
  monoamine oxidase A (MAOA).
• A mutation was identified in the X chromosome of
  the gene responsible for production of MAOA.

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Conclusion

• MAOA is involved in serotonin metabolism.
• The defect in the gene leading to impaired
  serotonin metabolism is likely to be responsible
  for the mental retardation in the family and this
  in turn may account for the violent behaviour.
• Brunner concluded that the MAOA deficiency
  accounted for their inability to regulate their
  aggression.

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GenderKey study Daly and Wilson (2001)

• Aim
• To find out if homicide rates would vary as a
  function of local life expectancy in Chicago.
• Method
• A correlational study using survey data from
  police records, school records and local
  demographic records.

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Procedure

• The study examined local communities in Chicago
  which had lower than average male life
  expectancies.

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Results

• Life expectancy proved to be the best predictor
  of neighbourhood-specific homicide rates it was
  possible that young men in these neighborhoods
  actually discounted the future and expected to
  live shorter lives, thereby escalating the
  likelihood that they would increase their risk
  taking for short-term rewards.
• Another key finding was that the
  neighbourhood-specific rate of absenteeism from
  school was also negatively correlated with life
  expectancy these young men see little point in
  investing effort in school performance.

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Conclusion

• One possible explanation they suggest is that
  parents are unwilling to invest in their childs
  education by enforcing attendance because they
  are also operating on a short time horizon.
• Inequity or the unequal distribution of wealth
  and resources in society mean the poorest feel
  they have little to lose by engaging in reckless
  behaviour.

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Biology overall conclusions

• Variety of explanations that show links between
  brain activity, genes and gender and criminal
  behaviour

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Biology possible section a questions

• Describe physiological explanations for turning
  to crime.
• Outline the link between gender and criminal
  behaviour.
• Describe methods used to investigate biological
  explanations for turning to crime

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Possible section b questions

• Discuss the extent to which biological
  explanations of turning to crime are reductionist
• Evaluate the usefulness of research into
  biological explanations of turning to crime
• Evaluate the methods used by psychologists to
  investigate biological explanations of turning to
  crime

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Other possible section b questions

• Discuss the nature nurture debate in relation to
  explanations of turning to crime.
• Discuss to what extent explanations of turning to
  crime are reductionist
• Evaluate methods used to investigate explanations
  of turning to crime
• Discuss the usefulness of explanations of turning
  to crime