Learning Criminality

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Learning Criminality

• MSc Applied Forensic Psychology
• Week 3
• Gareth Norris
• 11th October, 2005

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Key Principles

• Behaviourism
• Classical Conditioning
• Operant Conditioning
• Social Learning Theory
• Differential Association
• TV Violence

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Behaviorism

• John B. Watson (1878-1958)
• An alternative to the psychology of the mind
  and psychodynamic theory
• Behaviourist goal of psychology was to
  understand, predict, and control human behaviour
• Only a rigid scientific approach could achieve
  this no room for thought

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Classical Conditioning

• Ivan Pavlov
• Stimulus-Response (S-R) Psychology
• A stimulus is an object or event. A response is
  the elicited behaviour
• Watson believed that all human (and animal)
  behaviour was controlled by external stimuli

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C.C. and crime
CS Steal Cookie
UCS Punished by Parent
UCR Hurt Feel Uncomfortable
After several attempts
CS Steal Cookie
CR Feel Uncomfortable
CS Conditioned Stimulus UCS Unconditioned
Stimulus UCR Unconditioned Response CR
Conditioned Response.
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Poor CC in offenders?

• Eysenck believed this was a central feature of
  criminality the inability to learn and develop
  a conscience
• CC can be measured using skin conductance (or eye
  blinking after a puff of air!)
• Several studies have shown poor CC in gamblers,
  psychopaths and also anti-social children from
  good homes

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Operant Conditioning

• B.F. Skinner (1904-1990)
• The environment or stimuli become the independent
  variable, the resulting behaviours the dependent
  variable
• The aim of psychology (in the form of
  behaviourism) was to uncover the laws which
  connect these variables

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Cont.

• Skinner established a relationship between a
  behaviour and its consequences
• Operant conditioning is learning to either make
  or withhold a response in light of the expected
  consequences
• Jeremy Bentham pleasure/pain

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OC and crime
Response Steal Cookie
Reinforcement Punished by parent
After several trials
Passive Avoidance Response Inhibit anti-social
response
Reinforcement Reduction in anxiety
The basic principle of OC is that any response
that is reinforced or rewarded will increase in
frequency.
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Reinforcement

• Reinforcement is anything which is likely to
  increase the probability of future responding
  positive or negative
• Punishment and negative reinforcement differ
  punishment is an unpleasant response
• Punishment less effective only temporarily
  suppresses behaviour

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O.C. and criminal behaviour

• Jeffrey (1965) and Nietzel (1979)
• Criminal behaviour is both acquired and
  maintained by the principles of operant
  conditioning
• Humans are born neutral behaviour is defined
  as good or bad by society (or family/peers)
• Forms basis for behaviour modification
  treatments

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Cont.

• Again, psychopaths and other anti-socials are
  deficient with regards to learning OC in an
  mental maze
• Could be caused by autonomic under-arousal when
  given adrenalin, they performed better than
  controls
• Many criminals may also be oversensitive to
  rewards, or reward focused

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Social Learning Theory

• Conditioning theory mostly based upon animal
  experiments although valid, humans are
  infinitely more complex
• Internal and external factors are important in
  understanding actions
• This is the essence of human experience -
  individuality

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Cont.

• SLT believes that the social environment is the
  most important way in which we acquire behaviour
• Reinforcement (i.e. OC) is vital in maintaining
  these behaviours
• Although anybody can learn to pick a lock, not
  everybody becomes/continues to be a thief

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Expectancy Theory

• Julian Rotter
• Relationship between the expectations
  (cognitions) and consequences (outcomes)
• People develop generalised expectations about the
  outcomes of their behaviour
• People engage in crime as they expect something
  from it, e.g. money, power, status

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Banduras Observational Learning

• Albert Bandura
• Behaviour is more likely to be imitated if a
  reward is also observed
• Primarily focused on aggression
• Although imitation was important, it was the
  outcome of the action that had the most effect
• Witnessing rewards for behaviour encouraged
  imitation

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Differential Association

• Edwin H. Sutherland
• Also believed that criminal behaviour could be
  learned in the same way that non-criminal
  behaviour particularly from close associates
• Community organisation can impede or promote
  criminal behaviour
• Social disorganisation and sub-cultural theory

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Sutherland (1947)

• Criminal behaviour is learned by interaction with
  others, particularly within intimate personal
  groups
• People dont just learn criminal skill they
  also acquire the motives, drives and attitudes
  that accompany it
• The direction of these drives is learned by
  interpreting the law as favorable or unfavorable

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Cont.

• Delinquency results from an excess of favorable
  violations of law
• Differential association can vary in frequency,
  duration, priority, and intensity
• Whilst criminal behaviour is an expression of
  general needs and values, it cannot be explained
  as such non-criminal behaviour is also an
  expression of the same

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Differential Identification

• Daniel Glaser
• Physical contact is not necessary for criminal
  tendencies
• People especially the young and impressionable
  can identify with criminal peers
• People may commit crimes to feel as though they
  are a member of a group and that they share the
  same values

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Social Structural Learning Theory

• Ronald Akers
• Criminal behaviour originates in associations
  with law violators, when observers imitate these
  actions
• These are reinforced through personal or
  witnessed rewards
• Structural conditions such as poverty, make the
  associations with delinquent peers more likely

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Social Information Processing

• Based on the cognitive aspects of social
  interaction
• Delinquents more likely to judge stimuli as
  criminal (e.g. workman wearing mask as a robber)
• Delinquents less capable of response selection
  either passive or aggressive
• Dodge (1990) found that children were either
  pro-active or re-active in using aggression to
  meet there needs

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Talking point Social Learning and TV Violence

• One of the major discoveries of SLT is that
  people often imitate the behaviour of others
• The proximity of the actor is not always
  important merely watching a criminal act (and
  especially if it is reinforced) can elicit
  imitation
• Banduras research in particular, has been
  implicated in the dangers of children watching
  violent television and games

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Can watching TV make you violent?

• Children may become less sensitive to the pain
  and suffering of others
• Children may be more fearful of the world around
  them
• Children may be more likely to behave in
  aggressive of harmful ways towards others
• But remember a correlation does not imply
  causation

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Findings

• TV violence more influential on already
  aggressive children (Wober, 1989)
• Hennigan et al (1982) compared crime rates in
  towns following TV installation found no
  increase
• Phillips (1983) found violent acts to increase in
  day 3 following TV boxing match (victim race that
  of loser)

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More findings

• Childhood TV viewing predicted violent acts 22
  years later (Eron, 1987)
• Freedman (1984) argues that research into TV
  violence is artificial in a laboratory and that
  it is impossible to control for confounding
  variables in the outside
• Already violent individuals may seek out
  particular programs violence and aggression are
  caused by factors beyond TV