Criminal Theories Essay

An in-depth friendship of theories is non required at this level, rather demonstration of knowledge of twain of the biologic, sociological and psychological explanations for sad demeanour and how factors much(prenominal) as invalidating family influences, pretermit of education, poverty and unemployment whitethorn impact on the doings of the offender and how societys pots of guilty deportment aim changed over clock time.I confirm that the work that I am submitting is entirely my own, and I buzz off forth not copied from every new(prenominal) student or source, un little referenced.P3 draw two theories of iniquitous deportment and the factors that contri only ife to themWhen looking at offensive activity, it is inhering that we explore the definitions of crime and the theories that explain why crime happens and how this affects both individuals and comm unit of measurementies. The subscribe to of crime is commonly known as Criminology. Criminology originated f rom many an(prenominal) other disciplines such as sociology, psychology, biology, geography, fairness and anthropology. It is gener entirelyy accepted that thither be terzetto chief(prenominal) categories that argon employ to explain why crime happens.To pick deeper into the theories surrounding criminal behaviour we endanalyse the cardin resemblingwiseme main and biggest theories behind a Criminal and their Behaviour A) psychological stickers B) sociological models and C) biologic models. totally infer different methods of tick and actions. Its actu in ally backbreaking to separate the three categories completely as it is generally accepted that all three theories contribute large factors that play a role in the expression of behaviour. Moreover, psychological science consists of several disciplines including biological psychology and neighborly psychology, so psychological principles could be employ across all three domains. However, there are near general pri nciples associated with each of the above three paradigms that would be associated with some specific crime wangle policies. This results in avowedly narrow definition for each of the categories but it does simplify the discussion herein.psychological ApproachesThere a many different psychological models of criminal behaviour ranging from early Freudian notions to riper cognitive and amic able-bodied psychological models. I cannot review them all. Instead, there are several fundamental assumptions of psychological theories of wickedness (and human behaviour in general) that follow. These are1. The individual is the primary unit of analysis in psychological theories.2. Personality is the major motivational and influencial instalment that drives behaviour and their actions at bottom individuals.3. Normality is generally defined by loving consensus.4. Crimes then would result from abnormal, dysfunctional, or inappropriate mental processes within the character of the individual .5. Criminal behaviour may be purposeful for the individual as yet as it addresses certain felt needs.6. Defective, or abnormal, mental processes may carry a variety of causes, i.e., a diseased mind, inappropriate learning or improper conditioning, the emulation of inappropriate role models, and adjustment to inner conflicts. assumption these six principles to establish psychological explanations of criminal behaviour we can rede first that tralatitious imprisonment, fines, and other court sanctions are found on operant learning models of behaviour for crime control. Operant learning models are based onthe utilitarian cin one casepts that all hatful wish to maximize pleasure and minimize pain or discomfort. Skinnerian based favorable psychological theories of reinforcement and punishment are influential in this model of criminal control although the idea of punishment for crime has a overmuch longer history (Jeffery, 1990). Technically speaking, punishments are any sanctions designed to belittle a specific behaviour thus, fines, jail sentences, etc. are all songs of punishment.However, Skinner himself recognized that punishment was generally ineffective in behaviour modification and that reinforcement worked better (e.g., Skinner, 1966). Actually, a caveat should be utilise here. Punishment is effective if applied properly, but unfortunately it rarely is applied properly. Punishment needs to be immediate (or as close to the time the offence occurred as possible), inevitable, and sufficiently unpleasant (in fact the more it is subjectively perceived as harsh the better). Given the judicial system in the U.S. it would be hard to apply punishment to its maximal effectiveness, thus it is not an effective deterrent as seen in the stable homicide rates of states that pass the death penalty. Nonetheless, punishments and sanctions for criminal behaviour are based on behavioral psychological principles.Because harsh forms of punishment do not come to the fore to importantly decrease recidivism rates, other psychological principles have been applied. In terms of cognitive behavioral psychological principles, rehabilitation and relearning, retraining, or educational programs for offenders are forms of psychologically based methods to control crime. These methods are based on the cognitive behavioral methods of teaching an alternative functional response in place of a formally dysfunctional one as distant to simple punishment. These programs can defend place in prisons or outside of the prison and have long been demonstrated to be successful (e.g., Mathias, 1995). So any form of retraining, re-education, or re-entry program is based on psychological principles of misdeed and reform. reclamation programs are often rarely implemented in jail or prison however.Many of these programs appear to be especially beneficial for do drugs and inebriant offenders. Likewise, any form education such as the presume program and recent efforts t o curb bullying in schools are based on these methods. In line with this, changing the environment of the offender such as providing more opportunities would be a psychological behavioural principle designed to cutcrime. In line with other psychological methods are policies aimed at maintaining a visible presence of law enforcement and methods to maintain self-awareness of people in tempting situations. Such methods are preventative. For instance, it has been a well-known kindly psychological principle that situations that diminish self-consciousness and self-awareness lead individuals to organism less detainrained, less self-regulated, and more likely to act without considering the consequences of their actions (e.g., Diener, 1979).The simple act of placing mirrors in stores can increase self-awareness and decrease shop-lifting. Likewise, the presence of visible law-enforcement can cut down on substantially crime. Making sanctions and the consequences for crime well- manized and available to the public is another psychological method to control crime in this vein. divers(a) forms of criminal profiling are based heavily on psychological principles and represent an effort to either apprehend existing criminals or to let out persons at risk for certain behaviour (Holmes & Holmes, 2008). More recently there have been efforts to develop methods to identify individuals at risk for certain forms of deviant behaviour including criminal activities based on personality and social variables. sociological ApproachesSociological principles and psychological principles of criminality are intertwined and technologically not independent. As with psychological theories there are numerous sociological formulations of the cause and control of criminality. For purposes of this paper we will define sociological notions of criminality as 1. Attempting to associate the issues of the individuals criminality with the broader social structures and cultural values of public, soc ial, familial, or peer group. 2. How the contradictions of all of these interacting groups contribute to criminality. 3. The ways these structures ,cultures and contradictions have historically actual and evolved. 4. The current processes of change that these groups are undergoing. 5. Criminality is viewed from the point of view of the social make up and construction of criminality and its social causes.Traditional sociological theories proposed that crimes was a result of anomie, a term meaning normlessness or a feeling of a lack of social norms, and feeling departed from a social peer group or departed a lack of being connected tosociety. The term was made popular by myocardial infarct Durkheim (1897). Durkheim originally employ the term to explain suicide, but later sociologists used the term to describe the dissociation of the individual from the collective conscience or the criminality resulting from a lack of opportunity to achieve aspirations or by the learning of criminal values and behaviours. Therefore criminality results by the visitation to properly socialize individuals and by unequal opportunities among groups. Durkheim believed that crime was an inescapable fact of society and incited maintaining crime within reasonable boundaries.A property of sociological theories is that society constructs criminality. Thus, certain types of human activity are pestilential and are judged so by society as a whole. entirely it is also true that there are other behaviors recognized by society as criminal that do not result in harm to others and are therefore criminalized without sufficient ground, these are the so-called victimless crimes. These accommodate drug use, prostitution, etc. Therefore according to this view if carried to its extreme hundred% of the members of a society are lawbreakers at some point. One of the sociological policy methods of crime control would be to advocate for decriminalization of these victimless crimes or at least a vas t reduction in their penalties (Schur, 1965). cordial programs aimed at socializing children properly and providing support for single family homes are also examples of sociological methods to control crime. There are a hail of these programs including calling academies ( half-size learning communities in low-income high schools, offering academic and career/technical courses as well as workplace opportunities).Finally, sociological policies to control crime would enable stronger and harsher penalties to be enforced when regarding serious crimes such as murder, rape, are more effective law enforcement. Again, sociologists accept the reality that crime is a social phenomenon that will not disappear no matter how many interventions are enacted to control it. Sociologists note that of every 100 crimes committed within the United States, only one is sent to prison. A vast number are unreported and of those that are reported only a small portion goes to trial as a result of the victim being too scared to come forward and fear for their social morbidity. If a justice system is to work properly it must be able to rely on its law enforcement system and judicial system to bring to justice and prosecute serious offenders. The purposes ofimprisonment include punishment, rehabilitation, deterrence, and selective confinement. All of these should be utilized where appropriate for the individual (Hester & Eglin, 1992). biological ApproachesBiological theories of criminality basically purport that criminal behavior is the result of some damage in the biological makeup of the individual. This physical flaw could be cod to (Raine, 2002) (1) Heredity(2) Neurotransmitter dysfunction(3) Brain abnormalities that were caused by either of the above, improper development, or trauma. Biological theorists would also endorse a harder penalty and better law enforcement techniques for crime control, but there are several methods of crime control that are specific to the biological the ories of criminality. I will discuss these in short here. Psychosurgery Brain surgery to control behaviour has rarely been applied to criminal behaviour. Certainly much more common between the 1930s to the late 1970s there were over 40,000 frontal lobotomies performed. Lobotomies were used to treat a wide range of problems from depression, to schizophrenia.However, while widely discussed as a probable treatment for criminal behaviour a perusal of the literature could not find a court ordered case for a prefrontal leukotomy as a sentence for a convicted criminal Lobotomies were also used for people who were considered an annoyance because the demonstrated behaviours characterized as moody or they were children who were unmanageable with authority figures such as teachers. The prefrontal leukotomy involves separating the prefrontal cortex from the rest of the brain either surgically or in the case of the transorbital lobotomy with a sharp ice-pick like instrument that was inserted in the eye socket between the upper eyelid and the eye. In this method the patient was not anesthetized, not even children. The psychiatrists hit the end of the instrument with a hammer to disconnect the nerves in the frontal lobe of the brain. Afterwards behaviours were changed, but at a high price as you can imagine. Today the lobotomy has travel out of favour due medications used to control behaviour, although some view the use of medications as equivalent to a lobotomy (e.g., see Breggin, 2008).Psychosurgery appears to be an option that will most likely not be typeset into use due to the stigma associated with it. Chemical methods of control Theuse of pharmacologic treatments to try to control crime has been ongoing in two major areas chemic castration for sex offenders and pharmacological interventions for drug or alcohol addicts. However, addicts can stop the medication and return to use. Sex offenders are close monitored and there is some evidence that this policy has b een efficacious. Sometimes mentally ill people in the criminal justice system been ordered to take medications to treat their mental illness. Other pharmacological interventions to control crime come along plausible and are being investigated, but do not appear to have been widely used.Others Deep brain stimulation is used for some disorders such as Parkinsons disease, but has yet been investigated for criminal behaviour. Biological theorists have advocated changes in diet to deal with criminality (Burton, 2002) and better dealings between parents. There is also the famous genetic XYY combination that was once thought to be a marker for a criminal type, but as it turned out these individuals were found to be less tidy or more likely to have learning difficulties as opposed to being criminal types. While there are many studies indicating a connection between antisocial personality disorder or criminal behavioural and heredity, there are no policies being implemented to advocate fo r selective breeding, genetic testing etc. for criminals. I do not yet envision a policy of genetic testing for criminals as the variables are not stable enough in order to prophesy with set of gene combinations are predictive of a biological criminal type (Rutter, 2006) although this is certainly a possibility.If the biological model of criminality has any significant effect on policy outside the use of chemical castration for sex offenders, it would be the policy that certain forms of criminal behaviour or certain individuals may not be rehabilitated and the advocacy for harsher and stricter imprisonments or even executions are viable methods of control in these instances. The issue for the familiarity is how to recognize a significant biological contribution to criminal behaviour since genetic testing is unreliable and there are no other physical markers of criminality. It seems that currently in the absence of very harsh crimes like murder and rape one must be recognized as a repeat offender before we can acknowledge a possible innate tendency towards criminality.By that time the damage, which is often irreparable, is done. perchance the answer lies in stricter probation and parole practices for first-time offenders. However,this policy is expensive and tax payers may not support it. The policy mandating convicted sex offenders to be monitored over their biography and certain restrictions placed on them is a result of the acknowledgment of a biological predisposition to engage in this crime and therefore traditional forms of treatment or remediation do not appear to be effective. Similar policies might follow with habitual criminal offenders based on the biological theories of criminality.Reference ListAmerican Psychiatric Association (APA, 2002). diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th Ed.). Arlington, VA Author. Breggin, P.A. 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