Search results
Sep 1, 2009 · The Criminal Brain: Understanding Biological Theories of Crime. Based on: by Nicole Rafter; New York, New York University Press, 2008, 317 pages, $72 hardcover, $24 softcover. A picture can paint a thousand words. A CT scan or an MRI can lead a jury in a criminal trial to a conclusion of brain dysfunction and exculpability, even if the ...
Collection: Oxford Handbooks Online. A substantial body of research over the past 20 years has demonstrated that several biological risk factors significantly increase risk for criminal and violent behavior across the life span. Research on the relationship between biology and crime has focused on criminal offenders, individuals who display ...
Jan 22, 2014 · The Criminal Brain: Understanding Biological Theories of Crime. Biosocial Criminology: New Directions in Theory and Research. Criminals in the Making: Criminality Across the Life Course. Abstract Biological explanations for criminal behavior have gained importance in recent years. Advances in science and technology have permitted researchers to ...
- Jamie Newsome
- 2014
- History and Overview
- Degeneration Theory
- Atavistic Theory of Crime
- Sheldon Somotypes Theory
- Terrie Moffit’s Two-Path Theory
- Modern Biological Theories of Crime
- Critical Evaluation
- References
Biological theories of crimes state that whether or not people commit crimes depends on their biological nature. The biological characteristics that biological theories of crime claim are associated with criminality could include factors such as genetics, neurology, or physical constitution. Although many modern biological theories of crime conside...
Degeneracy Theory, an offshoot of 19th-century research into biological theories of crime, argues that certain (lower) social classes and races were predisposed to neurological and mental illnesses by inheritance, making them more likely to commit crimes. Those of low social standing, such as prostitutes, criminals, the poor, and those with mental ...
Cesare Lombroso (1876) was most famous for developing the avastic theory of crime in his book, The Criminal Man. In this book, Lombroso argued that there is a distinct biological class of people prone to criminality. Lombroso’s (1876) theory of criminology suggests that criminality is inherited and that someone “born criminal” could be identified b...
William Sheldon (1942) proposed a strong correlation between personality and somatotype(i.e., physique). From a study of several hundred male physiques, he derived three body types: Each body type was associated with a particular personality: Sheldon noted that the vast majority of criminals were mesomorphs. One explanation for this is that a solid...
Terrie Moffit’s Two-Path theory is a biosocial theory of crime. Moffit (1993) proposes that there are two groups of people who commit crimes: life-course-persistent offenders, whose anti-social, criminal behavior begins in childhood and continues to worsen thereafter, and adolescence-limited offenders, whose antisocial behavior begins in adolescenc...
Neurological Theories of Crime
Neural explanations look at the structure and functioning of the central nervous system. There are several regions of the brain that criminologists and neurologists have focused on in modern biological studies of crime. The cerebral cortex makes up the outer part of the brain and is divided into left and right hemispheres. Each hemisphere has four lobes. Criminologists have focused on the frontal lobe in their biological theories of crime because the region is involved in abstract thought, pl...
Genetic Explanations
Genetic explanations of crime propose that genetic factors could predispose individuals to commit crimes because genes code for physiological factors such as the structure and functioning of the nervous system and neurochemistry. As in early biological theories of crime, criminologists have used family, adoption, and twin studies in estimating the extent to which certain traits are heritable (Plomin, 2004). In these studies, if the behavior of an individual is more similar to those of their b...
Gene-Environment Interactions
Those with dissimilar genes are likely to act differently in the same environment. Those who have genetic predispositions towards criminality are more likely to engage in criminal behaviors if they are exposed to environments conducive to criminality. In contrast, those that do not have criminal dispositions are unlikely to engage in criminal behavior, even when they are in a criminogenic environment. Scientists such as Caspi et al. (2002) have found evidence for how criminological genes them...
Genetic studies are limited because they cannot determine which specific genetic factors lead to behavioral differences. Many genes can disrupt normal development, resulting in abnormal behavior. To find out which genes could be related to antisocial and criminal behavior, scientists have conducted molecular genetic studies. Criminologists have bee...
Brizer, D. A. (1988). Psychopharmacology and the management of violent patients. Psychiatric Clinics of North America, 11(4), 551-568. Caspi, A., McClay, J., Moffitt, T. E., Mill, J., Martin, J., Craig, I. W., … & Poulton, R. (2002). Role of genotype in the cycle of violence in maltreated children. Science, 297(5582), 851-854. Comings, D. E., & Blu...
Feb 4, 1995 · The perception that crime, especially violent crime, has become one of the most serious problems facing society has led to determined efforts by many researchers to find the causes of criminal behaviour. Researchers have focused on biological causes, believing that a biological basis of criminality exists and that an understanding of the biology will be useful in predicting which people are ...
Jan 29, 2020 · This chapter provides a historical and sociological overview of the biological explanations for violent and criminal behaviour. It starts with a detailed description of the seminal work by Cesare Lombroso (nineteenth century) and highlights the risks of biological determinism and the potential stigmatization raised by this line of research.
People also ask
Are biological theories about criminal behaviour scientific obscurantism?
What are biological theories of crime?
What biological abnormalities lead to crime?
What is a 'born criminal'?
Is a Y chromosome predisposed to violent criminal behaviour?
Can criminal behaviour be understood in genetics or biochemistry?
Abstract. Despite major advances in understanding the biological basis of human behaviour, the most popular theories of criminal behaviour remain restricted to those that consider only learning and social environmental variables. All of these strictly environmental theories have difficulty explaining why neurological, hormonal, and other ...
