Docsity
Docsity

Prepare for your exams
Prepare for your exams

Study with the several resources on Docsity


Earn points to download
Earn points to download

Earn points by helping other students or get them with a premium plan


Guidelines and tips
Guidelines and tips

Containment Theory, The Meaning of Crime: Social Process Perspective, Lecture notes of Criminology

Walter Reckless containment theory and couple of others criminal minds theories

Typology: Lecture notes

2021/2022

Uploaded on 03/31/2022

skips
skips 🇺🇸

4.4

(11)

222 documents

1 / 9

Toggle sidebar

This page cannot be seen from the preview

Don't miss anything!

bg1
LECTURE 11 THE MEANING OF CRIME: SOCIAL PROCESS PERSPECTIVE
FUNDAMENTAL ASSUMPTIONS
- Social reality is construction
- Interactions create meaning and meaning is derived from prev. experience
- Criminal behavior defined by others
- Differing interpretations
- Status derived from social definition of crime
- Limited opportunity & social reaction
- Conformity vs. non-conformity
LEARNING THEORY
MODELLING THEORY
Albert Bandura (1925-?)
- People learn by observing others
Aggression seen as a means to an end
- If stand up for self can improve how treated by others
Critique lacks comprehensive explanatory power
- How do you explain sibling differences in behavior?
CLASSICAL CONDITIONING
Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936)
Unconditioned stimulus: meat powder
Conditioned stimulus: bell
pf3
pf4
pf5
pf8
pf9

Partial preview of the text

Download Containment Theory, The Meaning of Crime: Social Process Perspective and more Lecture notes Criminology in PDF only on Docsity!

LECTURE 11 THE MEANING OF CRIME: SOCIAL PROCESS PERSPECTIVE

FUNDAMENTAL ASSUMPTIONS

  • Social reality is construction
  • Interactions create meaning and meaning is derived from prev. experience
  • Criminal behavior defined by others
  • Differing interpretations
  • Status derived from social definition of crime
  • Limited opportunity & social reaction
  • Conformity vs. non-conformity

LEARNING THEORY

MODELLING THEORY

Albert Bandura (1925-?)

  • People learn by observing others

Aggression seen as a means to an end

  • If stand up for self – can improve how treated by others

Critique – lacks comprehensive explanatory power

  • How do you explain sibling differences in behavior?

CLASSICAL CONDITIONING

Ivan Pavlov (1849-1936)

Unconditioned stimulus: meat powder

Conditioned stimulus: bell

Learned that the sound of the sound of the bell preceded treat; induced salivation (conditioned response)

BEHAVIOUR THEORY

B.F. Skinner

Stimulus-response approach to behavior

Positive and negative rewards and punishments

Focus is on environment

Behaviours are modified depending on reward/punishment

OPERANT CONDITIONING

Behavior learned through “law of effect”

  • Desirable effects (e.g. comfort, food, praise) are likely to be repeated
  • Undesirable effects (e.g. loss, pain, etc.) unlikely to be repeated

Established connection between behavior and its consequences.

Learning to either make or withhold a particular response because of its consequences.

REINFORCEMENT

Positive reinforcement: Gain something we desire as a consequence of certain behavior.

Negative reinforcement: Avoiding an unpleasant event or stimulus as a consequence of certain behavior.

Rejected notion that crime was caused by “criminal type” or “psychopathology”

Said it was the social context that contributed to criminal behavior

DIFFERENTIAL ASSOCIATION cont.

Criminal behaviour is learned through social interaction with intimate groups

Learning includes:

a) Techniques to commit crime

b) Rationalizations and motives to commit crime

When ones definitions favorable to the violation of law exceed those unfavorable to the violation of law criminal behavior will occur

AKERS’S SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY

Extended Sutherland’s differential association and focused on peer influences

”differential social reinforcement”

Social reinforcements (or positive consequences) encourage individuals to continue in a life of crime

Behavior can also be learned through modeling

NEUTRALIZATION THEORY

Developed by Sykes and Matza (1957)

If pressures to commit crime are so great, then why aren’t more people criminals?

Apart from committing crimes, why are criminals mostly like normal people?

TECHNIQUES OF NEUTRALIZATION

  • Denial of responsibility
  • Denial of injury
  • Denial of victim
  • Condemnation of the condemners
  • Appeal to higher loyalties

LABELLING THEORY

FRANK TANNENBAUM

“The dramatization of evil”; a “tag” being applied to identify child as delinquent

The child might then change own self-image or others might come to regard them as delinquent

An arrest leads to the delinquent being singled out for special treatment, precipitating a series of events including exposure to criminal justice institutions

Family and other social bonds control delinquent behaviour

Inner containment: components of the “self” (e.g., self control, good self-image, frustration tolerance)

Outer containment: social environment (e.g., family supervision and values, institutional reinforcement)

CONTAINMENT THEORY, cont.

Internal pushes (e.g. restlessness, impatience and anger) and external pulls (e.g., poverty, unemployment, the media, or delinquent friends) may pressure in a person into crime

Inner and outer containment control or contain crime

  • If there containments are weak a person will be more susceptible to the pushes and pulls

HIRSCHI’s SOCIAL BOND THEORY

Four strands of the bond:

Attachment: ties to conventional activities, institutions and individuals

Commitment: getting an education, vocational training and eventually a good job

Involvement: time spent in/with conventional activities, institutions and individuals

Belief: shared values – it’s wrong to steal, people should respect the law

GENERAL THOERY OF CRIME

Proposed by Gottfredson and Hirschi

Low self-control results in criminal behavior; absence of proper socialization (poor parenting) leads to low self control

  • Common traits: low intelligence, self centered, impulsive

LSC may also result in drinking/drug use, smoking promiscuity, gambling, overeating

Critics point out that some crimes(corporate, white collar, organized) require high levels of self control

SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT THEORIES

LIFE COURSE THEORY

Sampson and Laub were students of Hirschi

They suggested that self control that self control could change over time through social ties

Based on large scale study of juvenile delinquents followed to age 70

LCT IN SUM

Life trajectory (course) of crime influenced by social bonds

Different life points will have different effects