Criminological Theories Of Crime

Critically evaluate which criminological theories link with the explanations given by the author for their criminality in the account you have read. Your answer must make reference to specific criminological theories/theorists.

A number of criminological theories have been developed throughout the course of time for the purposes of attempting to understand and pinpoint what motivates individuals to demonstrate criminal behaviors by engaging in criminal acts. The focus of this work will be to apply theories of crime to the offense of burglary. Three criminological theories will be identified, discussed, and then related to the criminal behavior of burglary. The associations between the theories and the criminal behavior will be clearly explained. Additionally, the reliability and validity of each theory will be assessed. Lastly, this writer will offer an opinion as to which theory best explains a burglar’s behavior. This estimation will be supported by one practical example and relevant factors that are described in the most applicable theory.

For many years, people have studied the patterns and lives of serial killers in the effort to establish how

Biological Theories have been related to crime for a long time. The Biological Theory talks about how one’s brain has an impact on committing crime or not. Dr. Jim Fallon, a neuroscientist from California talks about the biological influences in a brain. He believes that the combination of three major aspects can determine whether someone is psychopathic or not. Fallon states a combination of genes, damage to the person 's brain and the environment surrounding the individual will have the biggest impact on a person (Fallon, 2009). A real world example of the biological theory in full effect was the crimes of David Berkowitz, aka “Son of Sam. Berkowitz was accused and found guilty of killing over 6 people in New York City. After being convicted and locked up for a few years, studies had shown that Berkowitz had been diagnosed with schizophrenia. Berkowitz also claimed that his neighbor’s dog, Sam had told him to do the killings as well (Biography). Comparing the Biological theory to my own life was pretty simple because there is a genetic factor that runs in my dad’s side and that is tempers. Tempers tend to flare fairly easy, and luckily so far there has no issues with the law, however like Fallon had said, with the right combination, anyone is possible to commit a crime at any time. I feel like in a biological theory, this would have a major impact on my life

Criminological theories have been used on a micro and macro level scale in order to search for an answer as to why people commit crimes. The broken windows theory and routine activity theory have been selected as the two theories provide different perspectives as to why crime occurs, and how to solve crime. The theories will be examined in order get a historical origins, outline main principles, distinguishing characteristics, misconceptions and critaziams of each theory.

Social structural theories of crime can help determine why some neighborhoods are either more prone to violence and crime and why some neighborhoods are not. There are multiple types of theories that have their merits, but when analyzing my own neighborhood, the collective efficacy and social disorganization theories can be best applied in understanding why the neighborhood is not prone to violence and crime. Collective efficacy is the idea that communities have to be organized towards achieving a specific purpose or goal; (Cronin, Week4). Social disorganization is identified by how disorganized structural variables lead to disorganized communities (Cronin, Week 4). The theories will help to explain the general goal of the neighborhood and what structural variables are active to keep the community from becoming disorganized.

Criminological theories (also known as theoretical criminology), according to Schmalleger (2015), is the “subfield of general criminology that posits explanations of criminal behavior.” (p. 13) There are many theories under this subfield that exist to help people have a better understanding of a criminal 's actions as well as put some justification behind them. There are six different schools that fall under criminological theories. These schools are: Classical School, Biological/Biosocial Theories, Psychological/Psychiatric Theories, Social Structions Approaches, Social Process & Social Development Theories, and Social Conflict Theories.

There are a number of proposed theories and approaches surrounding the true nature of crime and what drives criminals to act in the ways that they do. From approaches based around philosophy to those with origins in biology, sociology and psychology, there is yet to be a completely provable explanation for the motivations behind criminal behaviour. The case of 41 year old Alfred is a prime example of this as his case shows aspects of a number of different theories. The sociologically based strain theory first proposed by Émile Durkheim and furthered by Robert Agnew in 1992, and the ‘general theory of crime’ proposed by criminologists Michael Gottfredson and Travis Hirschi in 1990 are both strongly demonstrated within the case. Both

Over this course, our class has examined different sociological ideologies in order to understand what causes crime. In the article “Sociological Theories of Crime and Delinquency” by author David Zembroski, he explained several theories of what provokes criminal and deviant activity. From those ideas, I came with my own perspective on why people break the law. In my opinion crime is caused by deviant behavior that stems from one’s upbringing and their environment. Based off the different readings I learned that I relate to the Chicago School theory and The Differential Association Theory because we agree that some social interactions influence criminal activity.

The UCR utilizes the hierarchy rule that implies that when multiple crimes are linked to one offender within the same reporting year, only the most serious crime is counted. The UCR also uses another category termed clearance rate, this category highlights number of cases solved based on arrests, usually some cases where there are suspects but cannot be cleared for one reason or another when suspect flees the country, commits suicide, dies, or is convicted in another jurisdiction.

The study of social change is almost always occupied with an analysis of the relation between law and social order. There are three primary theories of criminology that emphasize this relation in a variety of ways. The consensus perspective holds that most members of society agree on what is right and wrong and, as a result, the elements of society (schools, chuches, government agencies, businesses, ect..) work in a consensus towward the greater good (220).

An initial consideration in writing this chapter was to present theories of crime and delinquency in such a way as to render them both functional and informative. Given that there are dozens – if not hundreds – of theories of criminology, this fact alone made these goals not only more essential but also much more complicated. With these goals in mind, however, the authors set about this task with three basic concerns:

A theory is a supposition or a system of ideas intended to explain something; a theory of crime tries to explain why certain things are related to criminal behavior. Criminological theory is the explanation of police, attorneys, judges, prosecutors, correctional personnel, victims, and criminal behavior in the criminal justice process. Most of what is done in criminal justice is based on criminological theory. There are three main types of criminological theory: classical and neoclassical theories, positivist theories, and critical theories.

Crime is a serious issue in the United States. Research shows that crime is running rampant and its effects are felt in all socioeconomic levels. Each economic class has its own crime rates and types of crime. It is a mistake to think of crime as a lower class problem. Crime is a problem for all people. The lower classes commit crime for survival while the upper class commits crime to supplement capital and maintain control.

There are many different aspects of criminal justice policy. One in particular is the different theories of crime and how they affect the criminal justice system. The Classical School of criminology is a theory about evolving from a capital punishment type of view to more humane ways of punishing people. Positivist criminology is maintaining the control of human behavior and criminal behavior. They did this through three different categories of Biological studies, which are five methodologies of crime that were mainly focused on biological theories, Psychological theories, which contains four separate theories, and the Sociological theories, which also includes four different methods of explaining why crime exists. The last theory is