C H A P T E R 3

The Search for Causes

OUTLINE
• Introduction
• Criminological Theory
• The Classical School
• Biological Theories
• Psychobiological Theories
• Psychological Theories
• Sociological Theories
• Social Process Theories
• Conflict Theories
• Emergent Perspectives

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
After reading this chapter, students should be able to
• Summarize the development of criminological theory, including the role of social research in that
development.
• Describe the Classical School of criminology, and show how it continues to influence criminological
theorizing.
• Describe the basic features of biological theories of crime causation and their shortcomings.
• Explain how the mapping of human DNA has enhanced contemporary psychobiological
understandings of criminal behavior.
• Describe the fundamental assumptions of psychological explanations for crime and their
shortcomings.
• Describe the basic features of sociological theories of crime causation.
• Describe social process theories of criminology, including the kinds of crime-control policies that
might be based on them.
• Describe conflict theories of criminality, including the kinds of crime-control policies that might be
based on them.
• Summarize three emergent theories of crime causation.

Chapter Overview
Chapter 3 provides an overview of theories used to explain the causes of crime. It begins with an introduction
to theory building in criminal justice, emphasizing the importance of research for testing hypotheses. The
chapter is organized into eight general categories, and Table 3-1 is an extraordinarily useful tool for its
summary of the characteristics of these theories and of the people most noted for their development.
Chapter 3 first discusses the criminological theories of the Classical School, including the works of
Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. The text discusses the five basic assumptions of classical theory:
1. Crime is caused by the individual exercise of free will.
2. Pain and pleasure are the two central determinants of human behavior.
3. Crime disparages the quality of the bond that exists between individuals and society.
4. Punishment is necessary to deter violators of the law and to serve as an example to others.
 5. Crime prevention is possible through swift and certain punishment.
Theories in the Biological School search for physical or biological explanations of
crime. Influenced by medical and technological advances, these theories have evolved over time. Compare the
early biological theories of Gall, Lombroso, and Sheldon to contemporary biochemical theories. Gall argued that
skull shape determined personality and behavior. Lombroso considered various parts of the body in his
atavistic explanation for crime. Criminals, he argued, were throwbacks to earlier stages of evolution. William
Sheldon used somatotyping (or body typing) to categorize each individual’s physique by its mesomorphic,
endomorphic, and ectomorphic characteristics. Sheldon found that juveniles with dominant mesomorphic
physiques were most likely to commit crime. Richard Dugdale has considered biological inheritance as applied
to criminal families in his examination of the Jukes’ family tree and Henry Goddard’s study of the Kallikaks.
Biological theories have advanced with medical technology. For example, chromosome theories look to
internal gene structure to understand the causes of crime. The XYY chromosome theory was popular in the
1960s and early 1970s, but later studies question the ability of the XYY theory to predict criminal behavior.
Other biological theories have examined the effects of chemical imbalances, hormones, and allergic reactions
to food on criminal behavior.
Psychological explanations argue that criminal behavior results from inappropriately conditioned
behavior or from abnormal, dysfunctional, and inappropriate mental processes. One thread of psychological
theories presented in the text is behavioral conditioning. Another thread focuses on personality
disturbances and diseases of the mind. People who believe in conditioning hold that the frequency of any
behavior can be increased through rewards, punishments, and/or association with other stimuli. Sigmund
Freud argued that personality was developed from the interaction of the id, the ego, and the superego. One
source of criminal behavior is the ability of a person’s superego to control his or her id.
Sociological explanations of crime examine the effects on behavior of environmental forces such as
poverty, urban decay, and unemployment. For example, Shaw and McKay’s social ecology theory argues that
certain areas of a city—those with high rates of poverty, unemployment, and lack of schooling—are socially
disorganized and likely to produce crime. Merton, borrowing the concept of anomie from Émile Durkheim,
argued that since the means to achieve goals are not equally available to all groups, individuals are forced to use
illegitimate means such as crime to accomplish goals. On the other hand, subcultural theories argue that the
goals of various groups are different and some groups view committing crime as a legitimate goal. For example,
Marvin Wolfgang and Franco Ferracuti found that murder was an acceptable goal for certain groups.
Chapter 3 also discusses social process theories, conflict theories, and some emerging theories such as
feminist criminology. Social process theories explain deviant behavior by highlighting the process of
interaction between individuals and society. Conflict theories consider law a tool of the powerful, which is
used by the powerful to further their own interests. Feminist criminology emphasizes gender issues in
criminology. None of these theories provide a definitive explanation of why people commit crimes. However,
understanding how these theories explain the causes of crime is important because they have an impact on
the development of criminal justice policy and the criminal justice system’s response to crime.

Outline
I. Introduction
• Define deviance, and explain the difference between criminal and deviant behavior.
Deviance A violation of social norms defining appropriate or proper behavior under a particular set of
circumstances. Deviance often includes criminal acts.

II. Criminological Theory

• Introduce the range of theories available to explain criminal behavior.
• Explain why some theories are better than others—that is, why some are better at explaining,
predicting, and so on. Discuss the fact that some theories serve the political ends of interest groups
that find their worldviews reaffirmed by a theory’s assertions.
• Explain the concept of a theory. Describe the similarities and differences between the physical and
social sciences as they relate to theory building.
Theory A set of interrelated propositions that attempt to describe, explain, predict, and ultimately control
some class of events. A theory is strengthened by its logical consistency and is “tested” by how well it
describes and predicts reality.
Hypothesis An explanation that accounts for a set of facts and that can be tested by further investigation.
Also, something that is taken to be true for the purpose of argument or investigation.
• Explain the use of research to test hypotheses.
Research The use of standardized, systematic procedures in the search for knowledge.
Interdisciplinary Theory An approach that integrates a variety of theoretical viewpoints in an attempt to
explain something, such as crime and violence.

III. The Classical School

Classical School An eighteenth-century approach to crime causation and criminal responsibility that grew
out of the Enlightenment and that emphasized the role of free will and reasonable punishments. Classical
thinkers believed that punishment, if it is to be an effective deterrent, has to outweigh the potential pleasure
derived from criminal behavior.
• Basic assumptions:
• Crime is caused by an inappropriate exercise of free will.
• Pain and pleasure are two central determinants of human behavior.
• Crime is an immoral form of behavior.
• Punishment is required to deter violators of law from future crimes and to serve as an
example to potential violators.
• Crime prevention is possible through swift and certain punishment.
• Discuss conditioning as a psychological theory. Relate the concepts of reward and punishment to
the free will and hedonistic ideas of the Classical School. Discuss the implications of the
conditioning approach for treatment strategies based on it.
A. Cesare Beccaria: Crime and Punishment
• Wrote Essays on Crimes and Punishment
• Stated that punishment should deter but not be excessive
• Is considered the founder of the Classical School
B. Jeremy Bentham: Hedonistic Calculus
• Devised the hedonistic calculus
• Believed the philosophy of social control is utilitarianism
• Like Beccaria, believed that punishment should be swift and certain
C. The Neoclassical Perspective
• Explain this perspective, and discuss rational choice and routine activities theory.
Neoclassical Criminology A contemporary version of classical criminology that emphasizes deterrence
and retribution and that holds that human beings are essentially free to make choices in favor of crime and
deviance or conformity to the law.
Rational Choice Theory A perspective on crime causation that holds that criminality is the result of
conscious choice. Rational choice theory predicts that individuals will choose to commit crime when the
benefits of doing so outweigh the costs of disobeying the law.
Routine Activities Theory A neoclassical perspective that suggests that lifestyles contribute significantly to
both the amount and the type of crime found in any society.
D. Social Policy and Classical Theories
• Most criminal justice policy is built around the conceptual basis provided by the Classical
School.
IV. Biological Theories (
Biological School A perspective on criminological thought that holds that criminal behavior has a
physiological basis.
• Assumptions:
• Human behavior is genetically based.
• A penchant for crime may be inherited.
• Criminals and deviants are in more primitive developmental stages in the evolutionary
process than most people.
A. Franz Joseph Gall: Phrenology
• Argued bodily constitution might reflect personality
• Developed cranioscopy.
Phrenology The study of the shape of the head to determine anatomical correlates of human behavior.
B. Cesare Lombroso: Atavism
• Founder of the Positivist School of criminology
Atavism A condition characterized by the existence of features thought to be common in earlier stages of
human evolution.
Positivist School An approach to criminal justice theory that stresses the application of scientific
techniques to the study of crime and criminals.
• Lombroso is considered the “father of modern criminology.”
• Identified a large number of atavistic traits that can lead to crime
1. The Evidence for and against Atavism
• A study was conducted on prisoners comparing their attributes to those of the royal
engineers, and no significant differences were found.
• Anthropometric profiles of inmates were gathered and classified for
12 years and compared to volunteers who were employed in certain jobs. There was
some basis to agree with Lombroso’s beliefs; however, it might have been because of
the process of selection.
C. Criminal Families
• Highlight Richard Dugdale’s examination of the Jukes family and Henry Goddard’s
examination of the Kallikaks family.
D. William Sheldon: Somatotypes
Somatotyping The classification of human beings into types according to body build and other physical
characteristics.
• Describe mesomorphs, who have predominate muscle, bone, and connective tissue.
• Describe endomorphs, who display soft roundness, short limbs, and smooth skin.
• Describe ectomorphs, who are thin, fragile, and delicate.

E. Social Policy and Biological Theories

• Tied to the eugenics movement
V. Psychobiological Theories
A. Chromosome Theory
• Explain why men with the XYY chromosomal makeup are identified as “supermales.”
Supermale A human male displaying the XYY chromosome structure.
 • Explain the limited value of this theory.
B. Biochemical Factors and Imbalances
• Explain the various biochemical factors thought to be linked with behavior; for example,
allergic reactions or effects of vitamins.
C. Heredity and Other Physical Factors
• Describe this as an effort to combine biology and environment.
• Explain the research of both James Q. Wilson and Richard Herrnstein.
D. Social Policy and Psychobiological Theories
VI. Psychological Theories
Psychological School A perspective on criminological thought that views offensive and deviant behavior
as the product of dysfunctional personalities. Psychological thinkers identify the conscious, and especially the
subconscious, contents of the human psyche as major determinants of behavior.
• Assumptions:
• The individual is the primary unit of analysis.
• Personality is the major motivational element in individuals.
• Crimes result from inappropriately conditioned behavior.
• Defective or abnormal mental processes may have a variety of causes.
A. Behavioral Conditioning
Behavioral Conditioning A psychological principle that holds that the frequency of any behavior can be
increased or decreased through reward, punishment, and association with other stimuli.
• Discuss Pavlov’s work with dogs.
B. Freudian Psychoanalysis
• Suggests that crime could result from three conditions:
• A weak superego that cannot control the id
• Sublimation
• The death wish
Psychoanalysis A theory of human behavior, based on the writings of Sigmund Freud, that sees
personality as a complex composite of interacting mental entities.
C. Psychopathology and Crime
• Describe the development of the concept of psychopathic personality.
• Present the Psychological School’s claim that crime occurs because of a diseased mind or
disordered personality.
Psychopathology The study of pathological mental conditions—that is, mental illness.
Psychopath A person with a personality disorder, especially one manifested in aggressively antisocial
behavior, which is often said to be the result of a poorly developed superego.
D. The Psychotic Offender
Psychosis A form of mental illness in which sufferers are said to be out of touch with reality.
Schizophrenic A mentally ill individual who suffers from disjointed thinking and possibly from delusions
and hallucinations.
E. Psychological Profiling
Psychological Profiling The attempt to categorize, understand, and predict the behavior of certain types
of offenders based on behavioral clues they provide. (
 • Explain how Adolf Hitler became the first subject for psychological profiling when Allied
leaders employed it in an effort to find possible weaknesses in his psyche.
F. Social Policy and Psychological Theories
• Describe the Psychological School’s orientation toward individual treatment, which is to
expose the individual offender to various forms of therapy.
Dangerousness The likelihood that a given individual will later harm society or others. Dangerousness is
often measured in terms of recidivism, or the likelihood that an individual will commit an additional crime
within five years following arrest or release from confinement.
VII. Sociological Theories
Chicago School A sociological approach that emphasizes demographics (the characteristics of population
groups) and geographics (the mapped locations of such groups relative to one another) and that sees the
social disorganization that characterizes delinquency areas as a major cause of criminality and victimization.
Social Disorganization A condition said to exist when a group is faced with social change, uneven
development of culture, maladaptiveness, disharmony, conflict, and lack of consensus.
• Assumptions:
• Social groups, social institutions, the arrangements of society, and social roles all provide the
proper focus for criminological study.
• Group dynamics, group organization, and subgroup relationships form the causal nexus out
of which crime develops.
• The structure of society and its relative degree of organization or disorganization are important
factors that contribute to the prevalence of criminal behavior.
A. Social Ecology Theory
• Mapping occurs according to social characteristics.
• Explain “zone two” crime rate.
• Crime depends on aspects of social structure.
• Elements include poverty, illiteracy, lack of schooling, unemployment, and illegitimacy.
B. Anomie Theory
Anomie A socially pervasive condition of normlessness. Also, a disjunction between approved goals and
means.
• Merton applied anomie to criminology.
• Anomie is a disjuncture between approved goals and means.
• Discuss the characteristics of innovators—retreatist, ritualist, and rebel.
C. Subcultural Theory
Reaction Formation The process whereby a person openly rejects that which he or she wants or aspires to
but cannot obtain or achieve.
• A subculture consists of a group of people who share a system of values and norms that are
at variance with the larger culture.
• Subcultural explanations of crime posit the existence of group values supportive of criminal
behavior.
Subculture of Violence A cultural setting in which violence is a traditional and often accepted method of
dispute resolution.
• Discuss gangs and the gang lifestyle to illustrate subcultural theory.
D. Social Policy and Sociological Theories
• Asserts that social action is a panacea
Defensible Space Theory The belief that an area’s physical features may be modified and structured so as
to reduce crime rates in that area and to lower the fear of victimization that residents experience.
Broken Windows Thesis A perspective on crime causation that holds that physical deterioration in an
area leads to higher crime rates and an increased concern for personal safety among residents.
• Discuss Cohen’s term reaction formation.
VIII. Social Process Theories
Social Process Theory A perspective on criminological thought that highlights the process of interaction
between individuals and society. Most social process theories highlight the role of social learning.
A. Differential Association Theory
• Crime is a product of socialization.
• Crime is the natural consequence of an individual’s interaction with criminal lifestyles.
Social Learning Theory A psychological perspective that says that people learn how to behave by
modeling themselves after others whom they have the opportunity to observe.
B. Restraint Theories (
1. Containment Theory
• Focuses on constraints rather than causes
• Inner and outer containment
Containment The aspects of the social bond and of the personality that act to prevent individuals from
committing crimes and engaging in deviance.
2. Social Control Theory
• Focuses on bonds between individuals and society
• Types of bonds
• Emotional attachments
• A commitment to appropriate lifestyles
• Involvement or immersion in conventional values
• A belief in the correctness of social obligations
3. Neutralization Techniques
• Explain these techniques as rationalizations that allow offenders to shed feelings of
guilt and any sense of responsibility.
C. Labeling Theory
Labeling Theory A social process perspective that sees continued crime as a consequence of the limited
opportunities for acceptable behavior that follow from the negative responses of society to those defined as
offenders.
• It focuses on constraints rather than causes.
• Describe how the criminal label produces consequences for labeled individuals that may
necessitate their continued criminality.
• Explain labeling theory as a product of the tumultuous 1960s. Ask students what form of
“treatment” labeling theorists might suggest for convicted offenders.
Moral Enterprise The process undertaken by an advocacy group to have its values legitimated and
embodied in law.
D. The Life Course Perspective
Social Development Theory An integrated view of human development that points to the process of
interaction among and between individuals and society as the root cause of criminal behavior.
Life Course Perspective An approach to explaining crime and deviance that investigates developments
and turning points in the course of a person’s life.
• Stress how criminal behavior follows an identifiable pattern throughout a person’s life cycle.
• Explain the three distinct pathways to delinquency
• The authority conflict pathway
• The covert pathway
• The overt pathway
IX. Conflict Theories
Conflict Perspective A theoretical approach that holds that crime is the natural consequence of economic
and other social inequities. Conflict theorists highlight the stresses that arise among and within social groups
as they compete with one another for resources and survival. The social forces that result are viewed as major
determinants of group and individual behavior, including crime. (p. 95)
• Key elements:
• Society is composed of diverse social groups, and diversity is based on distinctions that
people hold to be significant.
• Conflict between and among groups is unavoidable because of their different interests and
values.
• The fundamental nature of group conflict centers on the exercise of political power.
• Law is a tool of power that furthers the interests of those powerful enough to make it.
A. Radical Criminology
Radical Criminology A conflict perspective that sees crime as engendered by the unequal distribution of
wealth, power, and other resources, which adherents believe is especially characteristic of capitalist societies.
• Radical criminology blames criminality and deviant behavior on officially sanctioned cultural
and economic arrangements.
• Distribution of wealth and power in society is held to be the primary cause of criminal
behavior.
• Explain that radical criminologists see the causes of crime as rooted in social inequities.
B. Peacemaking Criminology
Peacemaking Criminology A perspective that holds that crime-control agencies and the citizens they
serve should work together to alleviate social problems and human suffering and thus reduce crime.
• Official agents of social control need to work with both victims and victimizers to achieve a
new world order that is just for all.
C. Social Policy and Conflict Theories
• Assumes inequalities in society cause crime
• Sees revolution as a potential solution to social inequality

X. Emergent Perspectives
A. Feminist Criminology
Feminist Criminology A developing intellectual approach that emphasizes gender issues in criminology.
B. Constitutive Criminology
Constitutive Criminology The study of the process by which human beings create an ideology of crime
that sustains the notion of crime as a concrete reality.
C. Postmodern Criminology
Postmodern Criminology A branch of criminology that developed following World War II and that
builds on the tenets of postmodern social thought.
Deconstructionist Theories One of the emerging approaches that challenges existing criminological
perspectives to debunk them and that works toward replacing them with concepts more applicable to the
postmodern era.

World Wide Web

Other Web sites for organizations and agencies related to the material in Chapter 3 include:
Web Site
Rand Corporation
Genomic Science Program
Crime Theory
Crime Times
Gruter Institute for Law
and Behavioral Research
Western Criminology Review
American Society of Criminology
URL
http://www.rand.org
http://genomics.energy.gov/
http://www.crimetheory.com
http://www.crimetimes.org/
http://www.gruterinstitute.org/Home.html
http://wcr.sonoma.edu
http://asc41.com