Psychologist William Sheldon claims that body types are related to crime. He divided body shapes into three categories which he termed “somatotypes”. According to his theory, Mesomorphic is characterized as muscular, triangular and described as the athletic, Endomorphic is characterized as fat, round, and usually short and Ectomorphic is characterized as skinny, weak, and usually tall. He suggests that people who has a Mesomorphic body type commits more crime. However, in James Holmes’ case, I would say that Sheldon’s theory failed to apply in several ways because James Holmes is not Mesomorphic, moreover, I could not even successfully place him into those three categories. Cesare Lombroso’s theory suggested that criminals can be distinguished from others by multiple physical traits, such as large jaws, baldness, obvious cheekbones, long arms, and fleshy lips, etc. In fact, when I first saw the picture of James Holmes, his eyes reminded me of the “hard, shifty eyes” that was mentioned in Lombroso’s theory. Although this theory sounds totally unreliable and it is full of bias, I think it kind of make sense that people do judge others by appearance, and we all have an images of how kind people looks like and how bad people looks like in our own mind.
According to The Denver Post, Psychiatrists have diagnosed Holmes with schizotypal personality disorder, “a serious mental illness characterized by extreme social anxiety, odd beliefs or behavior and severely constricted expressions.” Furthermore, he is described as having an “anti-social personality” by his co-workers and neighbors. Although there is no direct connection between schizotypal personality disorder and violent behavior, some mental disorders do have a link with crime. As we learned in class, people who has “Antisocial Personality Disorder” is more likely to commit crime because they have no empathy for others and they may have problem recognizing others emotions, in other words, they do not care about others. Given these points, I would say that Holmes might be one of the case as he did not show regrets and empathy after shooting those innocent people in the theater.
I do not believe people could be “born criminals”. The most simple and direct evidence is that there is no “criminal gene” exists in the world. Although some may argue that criminals have some traits in common such as low empathy, low IQ, high impulsiveness and they might be born with that. However, I agree with the text book, “Individual genes account for only a small effect on criminal behavior but contribute to traits linked to criminality, not directly to criminality itself ” (Frank 798). In my opinion, I think “what makes a criminal” is definitely a complex question, which cannot be concluded by either nature or nurture reasons. All in all, I think criminal behavior is influenced by biological, psychological and also environmental factors.
Works Cited
Frank E. Hagan. “Introduction to Criminology: Theories, Methods, and Criminal Behavior.” iBooks.
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