Evaluate the claim "we can predict who will become a criminal"
Sharonhy
Workshop1-DevelopmentalandBiological.pptxCriminal Behaviour CRM203
Workshop 1: Developmental
& Biological
INSERT YOUR INFO HERE
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Matters arising
Essay title vs Essay focus
Referencing
Forums (look around you…)
AoB (start messaging in now)
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‹#›
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Workshop Overview
Case study
Perspectives and Approaches
Factors associated with criminal behaviour
How to measure developmental criminal behaviours
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Case Study: John
Childhood (0-10): Generally ‘good’, no signs of truancy, no irregular behaviours, seemed to be social (had friends), enjoyed school, played with siblings (2 brothers)
Youth (10-13): Changes noticed, mostly minor (vandalism and anti-social behaviours) in the neighbourhood, began hanging around with a ‘tough crowd’
Teenage: Progression of crime, stealing from shops, throwing rocks from bridges (at cars passing beneath), began getting into fights
Adult: Continued violence, escalating to fights in local clubs.
Arrested: murder with knife, age 20
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Case Study: John
What questions do you have about John?
What do you need to know?
Is this progression typical?
Could it be stopped?
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Why study developmental risk factors?
The study of developmental risk factors offers potential strategies for early intervention.
One of the frustrating aspects of criminology generally is that most of our data is correlational
This means that we have limited cause and effect data.
For instance, how can you prove poor parenting causes crime? How can you show the effects of peer group on crime?
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Cumulative Risk Model
NOTE: Systems Approach
A number of risk factors build towards a criminal career development
Predicts negative emotional and mental health outcomes
Focus on harmful environmental, psychological, and social influences
Emphasises identification of children confronted by multiple risk factors as priority for intervention
Age (life history)
Number of risks
As risks increase across life so does the chance of being a criminal… (but is it additive?)
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Developmental Cascade Model
NOTE: Systems Approach (again)
AKA ‘Dynamic Cascade Model’
Interactive approach – between risk factors
Also, individual differences taken into account
Factor A
Factor B
Factor C
Crime
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This is ‘standard’ Psychology -and is not very good… at all!
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What are the ‘factors’
Multiple (more than listed here)
Broadly: Social, Familial/parenting, Psychological
REMEMBER: they interact
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Social I: SES
Socio-Economic Status (SES)
Poverty and crime = closely correlated (especially violent crime)
BUT, this is correlational
The overwhelming majority of low SES are not offenders
What does this mean?
How do poverty and crime interact?
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Social II: Peer Rejection
Not all peer rejection is a risk factor (i.e., Individuals with ASD –heightened peer rejection, but decreased risk of crime)
Peer rejection based on aggression appears to be a significant risk factor
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Social III: Anti-Social Peers
Social Learning Theory – plus conformity, influence, and later indoctrination/radicalisation
Can stem from rejection – rejected individuals group together…
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Social IV: School Problems
In addition to the bullying issues, truancy, failure, being held back, and poor reading skills (i.e., academic failure) are predictors
Note the importance here of parenting
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Social IV: School Problems
In addition to the bullying issues, truancy, failure, being held back, and poor reading skills (i.e., academic failure) are predictors
Note the importance here of parenting
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Familial / Parenting
Family variables are consistently found to be predictors
Parenting including poor supervision/ monitoring; erratic, non-contingent; harsh rejection; low involvement; punitive discipline without reasoning.
Other factors include disruption, criminality, size. Strong link between family violence and subsequent violence
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Familial / Parenting
Family dysfunction is a very stable and strong predictor. Includes criminality, family violence, alcohol and other drug (AOD) problems, abuse and neglect
Other factors include disruption and family size.
Strong link between family violence and subsequent violence
Adverse childhood experiences are also risk factors and are essentially familial
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Adverse Childhood Experiences
ACEs are associated with a wide range of health and well-being problems including criminal behaviour
Physical abuse
Sexual abuse
Emotional abuse
Physical neglect
Emotional neglect
Intimate partner violence
Mother treated violently
Substance misuse within household
Household mental illness
Parental separation or divorce
Incarcerated household member ….
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Psychological
In addition to the social and familial factors intra-individual factors have also been identified
Attachment is a factor but with the caveat that it is likely that it is not directly linked but operates through other factors
Multiple Psychological Factors
Empathy
Developmental Disorders
Intelligence
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Psychological: Empathy
Empathy is a problematic concept
Entails emotional and cognitive empathy
Absence of emotional empathy seems to be a risk factor
Links to animal cruelty…
Again, operates through other variables
BEWARE: talking about ‘psychopathy’ (in relation to empathy)…
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Psychological: Developmental disorders
Hyperactivity, impulsivity, attention deficit is a predictor
As you will note, impulsivity is one of the major personality characteristics of Life Course Persistent (LCP) criminals
It is likely to be in part a biological/genetic predisposition compounded by environmental circumstances
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Psychological: Intelligence
Low intelligence is predictive.
May be due to subsequent school failure & lack of attainment & isolation that is, a socialisation process.
Alternatively, may be related to poor abstract reasoning (necessary for impulse control, consequential thinking, planning & possibly empathy)
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Bartol & Bartol: Table 2-3
| Social | Parental/Familial | Psychological |
| Poverty | Single-parent household | Lack of empathy |
| Early peer rejection | Permissive or lax parenting | Attachment disorder |
| Association with anti-social peers | Minimal parental monitoring | Animal cruelty |
| Inadequate pre-school child care | Parental psychopathology | Cognitive / Language deficits |
| Inadequate after-school child care | Abuse | Low IQ |
| Academic Failure | Domestic violence / substance abuse | ADHD etc. |
| Anti-social siblings |
Beware biological issues (see next week!)
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HINT: this is a good chance to ask me anything
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How do we measure development?
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Longitudinal studies
Longitudinal research is also known as the criminal careers approach.
Tries to link human development sequences to the development of criminal behaviour.
Tries to find predictors or behaviours which might predict criminal behaviour. These behaviours might be criminal, anti-social or neither.
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Criminal Careers
We now understand that there are different factors which operate on:
Onset
Persistence
Escalation
Desistance
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Life Course Persistent
The longitudinal research has demonstrated that criminal conduct is evident in early life, that these individuals account for a substantial amount of crime, that they have a long criminal career and that there are very few late entrants
These individuals have been described as LCP as opposed to the Adolescent Limited offenders who will stop offending after early adulthood.
We are interested in the LCP offenders
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New methods for measuring life course / history of criminals
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Crime Script Analysis
Behaviour Sequence Analysis
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Crime Script Analysis
Comes from ‘Script Analysis’ in Cognitive Psychology
How do you navigate a restaurant?
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Crime Script Analysis
In the same way we have ‘restaurant’ scripts, criminals have ‘crime’ scripts…
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Crime Script Analysis
These can be applied to specific crimes (i.e., bombings, rape, homicide),
Examining active shooter events through the rational choice perspective and crime script analysis (Osborne & Capellan, 2017)
Pathways in Crime… (Keatley, 2018);
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Crime Script Analysis
… or they can be applied to life history events and risk factors
Understanding school shootings with crime script analysis (Keatley, Mcgurk, & Allely, 2019).
NOTE: this was my 2nd year student!!!
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Crime Script Analysis
Behaviour Sequence Analysis
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Behaviour Sequence Analysis (BSA)
More statistical (sorry)
BUT BETTER (yippee)
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Behaviour Sequence Analysis (BSA)
Episode (i.e., murder, rape, terrorism etc.)
Parse the episode into discrete behaviours/events – YOU define
Code behaviours (e.g., A, B, C…)
We are interested in transitions between behaviours
Analyse sequence of events
AB|BC|C D|EF … JK
A B C D E F G H I J K
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Behaviour Sequence Analysis (BSA)
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Behaviour Sequence Analysis (BSA)
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Behaviour Sequence Analysis (BSA)
Typologies
Behaviours
Childhood abuse
Keatley, Marono, & Clarke (2019)
NOTE: Abbie started publishing in her first year! She now has ~5+ papers!
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Temporal Analyses
There are more complex forms (i.e., T-Pattern Analysis)
Very useful (especially in applied cases!)
I’m very keen to collaborate with students! (remember: I want you to improve academia)
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BRINGING IT ALL TOGETHER
Various risk factors have been identified
The problem is that many of these factors are highly inter-correlated so it is difficult to know which factors might be causative
At this stage we do have information on the factors but not on if or how they are causal and how they might be interacting
The up side is that we can intervene at the primary level and this does have an effect
Methods like BSA can show ‘attractors’ / ‘absorbing point’ to intervene and break the flow.
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Criminal Behaviour CRM203
Biological Factors
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Case Study: Hadden Clark
AKA: the cross dressing cannibal
Serial Killer
Michelle Dorr (age 6) -1986
Laura Houghteling (age 23) - 1992
Early life abuse (see previous week)
So, why the biological factor?
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Case Study: The Clarks
Bradfield Clark
Jailed in 1985 for killing co-worker Trish Mak
Invited her over for dinner (while partner was out of town)
Brutally beat her, and ate parts of her
Similar Developmental background
Similar Biological background
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Questions?
How much of their behaviours stem from developmental factors?
How much of their behaviours stem from biological factors?
How would you study this?
What methods would you use?
Nature Vs Nurture
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Genetic Theories
Earliest positivist explanations of crime suggested a distinct biological/genetic basis to crime
Social Darwinism became a very popular social theory
Influenced eugenics
If people are ‘born’ bad – what does this mean for treatment and intervention?
Minority report?
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Genetics vs Biology
Genetic disposition or predisposition but also
Acquired deficits (birth trauma, other head injuries, abuse) and poisons causing permanent damage (heavy metal poisoning)
Transient biochemical problems (drugs, hormone imbalances)
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Genetics Position
Biology implicated in violence
Biological basis could be acquired or genetic or combination
Genetic predisposition but to general offending
Strong interaction effect
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Genetics Position
Some evidence to suggest certain types of genetic abnormalities are related to criminal behaviour (the XYY syndrome) but the number of this genetic abnormality (found in less than .3% of the pop.) makes it a marginal area of consideration.
Generally, polygenetic nature and function yet to be reliably explained.
PLEASE NOTE: ‘selfish gene’ does not mean ‘selfish people’.
There is NO ‘gene for…’
Note: this is also where ‘meme’ comes from!
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Genetics Position
The nature of the genetic effect is difficult to determine: It is either:
a predisposition to act in a manner likely to lead to criminal activity; or
occurs through an intervening process. For example, arguments that suggest that there is a difference in cortical control
If genes ‘code’ for the blanket, try changing just one crease –
Everything is inter-connected
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Genetics Position
In sum:
Most biosocial scientists would claim that there is some biological predisposition to crime; and
that genetic predisposition can be overcome by some environmental factors.
Not a single gene
Crime is not genetically determined
Genetic research cannot explain individual criminality
Genetic predisposition does not means determinism
Genetic studies need to address environmental impact
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Research Strategies
The fundamental proposition of the biological approach is that behaviour is, in part, determined by genetic influences.
An alternative (but not inconsistent) proposition is that behaviour is, in part, determined by biological influences.
The aim of this research is to demonstrate either a genetic or biological basis to criminal behaviour.
Is this even possible?
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Lombroso’s work
Three classes:
Born criminals – atavistic reversions – an evolutionary perspective
Insane – a commonly held belief that only an insane person could commit some of the horrific offences
Criminaloids – no special features but has criminogenic needs
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Lombroso’s work
Was discredited relatively quickly
Important because he tried to apply
scientific method
used clinical data
recognised multi-factorial explanation
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Body types…
Sheldon’s (1949) Theory of Body types
Somatotyping
Research consistently points to both juvenile and adult offenders having more mesomorphic body types (muscular) and more mesomorph – endomorph type (muscular & fat) as opposed to the ectomorph types (slight & thin)
Identify the argument for a biological basis to crime (and not the counter)
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Body types…
Sheldon’s (1949) Theory of Body types
Endomorph: heavy with short arms and legs. Relatively non-criminal
Mesomorph: athletic and muscular, tend to be aggressive and apt to commit violent crimes
Ectomorph: thin, introverted, overly sensitive
DISCREDITED!
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Physiological factors I
A variety of physiological indices have been found to correlate with criminal behaviour
Toxins – see effects of lead
Alcohol and other drugs
Neurotransmitters
Hormones including testosterone
Autononomic Nervous System activity (~fight or flight)
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Physiological factors II
A variety of physiological indices have been found to correlate with criminal behaviour
Heart Rate & Criminality
EEG Patterns and Criminality
Hypoglycaemia and Criminality
Hyperactivity
Hemisphere Functioning and Criminality
BEWARE THIS PATH JUNK SCIENCE LAYS AHEAD
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HINT: this is a good chance to ask me anything
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How do we measure (biological) development?
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NeuroPsychology
Recent advances in neuroimaging have led to research examining different brain behaviours and their relationship with criminal behaviour
This research points to the importance of brain plasticity – that is there is an interaction between gene and environment on behaviour
It shows that environmental factors impact on brain development
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Brain Plasticity
We now understand that there is considerable interaction between brain development and environmental factors
We also understand that there are negative environments which impact on the development of relevant parts of the brain; and conversely positive environments which impact on the brain.
For example the following impact on the developing brain
In-utero experiences – lead and alcohol
Birth complications increased risk especially with other psychosocial factors
Early trauma such as attachment and victimisation
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Neuropsychological factors I
There appears to be two areas of the brain which are particularly relevant to the development of criminal behaviour.
The frontal lobe is important for organising thought, planning, self regulation, sustained attention, abstract decision making, self-regulation and inhibition and thus consequential thinking. It is important for impulse control.
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Neuropsychological factors II
The amygdala is important for emotional regulation
Emotional regulation refers to emotional recognition, control and direction
There are sex differences
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FAST FORWARD
When we examine psychopathy you will note there are key dimensions:
Empathy, callous, unemotional
Poor impulse control
The amygdala is critical for emotional regulation
The frontal cortex is important for impulse control
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Gene studies
The previous studies indicate that criminal behaviour and certain physiological characteristics are linked but causality is difficult to determine and genetic causality is even more difficult to determine
The following research strategies are aimed at determining a clear gene/behaviour relationship
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Family studies
Identifies the conviction rates for parents and children. And siblings??
High correlations between criminal father and criminal sons compared to criminal behaviour of sons of non-criminal fathers.
Some studies have tried to control for environment but this is considered practically impossible.
Arguments and counter-arguments?
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Twin studies
Dizygotic Twins
Fraternal
Two different eggs
Genetically as different as non-twin siblings
Monozygotic Twins
Identical
Same egg
Share same genes
Why important?
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Twin studies
Assumption: monozygotic and dizygotic twins have same environment but different genes.
Concordance rates: probability of one twin being criminal it the other is also.
RESULTS:
Average concordance rate for MZ is 51.5% and for DZ 20.6%.
For most recent studies 31% v 12.9%.
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Adoption studies
These studies try to tease out genes and environment by examining criminal behaviour of children (mostly boys) reared by non familial parents.
You compare criminality of biological parents (ie criminal non-criminal) with criminality of adopted parent and criminality of child.
Results consistently point to genetic predisposition.
EVALUATE ADOPTION STUDIES…
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In sum
Overall, evidence points to a genetic predisposition to crime.
There may also be a separate biological process occurring.
While no one study is conclusive, divergent studies from different cultures all pointing in the same direction are difficult to dismiss.
The predisposition shows most strongly in adoption studies to be for property crime and not violent crime.
There is probably an interaction effect with genes and environment. Greater criminality is found when both operate and this is greater than their mere addition. This is evident in gene, brain plasticity and domestic violence.
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Discussion Point
Now you know about developmental and biological factors
Can we predict criminal behaviour?
Is it based on environment?
Is it based on biological?
Is it based on the limitations of our methods?
Are the Clarks the norm, or the exception?
Are the Krays the norm, or the exception?
Questions? (this is it for background theory, from here it gets more applied…)
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