Personal Views on Violence

Personal Views

Personal Views on Violence

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Personal Views on Violence

Violent crime is the result of the environment of the criminal or juvenile delinquent. Criminals have aspects of their genetic makeup that might make them more vulnerable to engaging in criminal behavior but without the negative influence of their environment they will not fulfill this genetic possibility. The social environment of the juvenile will shape you they become and what type of behavior they will display, moral or deviant. People learn how to behave from the significant or important people in their lives especially their parent or guardians. As they age different people in their lives will influence their behavior, such as peers.

The theory that would best suit this personal viewpoint is the sociological theory of crime. The sociological theory of crime finds the juvenile delinquent o criminal offender is influenced by their environment. To be specific this theory blames the lack of opportunity in a juvenile’s community on criminal behavior. In other words in lower class communities or communities with high crime rate there is no opportunity for a person to improve their lives through education or good job opportunities as in a middle to upper lass community. There are several theories under the sociological viewpoint.

When society does not distribute the opportunity to succeed fairly people not receiving the same opportunities get frustrated and will use criminal means to ensure they have the same opportunities. This is known as the strain theory. The labeling theory is another theory where the juvenile or adult is labeled a criminal by society (Zembroski, 2011). As a result they will accept this label and become a delinquent or criminal. The social learning theory lines up perfectly with the personal viewpoint finding criminals learn their deviant behavior from their environment and important people in their environment.

The personal theory of crime also recognized biological processes play a role in criminal behavior but as a risk factor that must be paired with the environment to create the criminal behavior but after reviewing all four major theories of aggressive crime the social psychological theory could explain why some crime occurs. The sociological theory cannot explain crime on its own and can be paired with biological or psychological theories to explain crime. The social-psychological finds the crime is the result of the environment which assists in creating a personality disorder leading to crime.

According to the psychological theory of crime the criminal has no control over their criminal behavior due to mental impairment that results out of improper development through their childhood years (Byrne, 2011). Based on one psychological viewpoint every person goes through stages of development and in order to move to the next stage must overcome conflict at this stage. If they cannot overcome the conflict their development is not healthy or normal resulting in non conforming personality traits, such as aggression, impulsivity, and deviancy. Because this behavior is ingrained there is no cure.

There are many different theories to explain aggression and why people commit crimes. No matter which theory is selected the environment plays a key role. If the cause of crime is biological the environment is needed to increase the risk these biological traits will cause crime. In psychological theories they unhealthy development of the offender is the result of their environment. In truth crime is the result of either social-biological causes or social-psychological causes of crime. There is more than one explanation for why crime occurs. Causes of crime can be as unique or as diverse as people in society.

References

Bryne, J. (2010). An Overview of Psychological Theories of Crime Causation. Retrieved from

http://faculty.uml.edu/jbyrne/44.521/documents/AnOverviewofPsychologicalTheoriesofCrime

Zembroski, D. (2011). Sociological Theories of Crime and Deviancy. Retrieved November 13,

2013 from http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10911359.2011.564553#preview