Theories of Offending

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Theories of Offending

• The Deterministic Perspective

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Criminal behaviour

• Genetic make-up
• Lombroso (1879)
• Criminals by physical characteristics (Atavism)
• Sheldon (1942)
• Body shape

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Lombroso 1876

• He argued criminals were born rather than made.
• He identified various criminal types, based on
  physical characteristics, after studying the
  prison populations.
• These physical anomalies included the size or
  shape of the ears, the length of the nose and
  arms, symmetry of the face and the amount of
  facial hair.

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• In his original theory, possessing 5 or more of
  these characteristics led to a criminal type.
• Criminals could be identified through certain
  features.
• Murderers could be distinguished by their thin
  lips while robbers had beak like noses.

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Support for Lombroso

• Goring (1913) made a study of the physical
  features of thousands of English prisoners.
• He didnt find any distinctive peculiarities put
  fwd by Lombroso.
• He did find that all convicts had the same low
  order intelligence, as this is genetic, there
  must be a genetic base to criminality

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Evaluative Comment

• -Lombrosos work had a poor sampling procedure,
  no control group and were often based on the
  mentally disturbed.
• Garland (1994) argued that Lombroso was
  responsible for giving criminology a scientific
  credibility, in which the objective measurement
  and categorisation of the criminal classes could
  be conducted.

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Sheldon (1942) (Somatotype)

• He argued that an individuals body shape was
  correlated with their personality. From a study
  of 300 male body types he characterised three
  main body types
• The Ectomorph
• The Endomorph
• The Mesomorph

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The Ectomorph

• Thin
• Wirey Frame
• Weedy
• Tall

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The Endomorph

• Heavy
• Rounded
• Fat
• Non-sporty

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The Mesomorph

• Solid
• Well Built
• Muscular Frame
• Sporty

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• Sheldon stated the Endomorphs tended to have a
  relaxed, loving nature and enjoy the company of
  other people.
• Ectomorphs are more solitary, introverted and
  self conscious individuals.
• Mesomorphs are characterised as criminals, being
  aggressive, callous and mindless of other
  peoples feelings.
• Sheldon stated that it was rare for people to be
  pure somatotypes instead, each individual would
  display a combination of each of the three
  personality traits according to their own
  somatotype.

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Study

• In a study of 200 college students and 200 male
  delinquents, Sheldon rated a full-length picture
  of participants according to each of the three
  body types. The pics were given scores out of 7.

Build Students Delinq
End 3.2 3.4
Ect 3.4 1.8
Mes 3.8 5.4
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Conclusions

• Sheldon found that male criminal delinquents had
  a mesomorphic body type. The results showed that
  students, on average, had the same body type
  whereas the criminal delinquent group were
  significantly more mesomorphic thus supporting
  Sheldons theory that those with a muscular and
  hard physique were more prone to criminality.

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Evaluation

• Despite this finding, Sheldons study has been
  much criticised. Cortes and Gatti (1972) argued
  that Sheldons classification of the somatotype
  was unreliable. Sutherland (1951) criticised the
  way that Sheldon selected his sample of
  delinquents (he didnt use legal criteria). When
  the data was re-analysed using legal criteria to
  define deliquency, the association between
  criminal behaviour and the mesomorphic body type
  was not found.

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Other explanations

• People with a muscular build have learned from an
  early age that the only way to get what they want
  is to behave in an aggressive manner.
• Muscular builds are recruited by gangs because of
  their perceived uses in criminal activity.
• Criticised by the British Crime Survey which
  found that smaller body types usually carried out
  delinquent acts.