In my life I have met or had the honor of knowing three people who have followed down the path of criminality. Now these three people were people that I grew up with in my neighborhood or neighborhoods I use to hang out in. Furthermore, some of these people had some form of talent that could have landed them in either the NBA or NFL but due to their life of crime and other issues it placed them in prison. Although, all of the three did not have these talent they still could have found ways be a good citizen. Nevertheless, neither one of the three I will discuss had to fall into a life of crime but after learning about the different theories I now see why they may have done it.
Now with “Person A” he was a young male who had some of the best basketball skills anyone would want to have but he was not a very smart person when it came to school. Nevertheless, after studying all of these theories, I have found that “Person A” was one that would fit into the psychological theory. Although, he was very talent at playing basketball and football, he came from a household where he had an older brother and sister as well as a brother younger than him and was raised by a single mother. Therefore, there was not a lot in the house for him and he struggled in school. Rather than getting help and using his talent to better himself and his family he turned to a life of crime. Furthermore, as we were growing up he had no kind of respect for his elders and would curse and be totally
The story of Maurice Haltiwanger stuck out to me because of the truth behind why he was in prison serving time for committing crimes that hypothetically he couldn’t help but to commit. Growing up, most kid’s role models are their parents or a close family member. Kids see what that person does and regardless of if that person is ‘good’ or ‘bad’, they want to be just like them. Maurice grew up around gang members and drug dealers, to him that seemed like a normal adult life. How was he supposed to know that what these people were
Ever since I was young, I have been watching tv shows like Burn Notice, Criminal Minds, NCIS, etc. It was always one of my interests. Ever since I started watching Criminal Minds, I have wanted to be a profiler. I want to because I enjoy the show, and I think it would be an interesting job. That is why I chose to do my I-Search paper on Criminal Behavior. My main question I want to focus on is “Why do criminals behave the way they do?”
As human beings we all see and hear about crimes from a day to day basis. We all question why we have crime and what makes a person commit a crime.
No human being is born with an innate desire to commit crime; growing up in an impoverished community with subpar education and little opportunity
Society holds expectations for its citizens, and non-citizens at a very high level. They expect everyone to abide by the law, and give back to the community. In a perfect world all citizens and non-citizens would be good Samaritans, sadly it is far from that in today’s society. Many individuals are deviant and stray from society’s expectations of them. We know them as criminals. Indeed some of them may be hardened criminals, yet some of them commit petty crimes that are still a burden on society. Whether, their crime is petty or severe, society expects them to pay for their actions. Most criminals at one time or another will spend time in prison or jail.
Throughout the years, the association between a criminal offense and a criminal have become more relevant. Although there are many theories that try to illustrate the concept of why crimes happen, no theory has a profound influence of understanding an individual’s nature, relationship, development, and a society itself (Coleman & Ganong, 2014). To further explain, “theories of crime are defined in relation to modernity, spanning their development from the enlightenment to the present, with the advent of postmodernism” (Miller, 2012, p. 1798). In other words, theories of crime are an approach to understanding an individuals behaviour and actions in their environment, society, and themselves that may lead to crime. Nevertheless, within this paper, it will be comparing the case of
Criminal behavior is something that affects everyone, even if you don’t particularly engage in the act itself. Every time a crime is committed, we often find ourselves wondering what led that person to do that crime. We wonder why they did it because it is something that we could never do, so therefor we cannot fathom the act of engaging in criminal activity. Some people feel that people only engage in it just because they lack the thing that they try to steal or because of their specific background and race. In actuality, there is a link between criminal behavior and the lack of education. However there is also a link between the attainment of education and criminal behavior.
Criminals are born not made is the discussion of this essay, it will explore the theories that attempt to explain criminal behaviour. Psychologists have come up with various theories and reasons as to why individuals commit crimes. These theories represent part of the classic psychological debate, nature versus nurture. Are individuals predisposed to becoming a criminal or are they made through their environment.
The majority of sociological theories believe, that the criminal behavior mainly is influenced by a combination of the social surrounding, political and economic factors. Offenders are not necessarily viewed as bad people, these theories tend to look at the social context of a person’s situation, examining his race, neighborhood, intelligence, education, family, political and media influence, income level, job and career, childhood history to determine why did he/she become criminal.There are many different theories seeking to explain criminal behavior such as Social Structure Theory (which itself consists of Social disorganization, Strain, and Cultural deviance theories) differential association, the theory of anomie, neutralization theory, Social Control Theory and many others. I don’t think this would be an acceptable reason for crime because this is something that an individual has learned from their surroundings and or peers this wasn’t something beyond their
The question, why do people become criminals raise a lot of views when it comes down to personal, social and environmental factors. While many think that people become criminals due to the environment and people they have grown up around, other’s think it is due to mental illness or just out of pure enjoyment. The following report will discuss how a person’s environment can impact them to become vicious killers, particularly discussing the Ivan Milat, a serial killer based in Australia, known for the case of the “Backpacker murders”.
1. Darrow claims that if the people currently incarcerated would have been given the opportunity to follow a career outside of crime, then those people would not be in jail. Darrow's assertion is supported by the knowledge that people are inclined to commit a crime when they are facing hardship as it is the path of least opposition. The underlying assumption that is associated with this idea is that people are willing to commit to their profession instead of reaching for the low hanging fruit provided by robbery or burglary. This assumption can go either way based on whether or not the group in question is truly committed to earning an honest living through hard work.
Criminals are born not made is the discussion of this essay, it will explore the theories that attempt to explain criminal behavior. Psychologists have come up with various theories and reasons as to why individuals commit crimes. These theories represent part of the classic psychological debate, nature versus nurture. Are individuals predisposed to becoming a criminal or are they made through their environment. There are various theories within the biological explanation as to why individuals commit criminal behavior, these include: genetic theory, hereditary theory,.
Mr. Reploge, I agree with your point of view. Criminal behavior is a learned behavior, not inherited. Gabriel Tarde challenged the concept of the born criminal developed by Cesare Lombroso. He believed that one becomes a criminal through their environment, not birth. Group dynamics validate this theory. The study of group dynamics can be useful in understanding decision-making and criminal behaviors. It allows the principle of differential association to be examined through the rule of law.
People commit crimes for various reasons. These various reasons got to do with social, economic, and cultural reason. These factors trigger an individual to do criminal activities. Social reasons are peer pressure, and school failure. Economic reasons are poverty. Cultural reasons are hatred. The combination of these factors is behind a person who commits crimes.
The second question I want to focus on is “how do criminals become criminals?” Natalie Boyd, who has a Ph.D. in psychology wrote that there are four basic ideas when it comes to psychological theories of crime (Criminal Psychology, 2005). The four ideas assume that crimes are a result of failures in