How do Differential Association Theories best Demonstrate that Criminal Behaviour is a ‘Learned Behaviour’

Edwin Sutherland’s theory of Differential Association theory is about an individual learning criminal behaviour through interaction with intimate groups. His theory includes four modalities, which are frequency, duration priority and intensity. Sutherland’s theory is seen

Operant conditioning applies to the enactment of criminal statutes in many ways. Society has been studied to determine what acceptable and unacceptable behaviors are. As a result of these studies and the enactment of statutes, they have identified those actions by citizens that are not desirable or dangerous

Negative reinforcement is removing an unpleasant consequence when a behavior is exhibited in order to encourage said behavior. This was shown when

There is also the argument between behaviourists to whether behaviour is learnt better through positive or negative reinforcement. Positive reinforcement is when someone does something correctly and we reward them with a sweet or chocolate. A strength of this is that the individual will repeat the action again, but a limitation is that the individual will expect the reward every time.

Differential reinforcements refers to the balance of anticipated or actual rewards and punishment that follow or are consequences of behavior. Whether individuals will refrain from or commit a crime "depends on the balance of past, present, and anticipated future rewards and punishments for their actions" (Akers and Jensen, 2006 p. 39-40). The probability that an act will be committed or repeated is increased by rewards that are higher in value and/or greater in number- positive reinforcement. Reinforces can be nonsocial as well, for example, the direct physical effects of drugs and alcohol (Akers et al. 1979). However, whether or not these effects are experienced positively or negatively is based upon previous learned expectations.

And on the other hand how “Code of the Streets” shows links to the Differential Association and Social Learning theories of crime. The Differential Association (closely related to Social Disorganization theory), developed by Edwin Sutherland, and Social Learning theory, developed by Ronald Akers, both theories of crime are theories that try to explain, at a micro-level, why individuals rather than groups of individuals commit crime (Feldmeyer, Differential Association and Social Learning, 2015).

From birth, our families, friends, and society influenced our choices. We were told what we could and could not accept. The music we listened to, the food we ate, and the clothes we wore were all influenced by someone in our community or household. These experiences from your childhood tend to determine the choices we will make as adults. We are living in a world that approaches life with a black or white perceptive, meaning decisions in life are either morally right or morally wrong. Differential Association Theory is defined as a criminological theory created by Edwin Sutherland that focuses on criminal behavior being learned through association with others (Walsh, 559). The theory focuses on an individual’s life that could lead them to a life of crime.

2. Negative reinforcements – this also makes children repeat behaviour but in different ways e.g.: If a child does well in an exam therefore they don’t have to do their chores.

Sutherland, both a sociologist and professor, developed Differential Association theory in 1939. Sutherland made a realization that crime happens in all social standings, not just the lower class. According to Sutherland, criminal activity is not inherent but learned. For example, children are not born to be racist but learn racism either through a family member or a close group of friends or acquaintances. Although Differential Association theory is a learned behavior, one needs to mentor someone on how to engage in deviant behavior and also how to have the right motivation and attitude to commit illegal corruption. What is the person undertaking the activity going to get out of the deviant behavior money, approval from friends or a better job? Criminals know that committing a crime is wrong, but they somehow have to rationalize to themselves that its alright because of the guilt they feel. Differential Association theory also states that people committing these crimes are doing it because it's more promising to violate the law than not too. Likewise, just because people commit deviant acts doesn’t mean they will continue to engage in those acts later in life according to

There are many perspectives in which one can analyze and understand why a person decides to commit a crime. Some perspectives are social learning theory, strain theory, classical and rational choice theory, deterrence theory, biological and psychological positivist theories, among others. However, for the purposes of this paper, the biological and psychological theories will be discussed.

Originally, reinforcement learning was motivated by “animal learning of sequential behavior, but has been developed and extended in the field of machine learning as an approach to Markov decision processes” (Ishii and Yoshida, 2006, p. 326). According to Andersen and Sandaker (2010), “A reinforcer is a stimulus which affects the probability of the kind of behaviour that produces it.? There can be both positive reinforcers and negative reinforcers. One where “behaviour that produces stimuli that reinforce consequences will increase.” The other is where “behaviour that produces these stimuli decreases or behaviour that removes them or postpones them increases.” Therefore, “many reinforcing stimuli are unconditional and function as reinforcers without prior learning. man is a

Operant conditioning focuses on a system of reinforcement and punishers where actions will have a consequence (Skinner, 2016). In operant conditioning, behaviour that is reinforced will be strengthened while behaviour that is not reinforced will weaken with time (Skinner, 2016). There are three types of operants. The neutral operants that will neither increase nor decrease the chances of repeating a behaviour (Skinner, 2016). The reinforcers will increase the chances of repeating a behaviour (Skinner, 2016). The punishers will decrease the chances of repeating a behaviour (Skinner, 2016). Positive reinforcement strengthens a behaviour as an individual gains rewards through it (Skinner, 2016). Negative reinforcement strengthens the behaviour by removing an unpleasant consequence

     Sutherland argued that the concept of differential association and differential social organization could be applied to the individual level and to the group level respectively. While differential association theory explains why any individual gravitates toward criminal behavior, differential social organization explains why crime rates of different social entities differ from each other's. In his fourth edition of Principles of Criminology he presented his final theory of differential association. His theory has 9 basic postulates:

     The use of how the theory has been used, an increased number of studies have begun to focus on differential association.  As such, the theory itself is making a come back into the field of criminology, as well as several other disciplines.  Thus, Sutherland’s theory has been in use now for over 64 years and continues to be quite popular in explaining why individuals commit deviant acts.

The Differential Association Theory, established by Edwin Sutherland in 1947, explicit the deviance of an individual's behavior and how it is learned through interaction with others or associations. There are several components that play a role in this theory that determines the main causes of delinquency. One of the components of this theory is, a person do not inherently become a criminal, it is a learned behavior. A person cannot decide one day he wants to commit a crime if he is not influence or challenge by others. When someone engages in criminal acts, they are most likely influence in some way that motivates them to commit the crime.