PYSCHOLOGICAL THEORIES OF CRIME CAUSATION

Psychological theories expressed that criminal behavior, was the product of unconscious
forces operating within the person’s mind. According to this group of theories, conflicts that
occur at various psychosexual stages of development might impact an individual’s ability to
operate normally as an adult. And that if aggressive impulse is not controlled, or is repressed
to an unusual degree, some aggression can leak out of the unconscious and a person can
engage in random acts of violence. (Bartol,2002)
Charles B. Goring
 He published a book entitled “The English Convict: A Statistical Study”, concluded
that there is no such thing as a physical criminal type.
 He found out using the 3,000 convicts as respondents that defective intelligence
rather than physical characteristics was the main factor why a person commits crime.
Gabriel Tarde
 In his Theory of Imitation, he believed that people learn from one another through a
process of imitation.

Psychodynamic Theory and Psychosexual Stages of Human Development

 The Psychodynamic or Psychonalytical Psychology
It was proposed by Sigmund Freud and still considered as one of the prominent theories in
Psychology. This theory hold that the human personality is controlled by unconscious mental
processes developed in early childhood. It argues that human personality contains three (3)
major components:
1. Id- it dictates the need and desire.
2. Superego- counteracts the id by fostering feelings of morality.
3. Ego- evaluates the reality of a position of these two extremes.

 Psychosexual Stages of Human Development

According to Freud, during the first year of life, the oral stage, a child attains
pleasure by sucking and biting. During the second and third year of life, the focus of
sexual attention is on the elimination of bodily waste – the anal stage. The phallic
stage, occurs during the third year when children focus their attention on their
genitals. Males begin to have sexual feelings to their mothers and girls for their
fathers. Latency stage begins at the age of six (6), during this period feelings of
sexuality are repressed until the genital stage begins at puberty; this marks the
beginning of adult sexuality.
BEHAVIORAL THEORY
It was originally created by John B. Watson and popularized by Burrhus Frederic
Skinner. The behavioral theory is concerned with the study of observable behavior
rather than the unconscious processes. It focuses on particular stimulus and how
people respond to that stimulus. It also maintains that human actions are developed
through learning experiences, and that behavior is learned when it is rewarded and
extinguished by negative reactions or punishment.

SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY

It is the branch of behavioral theory most relevant to criminology. It was created by
Albert S. Bandura. He argued that people are not actually born with the ability to act
violently but that they learn to be aggressive through their life experiences. He
claimed that people learned to act aggressively when, as children, they model their
behavior after the violent acts of adults. Bandura believed that violence as something
learned through a process called behavior modeling. Aggressive acts are usually
modeled after 3 principal sources;
1. Family Members
2. Environmental experiences
3. Mass media

ALTERNATIVE THEORY
It focuses on assortative mating where female offenders tend to cohabit with or get
married to male offenders. Children with two criminal parents are likely to be
disproportionally anti-social. There are two main classes of explanations concerning
why similar people tend to get married, cohabit or become sexual partners;
1. Social Homogamy- convicted people tend to choose each other as mates
because of physical and social proximity.
2. Phenotypic Assortment- people examine each other’s personality and behavior
and choose partners who are similar to themselves.
INTERGENERATIONAL TRANSMISSION THEORY
It refers to the socialization and social learning that helps to explain the way in which
children growing up in a violent family learn violent roles and subsequently, may play
out the roles of victim or victimizer in their own adult families as adults.

DIFFERENTIAL ASSOCIATION-REINFORCEMENT THEORY

This theory suggests that the presence of criminal behavior depends on whether or not
it is rewarded or punished and the most meaningful rewards and punishments are
those given by groups that are important in an individual life. In other words, people
respond more readily to the reactions of the most significant people in their lives. If
the criminal behaviors elicits more positive reinforcement or reward than punishment,
such behavior will persist.

EYSENCK’S CONDITIONING THEORY

Hans J. Eysenck in his theory of conditioning claims that all human personalities may
be seen in three dimensions such as psychoticism, extroversion and neuroticism.
Those who score high on measures of extroversion are sensation seeking, dominant
and assertive. While those who score high on measures of neuroticism maybe
described as having low-esteem, excessive anxiety and wide mood swings. Eysenck
prepared questionnaires what he called “Eysenck Personality Questionnaire” and
found out that criminals uniformly score higher in any of those mentioned dimensions
than non-criminals.

INTEGRATED THEORY
It has been proposed by James Q. Wilson and Richard Julius Herrnstein. They explain
predatory street crime by showing how human nature develops from the interplay of
psychological, biological and social factors. They stated that the factors that could
push the individuals to commit crimes are intelligent quotient, body build,
impulsiveness, aggressiveness and even those with mothers who drink and smoke
while pregnant. Lastly, they also argued that if reward (such money) is greater than
the expected punishment (small fine), there is an increased likelihood that a crime will
be committed.

MATERNAL DEPRIVATION AND ATTACHMENT THEORY

It has been devised by British Psychiatrist Edward John M. Bowlby who expressed
the notion that a child needs warmth and affection from his/her mother or a mother
substitute. The idea came after Bowlby experimented on infant monkeys. The said
infant monkeys were given the choice between two wire monkeys: one is made of
uncovered cage wire but dispensed milk while the other is made of cage wire covered
with soft fabric but did not give milk. The infant monkeys in the experiment were
attached to the warmth cloth monkey which provided comfort and security even
though it did not provide food. Bowlby emphasized that the most important
phenomenon to social development takes place after birth of any mammal and that is
the construction of an emotional bond between the infant and his mother.

Moral Development Theory

Lawrence A. Kolhberg expanded Piaget’s theory of cognitive development and
applied the concept of development stages to issues in criminology. His theory of
moral development was dependent on the thinking of Piaget and the American
philosopher John Dewey. Moral development suggests that people who obey the law
simply to avoid punishment or who have outlooks mainly characterized by self-
interest are more likely to commit crimes than those who have viewed the law as
something that benefits all of society and who honor the rights of others (Siegel 2007)
Kolhberg’s stages of development are as follows:
Level/Stage Age Range Description
Obedience/Punishment Infancy No difference between
doing the right things and
avoiding punishment
Self-interest Pre-school Interests shifts to rewards
rather than punishment—
effort is made to secure
greatest benefit to oneself
Conformity and School-age The “good boy/girl” level
Interpersonal Accord effect. Effort is made to
secure approval and
maintain friendly
relations with others.
Authority and Social Order School-age Orientation towards fixed
rules. The purpose of
morality is maintaining
the social order.
Social Contract Teens Mutual benefit,
reciprocity. Morally right
and legally right are not
always the same.
Universal Principles Adulthood Morality is based on
principles that transcend
mutual benefit.
Activity I

1. Rank the three principal sources of aggressive acts; family, environmental

experiences, and mass media from the first to the third as to which provides
the greatest impact on an individual. DEFEND YOUR ANSWER.

2. Using your own words, what is social learning theory?

3. Do you agree that if such reward (such as money) is greater than the expected
punishment (small fine) there will be increased likelihood that a crime will be
committed? Yes or No. Explain your answer. (READ INTEGRATED
THEORY)

4. Why do you think Bowlby choose to use monkey as the subject for his
experiment? Why does the experiment have to do with criminality? (READ
MATERNAL DEPRIVATION and ALTERNATIVE THEORY)

5. Explain the “Theory of Imitation” by Gabriel Tarde.

6. Interview your parents, guardian, or older brother or sister to describe your

behavior from infancy to present. Relate their responses with the stages of
moral development by Kohlberg.
Stage Age range Your behavior as
explained by your
interviewee
Obedience/Punishment Infancy
Self-interest Pre-school
Conformity and School-age
Interpersonal accord
Authority and Social order School-age
Social Contract Teens