Social learning theories of crime pdf

In addition, Kandel and Davies , in a study of illicit drug-users and non-users, found that more frequent drug-users tended to have closer relationships with their drug-using peers than non-users did with their conventional peers cited in Wortley, This research suggests delinquent peers do form close relationships with one another, and in turn, these relationships may indeed facilitate the onset and persistence of delinquency.

Social learning theory has been applied in numerous studies and its theoretical value has been supported by the strong relationships found between social learning concepts and criminal behaviours. The concepts of differential association, definitions, imitation, and differential reinforcement have been explored separately, as well in various combinations in the research literature. Of these social learning concepts, differential association has been examined most frequently and has consistently been shown to be a significant factor in explaining criminal and deviant behaviours see Arriaga and Foshee, ; Clingempeel and Henggeler, ; Conway and McCord, ; Daigle et al.

Research has also shown support, though more moderately, for definitions, imitation and differential reinforcement as social learning concepts see Baron et al. Studies of social learning theory as it relates to behaviour are wide-ranging in terms of the types of behaviours typically examined.

The range includes, but is not limited to, childhood and adolescent aggression, intimate partner violence, drug and alcohol use, terrorism, and other violent and non-violent criminal behaviour. Social learning variables have been found to explain these aforementioned behaviours in numerous studies see Akers and Silverman, ; Akers et al. Two areas of this research that have received considerable attention in the literature and are worth further exploring are how associations with family and friends impact behaviour.

The research literature has consistently found that there is a strong relationship between childhood experiences of violence in the family and early childhood aggression, and a more moderate relationship between these experiences and adolescent aggression see Gover, ; Hotton, ; Unnever and Agnew, ; Herrenkohl et al. Work by Hotton that looked at childhood aggression and exposure to violence in the home found that childhood aggression and exposure to violence in the home was significantly related to aggressive behaviour among children.

Hotton found that approximately 32 per cent of children exposed to violence were considered highly aggressive, compared with 16 per cent of non-exposed children.

The study also revealed that hostile and ineffective parenting practices were related to higher levels of child aggression.

Interestingly, the study also found that high levels of aggressive behaviour declined as children got older, and this was consistent for both children who were and were not exposed to violence in the home.

The finding that aggression in childhood diminishes in adolescence is consistent with existing literature see Herrenkohl, ; Loeber and Stouthamer-Loebe, ; Moffitt and Caspi, And while research has demonstrated that early aggression as learned through family exposure diminishes over time, it is still found to be a moderate predictor of aggressive behaviour in adolescence and early adulthood.

Loeber et al. The study was conducted in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and utilized data from a longitudinal, multiple cohort study of delinquency development among boys that included 1, participants. The poor and unstable child-rearing practices that were found to predict violence included two or more caretaker changes prior to 10 years of age, physical punishment, poor supervision, and poor communication within the family.

Exposure to violence in the family may be a stronger predictor of aggression in childhood than it is in adolescence. Peer influences, however, appear to be more important in adolescence. Research on adolescent aggression has shown that exposure to violent or delinquent peers, over and above the influence of family, are stronger predictors of violence among adolescents.

Arriaga and Foshee , in a study of intimate violence, examined the relationship between dating violence and friends involved in or supportive of this type of violence and inter-parental violence. The study found that while both variables were significant predictors, the effect of friend dating violence on the dating behaviours of adolescents was stronger than the effect of inter-parental violence.

This finding is consistent with other research that indicates the power of peer influences on behaviour during adolescence see Herrenkohl et al. This finding has also been shown to be consistent when looking at aggression across gender. Daigle et al. The study used data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Adolescent Health Add Health , a national school-based panel study of adolescents in grades 7 to 12 in the United States between and The study found that the factors that predicted delinquency were similar for both boys and girls, and that the most significant predictor for both was the number of delinquent peers they interacted with.

Negative peer associations, then, appear to be better predictors of delinquency and aggression in adolescence than negative family experiences are. Research has also looked at the temporal ordering of the onset of delinquent behaviour and shown that associations with delinquent peers appears to precede the onset of delinquent behaviour.

For example, Lacourse et al. The study used data from the Montreal Longitudinal Experimental Study, which tracked all male students in kindergarten classes, beginning in , from 53 Montreal elementary schools in low socio-economic areas. The sample that was used in this study comprised respondents, who were assessed between the ages of 11 and The results indicated, more specifically, that as a group, individuals who associated with delinquent peers during childhood or during adolescence committed more violence than the group who did not develop these delinquent peer associations.

Those who formed delinquent peer associations during childhood, and thus were involved with these groups the longest, showed the highest rates of violence. Transitioning out of a delinquent peer group was also shown to be associated with a decrease in violent behaviour. Over all, this study showed that involvement with delinquent peer groups during childhood and during adolescence facilitated the onset of violent behaviour, and this effect was stable throughout adolescence.

Ulrich , in a comprehensive review of the literature, found that the strongest cause of violent behaviour onset identified in the literature was association with delinquent peer groups, where violence was both modelled and rewarded.

Weak social ties to conventional peers and affiliation with anti-social delinquent peers were found to be strong predictors of violence, and the impact was consistently found to be greater for adolescents than for younger children. Ulrich also finds strong support in the literature for a relationship between aggressive children being rejected by their non-aggressive peers and an increase in their deviant peer networks, the result of which tends to lead to a reduction in positive peer interactions and increases the likelihood of deviant or violent behaviours.

Social learning theory explains the onset of deviant and criminal behaviour, but it can also explain transition into conforming behaviours. Clinigempeel and Henggeler , in a study of aggressive juvenile offenders transitioning into adulthood, found that the quality of the relationships the young people had with others was significantly related to their desistence or persistence in criminal conduct. The study tracked 80 young people between the ages of 12 and 17, over a five-year period, in Charleston, South Carolina.

The findings showed that after the five-year period, youth who committed the fewest and least-serious acts of aggression also reported significantly more emotional support and higher-quality relationships with others. Though the relationships are different, the literature clearly shows that family and peer interactions play an important role in the onset and maintenance of delinquent and criminal conduct.

Violence in the home during childhood is predictive of aggression in childhood and, in part, adolescence. Interestingly, learned aggressive behaviours in childhood diminish as children age. What appears to be most important in adolescence is interaction with negative peer groups. The support social learning theory has generated in the research literature has important implications for policy.

From a social learning perspective, deviant and criminal conduct is learned and sustained via associations with family and peer networks. From this perspective, policy-makers should focus on developing and implementing preventive and rehabilitative programs that use social learning variables to change behaviour in a positive direction. Examples of programs guided by social learning principles include mentoring, behavioural modification, delinquency prevention, peer counseling and gang interventions.

The idea behind some of these types of programs is that providing positive experiences and role models for young people serves to expose them to conventional norms and values that might diminish future delinquent or criminal acts. Akers, R. Criminological Theories: Introduction, Evaluation, and Application 4 th ed. Los Angeles: Roxbury Publishing. Zahn, H. Brownstein and Shelly Jackson Eds.

Cincinnati: LexisNexis and Andersen Publishing. Arriaga, X. Adolescent dating violence: Do adolescents follow in their friends', or their parents', footsteps? Bandura, A. Social Learning Theory. Barak, G. Deflem Ed. Amsterdam: Elsevier. Baron, S. Bellair, P. Roscigno and M. Occupational structure, social learning, and adolescent violence.

Akers and G. Jensen Eds. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction. Boeringer, S. Shehan and R. Social contexts and social learning in sexual coercion and aggression: Assessing the contribution of fraternity membership. Clingempeel, W. Aggressive juvenile offenders transitioning into emerging adulthood: Factors discriminating persistors and desistors. Conway, K. A longitudinal examination of the relation between co-offending with violent accomplices and violent crime.

Daigle, L. Cullen and J. Gender differences in the predictors of juvenile delinquency: Assessing the generality-specificity debate. Donnerstein, E. The media. Graham, K. Gover, Angela R. The effects of child maltreatment on violent offending among institutionalized youth. Haynie, D. Silver and B. Neighbourhood characteristics, peer networks, and adolescent violence. Herrenkohl, T. Examining the link between child abuse and youth violence: An analysis of mediating mechanisms.

Huang, R. Kosterman, D. Hawkins, R. Catalano and B. A comparison of social development processes leading to violent behavior in late adolescence for childhood initiators and adolescent initiators of violence.

Hochstetler, A. Copes and M. Differential association in group and solo offending. Hotton, Tina. Childhood Aggression and Exposure to Violence in the Home. Ottawa: Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics:. Huang B. Kosterman, R. Catalano, J. Hawkins, and R.

Some popular social theories tend to focus on social or structural factors of society, such as learned mannerisms or the influence of poverty on the behavior of various groups. Each approach has its own strengths and weaknesses. Understanding the criminal mind is essential for those who want to work in fields such as criminal justice or criminal psychology. In order to understand various sociological theories about crime, it helps to start by learning the four main theories about social deviance.

Those theories can help provide a useful and necessary context for approaching other kinds of sociological theories, and will allow you to develop a deeper understanding of crime and the criminal mind. Theories are perceptual tools that people use to order, name, and shape a picture of the world. As such, they play an essential role in the way we interpret facts. Several competing theories attempting to explain the same evidence can arrive at separate conclusions.

In other words, differing assumptions about human nature and its relation to social order. A legal definition of crime can be simple: crime is a violation of the law. There are many different ways to define crime, many different theories about the origins of criminal activity, and just as many sociological theories of crime. While there is no simple definition within the field of sociology, broadly speaking, you could say that crime is the study of social deviance and violations of established norms.

But why do those norms exist? Some sociologists ask us to reflect on the creation of individual laws: Whose interests are served by the law in question? Who benefits, and who pays the costs of various behaviors that are classified as illegal? Sociological theories of crime need to explain a diverse range of social phenomena. Definitions of crime have implications for the kind of questions you ask, the kinds of data you use to study criminal behavior, and the kinds of theories applied.

Some of the most commonly defined types of crime in sociology include:. Outside of these five types of crime in sociology, you can find a wealth of different ideas. Committing a crime violates social laws, while deviant behavior violates social norms and rules. However, deviant behavior can also tiptoe over the line of criminal behavior.

While there are many different sociological theories about crime, there are four primary perspectives about deviance: Structural Functionalism, Social Strain Typology, Conflict Theory, and Labeling Theory. Starting with these theories can provide the context and perspective necessary to better appreciate other sociological theories of crime.

Structural Functionalism argues deviant behavior plays a constructive part in society as it brings together different parts of the population within a society.

While deviant behavior can throw off social balance, society may adjust social norms in the process of restoring that balance. In other words, deviant behavior can then contribute to social stability in the long term because it challenges norms while promoting social cohesion. For example, some people turn to crime for the culturally accepted value of seeking to lead a wealthy life.

Deviance can mean breaking one norm to place another before it, which is a fundamental insight of social strain typology. Conflict Theory views deviant behavior as a consequence of material inequality between various socio-political groups. Those groups might be drawn along the lines of gender, religion, race, class, and so on. Each sociopolitical group has a tendency to perceive its own interests in completion with others.

In other words, the members of various groups tend to perceive rights and other social privileges as a zero-sum game, where gains for outsiders mean losses for your own group. Groups that find themselves in an unequal social position in society will be inclined to deviant behavior to change those circumstances, including the structures which helped create them.

As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Labeling Theory argues that deviant behavior is often a consequence of having a deviant-like label applied to a person.

For example, a teacher labeling a student as a troublemaker. In short, this theory tends to focus on how people become deviant as a result of others forcing that identity upon them.