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Edwin H. Sutherland's First Theorist Of The 20th Century

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Edwin H. Sutherland was the first theorist of the 20th Century to argue that criminal behavior was learned at the macro and micro levels (Bohm & Vogel, 2011). Sutherland’s theory lists nine components and they are used to explain street crimes as well as white-collar crimes, the term that he coined. The first component of his theory is that criminal behavior is learned, not inherited (Bohm & Vogel, 2011). I agree with Sutherland’s first theory that criminal behavior is learned, not inherited. I do believe that starting at any early age; children are predisposed to criminal behavior by watching their parents or friends act in criminal ways. Criminal behavior “is more prevalent in individuals who associate and interact with individuals who …show more content…

96). I agree with this theory as well, because children watch their parents and other influential person’s every move and try to emulate them. Children are taught morals and values from their parents or guardians and it is through their verbal or non-verbal communication that plays a major role in if the child chooses the path of criminal behavior. His third component of his theory is that criminal behavior is learned through close personal groups and not from movies or articles in the newspaper or other forms of communication. I believe that criminal behavior is learned through close personal groups such as parents, family members, and peers. I disagree with him feeling that criminal behavior is not learned through communication such as movies and now days, social media and video games. While there is no direct correlation to violent video games causing our youth to want to commit crimes, it does show that “exposure to video games can be a significant risk factor for violent behavior” (Regis, …show more content…

Sutherland’s seventh component is that “differential associations may vary in frequency, duration, priority, and intensity” (Bohm & Vogel, 2011, p. 97). I also agree with his seventh component because everyone at one point in their life will be around criminal behavior, but the more they are around it and depending on the level of crime they are around can have a direct correlation to that person becoming involved in such criminal behavior. Sutherland’s eight component is “the process of learning criminal behavior by association with criminal and anticriminal patterns involves all of the mechanisms that are involved in any other learning” (Bohm & Vogel, 2011, p. 97). I agree with Sutherland’s eighth component because often times youth are recruited at an early age to be involved in criminal activity for many reasons. Pressure and seduction can lead to acts of criminal behavior and “criminal behavior can be credited to acts of spontaneity” (Regis,

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Theories such as, Inherited Criminality, Appearance, and even theories regarding the poor development of key areas of the Central Nervous System (CNS), could all be factors. But what really stands out, is how these biological factors may have interacted within the environment in which these children grew up (Bernard, 2016). Most of the children featured in the documentary were abused, delinquent, and often used drugs and alcohol. Any undetermined biological or physical factor as identified by the biological theories of crime, could very well have played a role when factored into the environmental conditions that the child was growing up

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Sutherland explained that through repeated exposure to criminal activity, individuals became influenced to change their ideals to reflect that of a criminal group. Groups are often very close knit and the individual in addition to learning how to commit crimes, begin to understand the motives behind a criminal group’s actions (“Differential Association Theory”). Sutherland broke down the main argument in 9 different statements and stated that the frequency, duration, priority, and intensity of the situation may vary case to case ( “Differential Association

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When looking at the many theories of criminology, there are a few that he could fall under. However, because of all the evidence presented in this case, it seems that everything he learned about being violent, he learned from his father. Social Learning Theory suggests that humans learn social conduct through observational learning, where the individuals learn social norms through watching a model and replicating that models behavior. In this case, Samual, our suspect, watched his father, be okay with violence in the house, be abusive to the boys, and be high all the time. Everything he taught the boys Samual was always very attentive to his role

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Most crimes, they argue, are simple to commit, require no long-term planning, and provide few long-term benefits. In addition, this theory implies that individuals who were inadequately parented before the age of eight develop less self-control than individuals of approximately the same age who were raised with better parenting. Gottfredson and Hirschi argue that parents must monitor their children, recognize bad behavior, and correct this bad behavior. If self-control has not developed by ages eight to ten, they argue, it is not likely to develop. As a result, research have indicated that low levels of self-control are relevant to criminal and impulsive

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This theory is also based upon four concepts or elements found with social bonds: attachment, commitment, belief, and involvement, all of which contribute to criminal behavior. Social bonds are the interpersonal relationships we form with family, teachers, friends, employers and even neighbors. Self-control also plays a part in this theory because if a person does not possess self-control, the person is more prone to engaging in criminal activity because they do not want to violate social norms or hurt others. The stronger these elements are; the less likely criminal behavior takes

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Like many other attitudes and behaviors, we acquire in life, we can also learn how to be a willing participant in criminal behavior by being taught to do so. A child learns by observing others that they are in direct contact with and then imitate what they have observed, which carries on into adulthood. Of course, there are several environmental factors that can play into whether an individual learns to be a criminal or not, and those can boil down to where they live, how their family environment is, who they grow up around, their parents’ job or lack thereof, etc. Based off the text, Elijah Anderson’s The Code of the Street, criminal behavior is learned through this code that spells out how criminal behavior is learned, what it entails, how it is executed, and how it is passed down from family to

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This theory clearly rules out the effect of inherited or innate factors, and the last is the cognitive theory, which is based on how the perception of an individual is manifested into affecting his or her potential and capability to commit a crime. (Psychological theories of crime) Relating these theories to the case under study, it’s clear that the behaviour can be traced most times to faulty relationships in the family during the first years of

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Developmental theories look at how offenders start and end their criminal behaviors. All developmental theories, including the two focused on in this paper, pull from social, psychological, and biological factors to find answers. Both of these theories follow along a trajectory or pathway for offenders. Sampson and Laub’s age-graded theory has offenders following along two possible trajectories. They can either follow along the high risk trajectory or the low risk trajectory.

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Sutherland’s theory of Differential Association takes a macro level analysis as to why people commit crimes and brings it to a micro level analysis. He concludes that looking at a multiple factor approach did not explain why crimes are committed. Instead he asks the question what one singular factor touches on these multilevel factors. Sutherland looked for the universal explanation as to why crimes are committed rather than looking at individual reasons. His theory seeks what has always been present in crime and what has not or better yet what mechanism or experiences correlate to the crimes committed.

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Social learning theory and social bonding theory are two theories that may be compared and contrasted because they both overlap and differ. Although these theories have their similarities and differences, one theory may prove to be more convincing in terms of applying the theory to the understanding of crime and delinquency. Social learning theory refers to Akers’ theory of crime and deviance. Akers attempted to specify the mechanism and processes through which criminal learning takes place by explaining crime and deviance; he did this in such a way that the likelihood of conforming or deviant behavior based on the influence of an individual’s history of learning was accounted for. This theory was based off Sutherland’s differential association theory, which had nine propositions outlining the process by which individuals acquire attitudes favorable to criminal or delinquent behavior with the basic idea that people tend to associate with others in which they come into contact.

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Fifth, the specific direction of motives and drives is learned from definitions of the legal codes as favorable or unfavorable. Sixth, a person becomes delinquent because of an excess of definitions favorable to violation of law over definitions unfavorable to violation of the law. Seventh, Differential associations may vary in frequency, duration, priority, and intensity. Eighth, the process of learning criminal behavior by association with criminal and anti-criminal patterns involves all of the mechanisms that are involved in any other learning. Lastly, while criminal behavior is an expression of general needs and values, it is not explained by those needs and values, since non-criminal behavior is an expression of the same needs and values.

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The Mafia, a subculture, was an organized crime group that consisted of criminals committing illegal activities for power, influence, financial gain, and property. They protected their activities by using corruption, exploitation, and violence. Committing crimes became a way to protect their society and families. The behavior displayed by this criminal organization undoubtedly resulted in criminal mentality. In my opinion, since committing a crime is a personal choice, differential association theory may fail at accurately explaining crime.

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Furthermore, the psychology of criminal behavior, psychology, and criminology all have a primary objective of achieving an understanding of the variation in the criminal behavior of individuals (Andrews and Bonta , 2010). Empirically, the study of variation in criminal behavior is done by the studying of covariates (Andrews and Bonta , 2010). The primary covariates that PCC studies are biological, social, and psychological (Andrews and Bonta , 2010). Although, criminology tends to assess criminality at an aggregate level, in comparison to the psychology of criminal conduct’s focus on an individual level. Additionally, a psychology of criminal conduct involves applying what is learned by the studying of psychological information and methods to the predicting and influencing the propensity of criminal behavior on an individual

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Learning theory contends that delinquent behavior is learned from peers, family members, etc. Learning theory happens all the time from something as simple as a parent not wanting their child to hang out with a friend because they are a bad influence, to hanging out with that friend and doing something wrong because you saw them do it so you did too. This is seen quite commonly in gang neighborhoods where kids grow up and join the gang because they learned from their older sibling or parent that violent behavior with a specific group is okay or learned. Learning theory is quite common for delinquents, between peers, social media, television, movies, etc. juveniles can learn delinquent behavior from anything therefore influencing their

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