Psychological Theories of Crime & Delinquency

[Name of Author]

[Name of Institute]

Psychological Theories of Crime & Delinquency

Introduction

The paper aims to critically analyze an article regarding the topic - Psychological Theories of Crime and Delinquency. A number of psychological theories have been applied in order to recognize the concept of crime and delinquency. The literature review does classify the perspectives into five different areas which gives an overview of each along with an analysis regarding each area (Moore, n.d.). The main perspectives done in the articles are learning theories, intelligence theories, personality theories, theories of psychopathy, and cognitive and social development theories. The psychological theories have found to be beneficial in determining the way society considers regarding crime and delinquency and in designing policies which relate to these problems and issues.

Crime is one of the social problems that usually recognized a greater need and potential usefulness of psychology. The antisocial behavior of young people, women abuse, sexual assault, alcohol and other drugs create extreme discomfort in societies and urge a more comprehensive understanding that is oriented toward prevention. Although all these phenomena have a multi-factorial origin, some of its key psychological dimensions are to be the human subject performing the antisocial behavior (Burgess & Akers, 1966). Currently the Psychology of crime puts special emphasis on the prediction and management of risk of violent behavior and antisocial field being devoted an article later this same monograph. Psychological treatments of criminals aim to modify those risk factors, which are considered directly related to criminal activity. With new repertoires of pro-social behavior, develop their thinking, regulate their emotions angry, and prevent relapse or recurrence in the crime.

Discussion & Analysis

Two methods were used to determine the literature reviewed for this article. First of all, a computer search was done with the help of online library of University of California-Berkeley along with the Google Scholar. Moreover, an expert in the area was consulted in order to provide further resources. The databases of UC library were searched including PsycINFO as well as PsycARTICLES (Moore, n.d.).

The social learning theory is currently considered the most complete explanation of criminal behavior. The popular model in psychology enhances the role of imitation and behavioral expectations, and difference between the times of acquisition and subsequent behavior execution and maintenance. However, the dominant model in the explanation of crime is social learning, which considers the learning of criminal behavior involving four interrelated mechanisms: 1) differential association with people who show criminal habits and attitudes, 2) the acquisition by the individual of definitions favorable to crime, 3) differential reinforcement of their criminal behavior, and 4) the imitation of models pro-criminal (Webster, 2008). Sociological theory considers the offender and victim as a victim of social and penal system for criminal identification labeling. Among the most significant contributions of this current are: the introduction of the concept of crime unknown, or hidden figure of crime and not reported to the administration of justice, and immunity research on white-collar crime or economic crime affecting many victims (Catalano & Hawkins, ...