Biological/Biosocial and Classical Theories of Crime

Biological/Biosocial and Classical Theories of Crime

Biosocial theory

The modern biosocial theory is interdisciplinary in nature integrating biology, sociology, and behavioral psychology to explain the cause of crime. As a result, it is far more complex than the traditional approach that mostly focuses on the biological aspect only. Although modern biosocial theory does not reject or abandon all of the elements of traditional theories, it certainly places less emphasis on biology and more on social and environmental factors. For the purposes of this paper, the traditional biological theory will refer mostly to the Lombrossian theory as he is considered the father of positivism and pioneer biological approach to explain crime. The objective of this paper is to compare and contrast modern biosocial theory to traditional biological theory by highlighting the integrative and complex nature of modern theory and also discuss their policy implications for crime control and prevention. (Reiner, R. 2007)

(Reiner, R. 2007) calls the modern biosocial theory “environmental friendly” and “biologically informed environmental approaches.” Jeffrey's study (Reiner, R. 2007) explained this important biosocial concept with the behavioral genetics, which maintains the genes interact with the environment to produce the pheonotype (GxE=P), which subsequently interact with the environment to produce certain behavior (PxE=Behavior). As shown above, the environment plays significant role in human behavior. Modern theorists agree that criminology needs biology as there is “empirical evidence that lawbreaking is the product of biological, psychological, and sociological factors operating in complex ways” (Reiner, R. 2007)

Naturally, this integrative characteristic of biosocial theory places it on neither side of the nature versus nurture argument. Moreover, most of modern theorists have no intention of dredging up the old debate over nature versus nurture. They no longer ask “is it nature or nurture” but rather “how does nature and nurture affect each other?” (Presdee, M. 2000) states that there is no nature or nurture; there is only nature via nurture (Presdee, M. 2000) identifies biochemistry plus social hierarchy, temperament plus learning, genetic liability plus family functioning, neurotoxicity plus environmental enrichment, and cognitive ability plus experience as examples of nature plus nurture.

The modern biosocial theory, however, focuses on the human brain, biochemistry, genes, and the environment. Therefore, successful policies will minimize the impact of an environment and a biological constitution conducive to antisocial behavior and should focus on early detection, education, rehabilitation, and creating positive environment if they were to effectively ...