The Occurrence of Sexual Crime - Essay Example

? CRITCALY CONSIDER WHETHER THE OCCURENCE OF SEXUAL CRIME IS BETTER EXPLAINNED BY SOCIOLOGICAL OR PSYCHOLOGICAL ORIENTED CRIMINOLOGICAL THEORIES. In the early 1940s, sociologists started to connect socio-psychological interface to criminology behaviour. Psychological sociology also known as sociological social psychology is the study of human relationships and interactions and highlights such matters as group socialisation and dynamics. Under this concept, an individual relationship is associated with significant social processes like education, sex, peer relationships and family life. Researchers have proven that kids that grow up with inadequate schooling and in homes wracked by conflict become vulnerable to pro-crime forces. As per Edwin Sutherland, kids were learning from elders about the criminal attitudes. As per Walter Reckless, crime happens when kids develop an insufficient self-image rendering them incapable of managing their own misbehaviour. As per Karl Marx, social interaction is the main instrument which sowed the seeds for new vistas in criminology. (Siegel 2008:10). Emile Durkheim regarded crime as a necessary and a normal social event. Quetelet from France revealed that crime rates were highest in the summer in France in heterogeneous, especially in southern regions and mostly influenced by drinking habits. Quetelet recognised many of the relationships between social phenomenons and hence, crime still acts as a footing for criminology even today. Lombrosian findings of crime depend upon biological determinism is the direct opposite to Quetelet revelations that crime had a social basis which is a direct confront of the former. (Siegel 2008:11). Structural Strain: Employing a sociological perspective, the structural concepts indicate that social and economic forces of strain shape collective human behaviour. (Siegel 2008: 175).Merton is of the view that anomie has been one of the most significant and long-term sociological theories of criminality. (Siegel 2008:176). Sexual crime is not a psychiatric crime but of legal nature. One becomes a sexual offender by satisfying tests of legal definitions and principles and not by satisfying some diagnostic criteria like sexual sadism and paedophilia. Sexual crime includes sexual demeanour. Sexual crime includes sexual behaviour like attempted or actual anal or vaginal penetration and whether the victim has been forcibly compelled or had with consent and the magnitude of the force employed by the perpetrator. (Flowers 2006:15). Masters and Johnson (1974) are of the view that human sexual demeanour is both instinctive and learned and effected by a variety of psychological, biological and socio-cultural manipulations. There is availability of plenty of evidence that majority of human sexual movements would become more graspable to majority individuals, if they could understand the setting of each other background and behaviour. (Kinsey, Promeroy and Martin 1948:678). The criminological outlook spotlights on sexual crimes, the consequences and it’s causes. The psychological standpoint spotlights on the manner in which sexual arousal and sexuality are influenced by personality dynamics, attitudes, motivations, emotions, interpersonal demeanour and beliefs. The sociological outlook sees sexuality as a genetic adaptation to the background with conception that sex differences in females and males are adaptive and functional in a biological sense. Sexual deviance is kind of sexual behaviour which is deviant from criminological and sociological perspectives will change across place and time and will be socially constructed. Kraft –Ebing (1906) explained sexual disorders, which include masochism, sadism, fetishism, transvestism, transsexualism, sexual bondage, nymphomania and lust murder. Sex crimes are distinguished from sexual deviance and sexual disorders as they are behavioural functions that infringe the law. From a legal outlook, sexual offenses are acts considered to be both a hazard to public and individual safety and sexually deviant. . Sexual crimes are behaviour where offender involves in a sexual act with a non-consulting victim which includes child molestation, rape, indecent liberties, misconduct with a minor, custodial sexual misconduct and indecent liberties. Sexual offenses are punishable under the Sex Offenders Act 2003 (and with improvement in earlier acts made in 1956, 1997 etc.) deals with all kinds of sex offenses and lays down punishment for various kinds of sex offences in U.K. (Bancroft 2009:468). The phrases “sexual psychopath and Sexual Predator are legal phrases employed to inflict civil commitment of hazardous sex offenders whose demeanour is linked with pathological tendency and mental illness to reoffend. In UK, in 2004/2005 alone, there were about 60,946 recorded sexual offenses in the aggregate which showed an increase of 17% with that of the earlier year and has doubled as compared to the figures of 1993. According to UK Home Office (2006), from 1993 to 2001/2002, the “other sexual offenses” stayed stable around 9000, but they commenced to climb up to a total of 23,959 in the year 2003/2004 to 2004/2005. Thus, this explosive increase in one year can be attributed to the inclusion of “indecent exposure” as a sexual offence under UK laws. (Bancroft 2009:468). Differential Association theory falls under social process theory and it assumes that individuals are taught to do crime from vulnerability to antisocial definitions and this illustrates the birth of criminality and it describes the existence of crime in all walks of social structure and explains why some individual in high-crime provinces abstain from criminality and this is applicable to juveniles and adult. Neutralisation theory explains how youths Jenkins (2001:4) is of the view that child pornography is a social issue that is commonly criticised and stigmatised since, by definition, the subjects of child pornography cannot offer any guise of legal or informed consent to their association in the crime and when children are just depicted to nude, they might have been subject to actual molestation. (Ziney & Ziney2009:80). According to Coalition against Sexual Assault (CCASA), while someone is sexually assaulted, the whole society pays for that. Due to a sexual assault, a victim may have tangible expenses like legal expenses, mental health expenses and medical expenses. For the society , catching , sentencing and supervising the sex offenders is not only essential for well being of the sexual abuse victims but also essential for minimising the expenses of sexual attack as one sex criminal is likely to carry out up to 100 sexual offenses and may result in sufferings by numerous sexual victims. The total annual costs incurred for the victims of sexual offenders in UK are calculated by taking into account medical expenses incurred on sexual victims, other out-of-pocket and tangible expenses and the aggregate of the other intangible total number of life losses of sex crime victims. . As per Greissman (1996), sex offenders do not “age out” of crime over period of time as compared to other types of offenders. The social and personal costs linked with sex crimes and as the unique confront witnessed by sex offenders, combine to invite the emotion and the attention to the area of sex offenders’ legislation. The scientific study of mental processes and behaviour is termed as Psychology whereas the scientific study of criminals and different types of crimes is known as criminology. Thus, psychological criminology can be illustrated as the scientific study of the mental processes and behaviour that contribute to a comprehension of criminals and crime. (Wortley 2010:2) Psychological criminology answers the question: What is about individuals and their experiences that make them to commit the crime or to turn to be a criminal. Psychologists are more particular about how an individual personality, biological makeup, upbringing, current scenario, thought processes and etc which engender criminal behaviour. Psychologists pay more attention to whether criminals have separate characteristic profiles that end up in their criminal demeanours. (Wortley 2010:1) It spotlights on the root causes of crime that originate from individual offenders. In rape, the offenders’ demeanours towards women are outlined by his social-cultural experiences and social interactions. The sociological evaluation will normally remain at the collective level which mirrors the group’s attitude, whereas the psychological analyses will normally mirror on the individual’s attitude within a group. However, the sociologists are of very critical of psychological approaches to demonstrate criminality and crime. Sociologists argue that in spotlighting individuals, psychologists not take into account issues like economic inequality and social disadvantages that are the main causes for crime. However, the psychologists are of the view that sociological theories disregard significant individual differences in criminal demeanour and are overly manipulated by an ideological outline instead of scientific evidence.( Wortley 2010:2) The research study about the fundamental behaviour and etiology of the serial murderers is still in its infancy and in the last 25 years, numerous attempts have been made to make aware about the dangers of the serial murders in the society. (Holmes & Holmes 2056:179). Serial murders are predominantly associated with sexual themes like sodomy, rape, sadism, molestation, prostitution, pornography, prostitution and other guises of sexual perversions and violence. A number of criminologists have examined sexual serial killers and arrived at conclusions on their typologies and characteristics. As per D.T. Lunde, the majority of the serial killers are sexual sadists who have linked with violence and sexuality normally beginning at their young age. As per Dietz and Warren’s study, about 43% of sex offenders are associated in homosexual in their adulthood, whereas 20% of them had unleashed sexual offenses like voyeurism and exhibitionism. Dietz found that one type of sex serial killer as psychopathic sexual sadists. Dietz emphasised that every known serial murderer with a dozen or more victims were males named with sexually sadistic tendencies and with the antisocial personality disorder. In cases of serial killers of prostitutes, sex offenders seem to have in common an extreme hatred towards women in general and prostitutes in specific. (Flowers2006:13). Signature sexual killers are another type of sexual killers who are driven by such a primal knowledge motivation to carry out the analogues crime again and again that their prototypes become obsessive. Majority of signature murderers sought some guise of sexual gratification, and their crimes are expressions on the means that they satisfy their needs. (Flowers2006:13). About sixty percent of sex killers had childhood psychiatric issues, while the majority of them had dominant, cold, uncaring fathers or mothers. Nearly 50% reported being physically, sexually or emotionally abused. Majority of the sex offenders had sadistic, violent or rape fantasies while growing up and displayed cruelty to other children or to animals. Majority of them regarded themselves as failures, insensitive to other needs and had low self-esteem. (Flowers2006: 15). Robert Ressler, Ann Burgess and John Douglas, in their study of sexual homicide further found that stress factors, financial issues and relationship issues played significant part in the murderer’s life earlier to commit the sex offense. Majority of sex murderers had negative mental state, which includes anger, frustration, agitation, hostility and excitement. (Flowers2006: 15). Social psychology speculates that social forces shape the individual psychology. Both social and biological forces catalyse, combine and influence one another. The social psychological replica assists to comprehend the interactional exchange that transpires between social environment and children and also how and where from they get their ideas, getting directions and learning their demeanours. Under sociological scenario, social forces influence and make individuals within the society who, in return, shape and act upon social forces. (Rich 2011:32). Sociological theories of sex crimes is dealing with human behavior which is influenced by social traditions and pressures and socially deviant demeanor is either restrained or contained by societal forces which includes values and norms learnt by individuals through a system of social enculturation. (Rich 2011:12). Masters and Johnson (1974) are of the view that human sexual demeanour is both instinctive and learned and effected by a variety of psychological, biological and socio-cultural manipulations. There is availability of plenty of evidence that majority of human sexual movements would become more graspable to majority individuals, if they could understand the setting of each other background and behaviour.(Kinsey, Promeroy and Martin 1948:678). Hanson and Bussiere (1998) were of the opinion that social factors are responsible for sex offenses and these include the abuse of drugs and alcohol, unstable employment and associating with criminal peers. Hanson and Morton0bourgon (2005) recognised some social factors which were prognostic of sexual recidivism. These social factors include sexual preoccupation, unstable life style, intimacy deficits, deviant sexual conflicts and employment of sex as a coping stratagem. Hanson and Harris (2000a) recognised some additional social factors like sexual entitlement and poor social influence for sex crimes. (Eher, Miner& Pfflin 45). In UK society, majority of the youths are socially segregated, who have feelings that they are socially low and inadequate in masculine adequacy and build up their sexual outlooks through their adolescent maltreatment, including sexual abuse mainly through traditional mass media and its habitual attractive displays of sexual demeanor and through the display of sexual demeanor available through openly reachable pornography. (Rich 2011:32). Psychopathic theory deals with individual experiences which deals with only selfishness, lacks concern for or understanding of the requirements of others has superficial and shallow emotions, and acts with remorse or any regard for others. When psychopathic individuals engross in sexual violence, it is just another side of a personal demand –pushed and entitled narcissism, in which there is neither concern nor recognition for the victim and in which personal drives and needs are out of tune with concerns or needs of society at large. (Rich 2011:12). The criminological outlook spotlights on sexual crimes, the consequences and its causes. The psychological standpoint spotlights on the manner in which sexual arousal and sexuality are influenced by personality dynamics, attitudes, motivations, emotions, interpersonal demeanour and beliefs. The sociological outlook sees sexuality as a genetic adaptation to the background with conception that sex differences in females and males are adaptive and functional in a biological sense. Feel good, Cortoni & Thompson (2005) argue that psychological factor is responsible for engaging in sexual activity with children. Hanson and Harris (2000c) describe that psychological attitudes of offenders’ view that victims can really such abusive activity are further considered as one of the susceptible issues in sex offenses. Further, a hyper masculine character and where a male is of the opinion that sexual assault is a type of establishing dominance has been observed to be a further psychological factor in case of sex offenses. Ryan (2003) recognised that such hyper masculine behavior is regarded as a strong susceptibility feature when associated to sexual dominance and power, as contrasted to general feelings of masculinity on psychological grounds. (Eher, Miner& Pfflin 45). For instance , Andrews & Bonta (2003) argue that holding beliefs and values that crime is justified and creates little injury is a psychological risk factor in sex offenses, which correlated with future offenses while having easy access to criminal circumstances like unobserved access to victims is a sociological risk factor .( McAnulty & Burnette 2006 :181) . MacDonald and Waterman are of the opinion that sexual abuse by a family member is linked with more psychological anguish and social adjustment indicators than extrafamilial childhood abuse. Russell (1986) argues that when contrasting female victims of childhood sexual abuse, father –daughter incest is the most psychologically detrimental sexually abusive association. (McAnulty & Burnette 2006:134) It is difficult to arrive at exact sexual crime figures as many sex crimes are not reported. Further, some demeanours are not legally banned whereas some sexual demeanours are treated as crimes. Some sexual behaviour occurs more frequently than others, and some sexual behaviour are regarded as more serious than others. Further, some sexual crimes happen with consulting adults and majority of the sex crimes unleashed against unprotected, unwilling and susceptible sex victims. Both criminology and Sociological theory offer to understand the varied explanations to sexual offending. Sociological theory assists to comprehend the complexity of sexual issue. Criminology theory helps to define the socially constructed nature of sexual offending and how society is organised to retort to a sexual issue. (Ziney & Ziney2009 80). It is to be noted that criminological theories have not been widely applied to the comprehension of sexual offenders and sexual offenses. Most criminologists’ transcripts that cover the province of sex crimes employ feminists or psychological theories as the root cause. However, both criminological and sociological theories have not been widely employed to demonstrate such crimes and there exist a lot of references for the same. Both criminological and sociological theories approach sexual offending as a phenomenon clubbed in the structural elements of society. Sociological emphasise that cultural and social factors influence our demeanours towards sexual offenses like what is regarded as a sexual offense, how we regard sexual offenders and the importance of sexual offenses as an issue in the society. In common, sociological theory spotlight theory that are applicable to sexual offending, which may focus on social interaction styles in the specific scenarios as contrasted to adopting a structural critique. (Ziney & Ziney 2009:51). This research essay wishes to emphasis on the findings of Masters and Johnson (1974) are of the view that human sexual demeanour is both instinctive and learned and effected by a variety of psychological, biological and socio-cultural manipulations. There is availability of plenty of evidence that majority of human sexual movements would become more graspable to majority individuals, if they could understand the setting of each other background and behaviour.(Kinsey, Promeroy and Martin 1948:678). Thus, this research essay wish to conclude that in view of above, this research essay wishes to conclude that the occurrence of sexual crime is better explained by both sociological and psychological oriented criminological theories which are dependent upon each other. Thus, both the sociological and psychological factors are responsible for occurrence of sex crimes not only in UK but around the globe. List of References Bancroft John. (2009). Human Sexuality and its Problems. London: Elsevier Health Sciences. Eher Reinhard, Miner M H & Pfflin F. (2011). International Perspectives on the Assessment and Treatment of Sexual Offences. New York: John Wiley and Sons. Flowers, Ronald B. (2006). Sex Crimes: Perpetrators, Prostitutes and Victims. New York: Charles C Thomas Publishing Ltd. Homes Ronald M & Homes Stephens T. (2002). Current Perspectives on Sex Crimes. New York: SAGE. McAnulty R D & Burnette M M. (2006) Sex and Sexuality: Sexual Deviation and Sexual Offenses. New York: Greenwood Publishing Group. Rich Phil.(2011). Understanding, Assessing and Rehabilitating Juvenile Sexual Offenders . London: John Wiley and Sons. Siegel, Larry J. (2008). Criminology. New York: Cengage Learning. Wortley Richard. (2010). Psychological Criminology. Taylor & Francis. Ziney & Ziney. (2009). Perverts and Predators: the Making of Sexual Offending Laws. New York: Rowman & Littlefield. Read More