Is Crime a Psychological Defect - Term Paper Example

Is Crime a Psychological Defect”? Compare the arguments of one psychological and one social theory of crime. Introduction Crime comes from the Latin word crimen, meaning guilt or accusation. Crime is an act that is either committed or omitted which results in the violation of rules or laws of a governing authority. This governing authority, such as a country or a state, is also responsible for determining punishment for specific crimes. This punishment is carried out by the same governing authority in order to maintain social order and to compel obedience to its rules by its constituents. By social norms, crime refers to a defiant behaviour which violates a standard of a certain group on how to behave properly. Psychological defect refers to undesirable elements like anger, greed, lust, envy or jealousy, pride, sloth or laziness, gluttony or over-indulgence and over-consumption of food, drink, or intoxicants, to the point of waste. Each of these undesirable elements are like people fighting each other to gain control of the ego or sense of individual existence; which is why some people become greedy, lustful, paranoid because jealousy, and dependent on others because of laziness. These defects can be compared to the hidden faces of the moon, that is, when this hidden part is lighted, the defect manifests. This is why some become greedy, lustful and envious. Despite this, it is important for these defects to manifest in order that a person can learn how to control or suppress them. These psychological defects are usually hidden in the consciousness. They are the source of pain and suffering, like jealousy that divides home and family, lust that generates adultery, rape, sexual harassment (especially against women), betrayal and polygamy, greed which can lead to exploitation of employees, and lastly, anger and impatience which leads to harm of either to self or to others. These defects can be suppressed or reduced if self-control or discipline is increased. Social Theories of Crime and their Relation to Psychological Defect These major sociological theories of crimes explain that crimes are based on the social environment, e.g. family, peer group, school, workplace, community and the society itself. These theories are strain, social learning, and control theory. Other social theories of crime include labelling, social disorganization, and critical theory. Each of these theories differs from each other because they focus on specific or individual factors which results to a criminal act. The strain theory of crime posits that crimes are committed in order to decrease or escape from the strains a person experiences like financial problems, as defense from physical and psychological stressors, like sexual abusers. There are two general categories of strain that contribute to crime. First is, when another person prevents you from achieving your goals, and secondly, when another person takes valuable things from you with a negative or noxious stimuli. An example of this theory is, a man who is broke who robs a woman in order to reduce his financial problems. Another example would be a woman who kills her husband in order to end his abuse to her. In this situation, psychological defect becomes a source of the crime. In the situation of a woman killing his husband, her hatred, and a psychological defect pushed her to kill his husband to end his abusive acts to her. Social learning theory of crime says that crimes are committed by a person who learned criminal acts by associating with other people engaged in criminal activities. According to this theory, people associated with certain group of people engaged in criminal activities are prone to commit a crime and have positive beliefs in committing crimes. They view crimes as something desirable or at least justifiable in certain situations. These people commit crimes in order to get attention, for money, pleasure derived from drugs, and approval from friends or peer groups. An example of this theory is a juvenile taking a prohibited drug to become a member of a certain group and to prevent people from calling him a coward if he refuses to do so. In this situation, the juvenile psychological defect is his pride which drives him to take the prohibited drug to show that he is worthy to become a member of the group. Control theory focuses more on the factors that restrain or prevent an individual from committing a crime. On the other hand, the strain and social learning theory focuses more on the factors that push an individual to commit a crime. Control theory also emphasizes that each person has his own level or control when they commit a crime, which why some people are freer in doing a crime compare to others. This restraint or control has three major types: (1) direct control, where a person, especially a juvenile, is monitored by his parents, school officials, neighbourhood residents, and the police to make sure that he complies with their rules and does not engage in crime. An example of this is a mother who calls his son often to monitor his activities. This way, his son’s temptations and opportunities to commit a crime, like taking prohibited drugs, become limited; (2) his stake in conformity, where an individual avoids doing a crime because he believes that he could jeopardize his high stake, example good academic record, by doing so. Another example would be a person who avoids committing a crime so as not to upset family members with whom he has strong emotional bond. (3) internal control, where a person would refrain from committing a crime despite being presented with the opportunity to commit it. This person does not commit the crime because he has high self control, although this varies from person to person, which is why some people are predisposed in committing a crime. An example would be a girl who refuses to take prohibited drugs distributed in a party while her best friend openly takes it. Base on this crime theory, their psychological defect is suppressed by their internal control or restraints imposed on them, and when a person gives in to their defects, this leads to the commission of a crime which is why the best friend of the girl, took the prohibited drug. Unlike the strain, social learning and control theory of crime, which all focus on the environmental and social factors that either push or restrain an individual from committing a crime, the labelling theory of crime on the other hand, focuses more on the people imposing the law, such as the police and other official agencies, and their reaction to crime. Individuals who are arrested, prosecuted, and punished are labelled as criminals and when these people are out of the jail, other people still view and treat them as criminals. This increases the likelihood of those labelled as criminals to commit a crime again because they have trouble obtaining a legitimate job, which increases their level of strain for of lack of financial resources and also, reduces their stake in conformity, as these people usually have nothing to valuable to lose. Furthermore, people are reluctant to associate with people labelled as criminals because of their prior criminal acts and thus, these people tend to associate themselves with other criminals, which foster the social learning theory of crime. Lastly, people labelled as criminals think of themselves as criminals, thus decreasing their internal control or restraint in doing a crime, thus reinforcing the control theory of crime. This also fuels the psychological defects which also push them to commit crimes. Recent theoretical revision done by Ross Matsueda focus more on the informal labelling or the labelling of individuals as delinquents, frequently done by parents, peers and teachers, rather than the official labelling done by law enforcers. There is no consistent finding on whether official labelling really increases the likelihood of committing a crime by an officially labelled criminal. According to Matsueda, informal labelling causes changes in their perception on how others see them. Thus, people who are viewed as delinquents are more like to commit a delinquent act. An example would be a teacher treats a student as bad and worthless, and as a result, the student commits delinquent acts. By labelling the student, their internal control reduces, which in return awakens his psychological defect, like revenge against his teacher, and thus, the student commits delinquent acts. Social Disorganization theory of crime focuses more on the larger social environment, mainly the community or the society as a whole, compared to strain, social learning and control theory. This theory tries to answer why some communities or societies have differing crime rates. An example of this is the economically-deprived community with large population and high family disruption, such as divorce or single parent. These factors reduce the stake of conformity especially to young people because of lack of job opportunities due to lack of schools that provide necessary skills to land a job and also, lack of business establishments that provide employment. This also increases the strain being experienced by these people due to financial problems from lack of employment which further push them to commit a crime. Lastly, the lack of skills and resources of the community, like law enforcers and other concerned agencies, to monitor or impose sanctions on the undesirable behaviour of its constituents is very important since it acts as a restraint to limit or prevent opportunities to commit crimes, base on the control theory of crime. An example of this situation is a man who from a woman across the street to feed his family, for lack of employment opportunities in his area laziness to look for employment. Based on the situation, the lack of employment pushed the man to steal because this increases his strain to feed his family. His laziness is psychological defects which also pushed him to commit the crime. Critical theory of crime focuses more on class differences, some on gender differences, and some on societal differences, in crime rate difference. According to Karl Marx, a specific group that has power or influence, such as the capitalists, use their power as an advantage to influence the passage of laws by law makers of the government. As a result, penalty on “street” crimes done by the lower class is graver compared to the undesirable actions and conditions of business establishments, like causing pollution, lower wages and lack of employee benefits and also, unsafe working conditions. The abusive actions done by capitalists to earn more money would cause workers and unemployed people to commit a crime due to increased strain (financial problems) and a lesser stake of conformity, because of lack of benefits received from either the business sector or the government. According to Marx, there is a difference in the crime rates between males and females. He says that females socialize passively, are subservient, and focus more on the needs of others, like their family, especially children. As a result, their behaviours increase their internal or self control and also their high stake of conformity as the commission of a crime could jeopardize their family. Furthermore, they are more closely supervised than males, especially fathers and husband that desire to protect them from other males that could do harm or take their females away from them, which is a restraint that limits their opportunity in committing a crime based on the control theory. Based on the study, in every age group and for almost all offense classes, males have always had the higher levels in crime offense compare to females. Base on all the social theories of crime, psychological defect or undesirable elements or weaknesses such as greed, lust and anger and hatred, has been found to be the source of crime. For example, a capitalist who becomes greedy, a psychological defect, as he wants to ensure the stability of his company by increasing his profit, uses his power and influence to pass laws allowing him to freely abuse his employees by providing less wage, undesired working condition and less employee benefits, based on the critical theory of crime. Another example is, an unemployed man, who, for lack of job opportunity and support by their government in his area, resorts to relying on stealing to feed his family and as consequence, becomes lazy in finding a decent job, which is a psychological defect, based on social disorganization and strain theory of crime. But the argument that psychological defect is truly a crime is not concluded because examples based on social theories of crime imply that there should be triggering factors or situations which are required, like the hatred (a psychological defect) of a wife for his husband which results in her killing him in an effort to stop the physical and mental abuse done to her, based on strain theory of crime. Furthermore, this psychological defects are like people fighting each other for superiority and is just waiting for its chance to manifest, and when a person gives in to his psychological defects because of lack of internal or self control base on control theory of crime and Gnostic teaching, this could lead to pain and suffering and that could eventually lead to a crime given the right factors and triggering conditions. Psychological Theories of Crime and Relation to Psychological Defect Psychological theories of crime are concerned with the individual differences of behaviours that may predispose a person to commit a crime, based on personality characteristics, biological factors, or social interactions. Psychoanalytic theory was created by Sigmund Freud which states that all humans have natural urges and drives which are repressed in their subconscious and all have criminal tendencies. According to him, the process of socialization or the process of acquiring culture or behavioural patterns from childhood experience help people to develop internal control, which is important in suppressing criminal tendencies, an important factor which prevents or restrains individuals from committing a crime, based on the control theory of crime. Freud hypothesized that the most common factor contributed to criminal behaviour of individual is how their parents raised their children. An improperly raised child would result in personality problems that trigger antisocial impulses inward and outward. The personality impulse directed outward by a child causes aggression that harm others, whether physical or verbal, which could lead to criminal acts. On the other hand, impulses directed inward becomes neurotic which could result to behaviours like low self esteem, anxiety, sadness and depression. An example is a boy raised by a family, wherein he is always physically and verbally abused, goes to school and beats a male classmate for no reason, a delinquent act, and as a result, is suspended from school. His anger and aggression towards his parents, a psychological defect, pushes him to commit this delinquent act to channel his anger and aggression to classmate. Cognitive development theory on crime focuses more on the perception of people towards law and morality. According to Lawrence Kohlberg, a developmental psychologist, the theory on moral reasoning has three levels. The first or the preconventional level, which occurs in middle childhood, focuses more on obedience and avoiding punishment, which is similar to control theory of crime, specifically direct control, from which obedience is established because parents or other authority figures are monitoring them, which limit their chance of committing a mistake that could lead to punishment. The second or the conventional level, which occurs at the end of middle childhood, focuses on expectation of their family and others, which is still similar to control theory of crime, specifically stake of conformity, wherein their family and others is their high stake, and will lose them if they become upset when he commits an undesirable act. The third is the postconventional level, which occurs at early adulthood, values the laws of a society. They are open to change that can improve the law and order of a society. Failure to progress from these stages could result to wrong perception towards morality and law which eventually leads to delinquency or worst, the commission of a crime. Behavioral psychology principles are what psychological learning theory of crime is all about. Behavioral psychology stipulates that reward value such as money, goods and social status or consequences is what a person’s behavior learned and maintained. According to this theory, by taking away the reward value of the behavior, deviant behavior can be eliminated. This is supported by Hans J. Eysenck, a psychologist that relates his principles in behavioral psychology to biology by using classical conditioning, operant conditioning, and modeling people, wherein they learn to have their own moral preferences. Classical conditioning is a learning process that started as a result of pairing a reliable stimulus with a response which is similar to social learning of crime but this time, a response example a child is pair or associated to reliable stimulus like parents with desirable behavior and as a result, the child will eventually develop a desirable behavior. Furthermore, he believes that if paired with opposite, the child becomes delinquent and would later lead to committing an undesirable actions. Constitutional-Learning theory of crime according to James Q. Wilsons and Richard J. Herrnstein combines both biology and social learning in order to answer and explain the potential cause of crime. They present reasons that criminal and noncriminal behavior has gains, like money and valuables, and losses, such as imprisonment. They also mention that time discounting and equity are two other variables that play an important role in criminality. Base on time discounting, each of us have different levels of gratifications and because of this some people are prone to commit crimes because they want immediate gratifications like money. An example is a group of men who rob a bank because if they work honestly, their gains would take some time. This is similar to control theory of crime, where an individual has different internal or self control that acts or prevents the commission of a crime. Equity on the other hand means that gain is associated with committing a crime that could ease a persons feelings of being treated unjustly which is very similar to strain theory of crime from which an individual seeks revenge to the people who have done them wrong. Base on all the psychological theories of crime, psychological defect is still the source of crime. According to Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalytic theory, every person has criminal tendencies and is merely suppressed because of the process of socialization. This psychological defect is the same as criminal tendencies and both are being suppressed in the consciousness and only resurface when trigger factors are present. Cognitive theory on the other hand focuses more on the stages that helps a person view law and morality. Failure to complete this stage would result to a predisposition to commit a crime because of wrong perceptions of morality. Next, learning theory, which focuses more on the learning process, like Eysenck’s classical conditioning, wherein an individual learns desirable behaviour, if also paired with another positive person with desirable behaviour. An example would be children paired with parents with desirable behavior. Lastly, Constitutional-Learning theory of crime focuses more on gains and loses in committing a crime. Discussions: Crime occurs when someone violates the rule or law of a governing authority. Sanctions and punishments are passed by law makers in order to maintain a desirable social order. Crime has many theories regarding it and a number of factors push an individual to commit this undesirable acts. Psychological defect base on Gnostic teachings are our undesirable elements or weakness that is hidden in our consciousness. Each of these psychological defects fights each other to manifest itself in our ego. These defects can be compared to the face of the moon wherein when some parts of the moon is lighted where our defects is present, they manifest itself in our consciousness which is why some of us are become greedy which exploits others, lustful which can result to sexual harassments, rape and betrayal, jealousy that could lead to crime of passion, lack of patience which leads to taking valuable to others and hatred that could lead to killing others. Because of these defects, this has cause us pain and suffering that results to hurting ourselves and others. Based on Gnostic teachings, by controlling our inner self through self discipline, we can control and eliminate our defects but before we can do this, we must face and experience this one. Social theories of crime explain the factors that lead to the commission of a crime and how crime is different from one class to another. Strain theory of crime is base on factors that pushes an individual to reduce or escape situations that put strain on them. In strain theory of crime, psychological defects becomes a source or origin of crime combined with the factors that push it, these defects become so strong that it cause suffering to others and to self leading to commitment of crime. An example is a daughter who kills his father out of extreme hatred because she is being molested. Social learning theory on the other hand, originates from association of people with criminal activities and because of this, their beliefs towards crime changes to the extent that they view crime as justifiable given the right condition. Because of this, their defects are reinforced and manifested, leading to the commission of a crime. Control theory of crime on the other hand focuses more on the factors that restraints or prevents us from committing a crime. These factors could be direct control or someone monitors an individual behavior to limit their opportunities in committing a crime especially among young people who are prone to drugs. Another factor is stake of conformity wherein if a person commits a crime, they will lose their high stakes such as good academic record and lastly, internal control which is important in preventing and restraining people from committing a crime and the key according to Gnostic teaching is to have self control or discipline to strengthen it. Labelling theory of crime focuses more on the view of different people towards others. This view could be either formal or informal labelling. This uneasy perception towards them causes to decrease their internal control which acts as a restrain to prevent them from committing a crime. Other reasons especially to labelled criminals are they are push to do crime again because they experience more strains because of lack of employment and financial issues. Another theory is disorganized association theory wherein it focuses more on the community and society as a whole. This theory stipulates that when a community or society has conditions that promotes strain and reduces stake of conformity of people like poor economic condition of a community with high population, lack of job opportunity and also, less skills and resources to monitor the community predisposes these people of committing a crime. Lastly, critical theory of crime focuses on the difference of crime rate base on their class, gender or certain groups. Base on this theory, upper class like capitalist uses its power and influence to let law makers favourable to them while imposing more punishment against the lower class. This unjust treatment leads to abuse of power to the lower class such as a greedy capitalist provides fewer wages and employment and benefits to its employee and because of this corruption, there decrease in stake of conformity and more strain from financial problems among employed and unemployed people to be predispose in committing a crime. Psychological theories of crime have many similarities towards social theory of crime. Psychoanalytic theory stipulates that all of us have criminal tendencies and these tendencies are suppress when our internal control is develop during our childhood experience. This theory is similar to control theory of crime in terms of restraining us or preventing us from committing a crime and by losing this internal control, a person becomes predispose to committing a crime. Cognitive development theory of crime focuses on the views of people towards law and morality. In this theory, it is important that the three stages of cognitive development must be successful because failure of this will alter a person’s perception towards morality which could lead to decreases internal control that predisposes them in committing a crime. Learning theory is base on the principles of behavioral psychology and in this theory; deviant behavior can be eliminated even if taking away the reward value of the behavior. Base on Hans J. Eysenck, using classical conditioning by pairing a person like child with another person with desirable behavior like parents, the child would grow up to have desirable behavior as well which is similar to social learning theory of crime but its principle is just opposite. Instead of learning criminal activity through immersion by social learning theory of crime, in learning theory of crime on the other hand, a person learns positive reinforcement through immersion. Lastly, Constitutional-Learning theory of crime combines both biology and social learning in order to answer and explain the potential cause of crime. In this theory, time discounting and equity are two important variables that play an important role in crime. In the situation of time discounting , some people commit crime in order to immediately gratify their needs while others don’t example is a group of man that robs a bank in order to gratify their immediate wants, their impatience which is a psychological defect has push them to do this crime and also in equity, because of unequal treatment or injustice done to them, some people commit crime to ease their feelings. Example of this situation is a man kills his neighbour for killing his wife because of his hatred and vengeance which is actually a psychological defect. Overall, all theories of crimes have relationship and similarities each other base on factors that pushes the individual in committing a crime. Both social and psychological theories of crime agree that psychological defect itself is not a crime itself but rather a source of it. Psychological defects when awaken can lead to committing a crime when certain factors is met or given. References: 1. Rogers, Marc. 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Criminology. Retrieved from http://books.google.com.ph/books?id=FsZOjMQLTsUC&pg=PA38&dq=psychological+theories+of+crime&lr=&hl=en 12. Stumphauzer, Jerome S. Helping Delinquents Change. Retrieved from http://books.google.com.ph/books?id=DqdJEG7j3asC&pg=PA2&dq=psychological+theories+of+crime&lr=&hl=en Read More