Criminal Theory - Biological Positivist PDF

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Discuss the contribution of biological positivist criminology to our understanding of crime and criminal justice...

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Discuss the contribution of biological positivist criminology to our understanding of crime and criminal justice. This essays aims to cover in what ways biological positivist criminology has led to our understanding of crime. Biological Positivists reject the idea that criminals have a choice in their behaviour and actions, and that it is the result of biological defects and abnormalities. However as with any theory there are issues with this, such as the lack of accountability, because if they were predisposed to commit crimes should they be prosecuted for something they can’t control? There are theories cantered around the idea that unusual physical or biological characteristics can distinguish criminals. Cesare Lombroso made claims on the topic that have been influential up until today. He theorised that crime is caused by “atavistic reversion” (Jones, 2009) which means regressing to an earlier form of life, such as ape-like primal ancestors. The main feature of his theory is the fact that he provided a list of physical characteristics that could be used to distinguish a criminal from the rest of the general population. For example, an asymmetrical face, unusual ears, or upturned nose. In his study of 383 Italian criminals, he discovered that 21% had one of these characteristics and 43% had five or more. It was this data that lead him to conclude that five or more of these characteristics would indicate a born criminal. Lombroso’s research was not strictly objective, he argued that instead of using objective measurements of these characteristics they “could be detected by the eye of a trained server, but couldn’t be measured.” (Vold, Bernard, Snipes, 2002) Even though Lombroso’s research used early examples of control groups and statistical techniques (Jones, 2009) they were carried our poorly. Many of the ‘criminals’ were Sicilians who are normally swarthy or stocky in appearance already, moreover some of the criminals were found to be mentally ill; which might have affected their appearance. Later William Sheldon attempted to link criminal behaviour with physical characteristics, he claimed that there was a strong link between body type and temperament. Sheldon prepared a typology matching temperamental characteristics with psychical aspects. (Jones, 2009) (Vold, Bernard, Snipes, 2002) An endomorph has soft, rounded contours and likes relaxation and comfort. A mesomorph is large and muscular and is associated with action and aggression. And an ectomorph is lean with prominent bones and is nervous and shy in temperament. Sheldon conducted a study to compare 200 young males in small rehabilitation home and 200 boys college boys found to be non-delinquent. His findings showed that delinquent youths were far more mesomorph and lower in ectopmorphy, whereas the college boys gave more balanced results. An issue with this study however is that

Sheldon didn’t use a legal definition of delinquent, but carried out a more subjective assessment (Jones, 2009). Looking at both Lombroso and Sheldon’s studies of physical features link to crime collectively there are some issues that have been addressed. Both theories encouraged stereotyping among not only society but the criminal justice system in general. Theories like these lead to discrimination towards certain groups of people in society who share the same traits. There is a possibility that these theories sparked some early causes as to how the criminal justice system treats certain minority groups unfairly today. And that societies understanding of the stereotyped criminal being of an ethnic minority may have been shaped by these theories as black people are 1 in 7 more likely to be prosecuted than white people. (Ministry of Justice, 2015) Whilst physical features were a way to possibly determine criminality in the past, modern advances have led to possibly causes inwards, such as hormones. This topic is closely related to gender and the differences in conviction rates for the sexes. Some attention has been focused on premenstrual tension when there is a wide variation in hormonal levels. In a study conducted by Dalton (1961) 49% of a sample of 156 female prisoners committed their crime during the eight days before or during menstruation. However, it can hardly be said that menstrual tension can be said to cause crime otherwise female conviction and prosecution rates would be a lot higher. It’s suggested that between 20% and 40% of women suffer from sever PMT symptom but no one has suggested that 4/10 women commit crime as a result (Jones, 2012) PMT has been successfully used in English Criminal Courts as grounds for diminished responsibility on cases and used as a mitigating factor in sentencing (Windom and Ames 1988). However, nothing of the sort has been permitted for men who have an unusually high level of the hormone, testosterone. Studies used to show the link of testosterone and aggression have been carried out on animals such as monkeys. Such experiments include injecting female monkeys with testosterone which resulted in them acting more aggressively. Although these studies can’t be held applicable to human as the results are taken from non-human animals. Another factor taken into account when assessing the biological link to criminality is heredity. One way this link was assessed was through twin studies. There are two types of twins: Monozygotic, meaning the egg that was fertalised and then divied; these twins are commonly known as identical twins. Then there’s Dizygotic twins which are no different than normal siblings. (Jones, 2009) A study conducted by Lange found that in thirteen pairs of monozygotic twins where one twin had a criminal record the other twin did twin in 77% of cases. However, in a group of seventeen dizygotic twins on there was only a 12% concordance rate. Lange compared this to a control group of 214 pairs of

brother, a similar record was only found in 8% of these cases (Jones, 2009). The issue with this study is that it was conducted in the early 20 th century, at this time it was common to diagnose monozygotic and dizygotic twins purely based on visuals which would give distorted findings. The biological positivist approach has changed criminological ideas vastly from the early 19 th century, which before were mainly based on classical criminology which promoted the idea of hierarchy and the link of religion and crime. This theory is far more grounded and based in scientific facts and takes most its information from scientific studies which make it measurable and objective. Because this theory is so deterministic it increases the likelihood of being able to treat people with abnormal brain structures and abnormalities as could identify these. It also provides us with possible scientific reasons behind people criminal behaviour, such as aggressive criminal acts being linked to a rise in the hormone testosterone. In regard to this theory and it’s negatives it’s extremely nomothetic, meaning it takes theories about disorders and biology and generalises them to apply to everyone. It doesn’t take into account individual characteristics. An example of this is that some people may have a higher level of testosterone but relieve it in positive ways so they do not commit crime. Another issue is the potential impact on public policy. If biological theories and studies are conducted and produce credible information concerning a certain biological trait for criminality, there would be a need for legislation. For example, if it was found that all criminals have ‘gene X’ then society would want laws to be put in place for protection against ‘gene X’ carriers. Data obtained from biological crime studies can be interpreted, furthering the ‘gene X’ example, whilst all criminals may contain this gene not all are criminals, which could lead to unfair treatment of innocent carriers in the criminal justice system due to biases and stereotypes. Even if our biology was solely responsible for criminal behaviour, the bigger question would be how would the criminal justice system handle this in terms of policies and punishment. To an extent there have already been actions taken out to combat this, such as incarceration and sterilisation; in American between 1911 and 1930 over 30 states enacted laws which allowed for the sterilisation of individuals showing antisocial and undesirable traits thought to be genetically transmitted (Jones, 2009) It has also been suggested that people who genetically pose a threat but haven’t committed a crime should be incarcerated as a preventative measure. But there are less extreme forms of intervention, Gary Pugh suggested that primary school children should be placed in a DNA database if their behaviour suggested that they might be criminals later in life. Although we would have to consider the ethics of this and how easy it would be to subjectively categorize what contributed to possible signs of criminal behaviour.

In conclusion, there is evidence to support the biological positivist theory such as Sheldon and Lombroso’s work, which mainly comes from objective scientific study, but there are issues with this due to lack of ecological validity and its application to real world situations. We can theorise as a whole that biological explanations of crime are not completely responsible for criminal activity but do explain some underlying causes that may explain certain actions. More so it is a combination of both biological and sociological explanations that work together to explain why criminal actions transpire. This biological approach has made grounds for different policies to be tested to reduce the rate of crime and has overall influenced the way we see crime and criminal justice in a more scientific way. Word Count: 1,516

Bibliography: Dalton K (1961) Menstruation and Crime. British Medical Journal, 2. Jones, S. (2009) Criminology. 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ministry of Justice (2015) Race and the criminal justice system: 2014. London: Ministry of Justice. Vold, G., Bernard, T. and Snipes, J. (2002) Theoretical Criminology. 5th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Widom, C., Ames, A. (1988) Biology and Female Crime. In T Moffitt and S Mednick (eds) Biological Contributions to Crime Causation. Williams, K. (2012) Textbook on Criminology. 7th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press....