2 Criminology, Deviance and Crime · 2.1 Criminology, deviance and crime
2.1.3 Biological and psychological theories of crime
Biological and psychological theories look for the cause of crime inside the offender: in body build, heredity or the brain (Lombroso and his successors) or in the mind and personality (Freud, Eysenck); they began with the positive (Italian) school of Lombroso, Ferri and Garofalo, which replaced free will with determinism and punishment with treatment and social defence.
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Core facts
- Positive / Italian school (late 19th century): the "holy three" Lombroso, Ferri, Garofalo. Opposed the classical school (Beccaria 1764, Bentham), which assumed free will and fixed punishment to the crime. Positivists studied the criminal, not the crime, by scientific method.
- Cesare Lombroso (1835–1909), Italian army doctor and psychiatrist: "father of modern criminology", founder of the positive school.
- Book: *L'uomo delinquente* (The Criminal Man), 1876.
- Atavism: the born criminal is a throwback to an earlier, savage stage of evolution.
- Stigmata: physical marks of the born criminal (sloping forehead, large jaw, long arms, handle-shaped ears, insensitivity to pain, tattoos).
- Types: born criminal, insane criminal, criminaloid (occasional; no physical marks), criminal by passion.
- Later editions gave more weight to social causes; wrote The Female Offender (1893) with Guglielmo Ferrero.
- Enrico Ferri (1856–1929), Lombroso's pupil, lawyer and politician:
- Book: *Criminal Sociology* (Sociologia criminale, 1884).
- Three groups of causes: anthropological (individual), physical (climate, season, geography), social (population, economy, family).
- Law of criminal saturation: a society, like a chemical solution at a given temperature, has a fixed amount of crime set by its conditions.
- Rejected free will; responsibility is social, not moral. Five types: born, insane, habitual, occasional, passional.
- Raffaele Garofalo (1851–1934), magistrate: book *Criminologia* (1885); credited with popularising the word "criminology" (the French criminologie of Topinard, 1879, is earlier).
- Natural crime: an act that offends the basic moral sentiments of pity and probity found in every civilised society.
- Criminals have a moral (psychic) anomaly; stressed temibilità (dangerousness) and elimination for the incorrigible.
- Charles Goring (1870–1919), English prison doctor: *The English Convict* (1913). Compared about 3,000 convicts with non-criminals (students, soldiers, hospital patients) using Karl Pearson's statistics: no distinct physical criminal type; refuted Lombroso, but found convicts shorter, lighter and of lower intelligence, which he took as inherited.
- Earnest Hooton (1887–1954), Harvard anthropologist: *The American Criminal* (1939). Measured about 14,000 prisoners and about 3,000 civilians; called criminals "organically inferior". Criticised for a weak control group and circular reasoning.
- Body build (constitutional) theories:
- Ernst Kretschmer (Physique and Character, 1921): pyknic (stout), athletic, asthenic / leptosome (thin), dysplastic.
- William Sheldon (Varieties of Delinquent Youth, 1949; 200 Boston youths): somatotypes endomorph (soft, round; relaxed), mesomorph (muscular; active, aggressive), ectomorph (thin, fragile; introverted). Delinquents were mostly mesomorphs.
- Sheldon and Eleanor Glueck (Unraveling Juvenile Delinquency, 1950; 500 delinquents vs 500 non-delinquents): about 60% of delinquents vs about 31% of non-delinquents were mesomorphs.
- Heredity (family) studies:
- Richard Dugdale, *The Jukes* (1877): a New York family with many criminals and paupers.
- Henry Goddard, *The Kallikak Family* (1912): feeblemindedness as the inherited cause of crime.
- Twin and adoption studies: Johannes Lange, *Crime as Destiny* (1929): 10 of 13 identical (MZ) twin pairs vs 2 of 17 fraternal (DZ) pairs both criminal. Karl Christiansen (Denmark, 1970s) and Mednick (Danish adoptees, 1984) found a smaller but real genetic link.
- XYY chromosome ("supermale"): Patricia Jacobs and colleagues, 1965, Scottish state hospital; later studies did not confirm a strong link to violence.
- Forerunners: physiognomy (Lavater, reading character from the face) and phrenology (Franz Joseph Gall and Spurzheim, reading faculties from the skull's bumps).
- Sigmund Freud (1856–1939): personality = id (instincts, pleasure principle), ego (reality principle), superego (conscience). Crime follows when the id is not controlled by a weak ego or superego. Freud's essay (1916) on "criminals from a sense of guilt": some offend to be punished for unconscious guilt.
- August Aichhorn, *Wayward Youth* (1925): latent delinquency; first applied psychoanalysis to delinquents in institutions.
- John Bowlby, *Forty-four Juvenile Thieves* (1944): maternal deprivation in early years produces an "affectionless character".
- Hans Eysenck, *Crime and Personality* (1964): high extraversion, neuroticism and later psychoticism (E, N, P) make a person hard to condition, so conscience forms poorly.
- Psychopathy: Hervey Cleckley, *The Mask of Sanity* (1941); Robert Hare's Psychopathy Checklist (PCL-R). In the DSM it is close to antisocial personality disorder.
- Frustration–aggression hypothesis: Dollard, Doob, Miller and others, 1939.
Explained
1. Classical vs positive school.
| Point | Classical school | Positive school |
|---|---|---|
| Founders | Beccaria (On Crimes and Punishments, 1764), Bentham | Lombroso, Ferri, Garofalo |
| Human action | free will, rational choice | determined by body, mind, society |
| Focus | the crime (act) | the criminal (person) |
| Response | punishment fitted to the crime, deterrence | individualised treatment, social defence |
The positive school is the root of probation, indeterminate sentences, juvenile courts and the case study of the offender, which is why a probation officer studies the person and not only the offence.
2. Lombroso's argument. Examining the skull of the brigand Giuseppe Villella (1870–71), Lombroso found a hollow at the back (the median occipital fossa) that he took as a mark of lower animals. From this he built the idea of the born criminal: a biological throwback (atavism) recognisable by stigmata. In later work he said born criminals are only about a third of offenders; the rest are insane, occasional (criminaloids) or passionate offenders, and he admitted climate, poverty and education as causes too. Criticisms: no proper control group, mixing of insane and criminal subjects, circular definition (offenders define the criminal type).
3. Ferri and Garofalo compared.
| Point | Ferri | Garofalo |
|---|---|---|
| Training | lawyer, socialist MP | judge |
| Key idea | three factors; criminal saturation | natural crime; moral anomaly |
| Stress | social causes (most sociological of the three) | psychological (moral) causes |
| Penal view | social responsibility, preventive "penal substitutes" | elimination or transport of the dangerous |
Ferri's penal substitutes: indirect measures (street lighting, cheap housing, free trade, birth control, lower taxes on food) that remove the conditions of crime. He also drafted the Italian Penal Code project of 1921, based on social defence.
4. From skull to body build. Goring (1913) tested Lombroso statistically and found no criminal type. Hooton (1939) revived the biological view with a huge sample. Sheldon (1949) moved from single marks to whole body type and temperament; the Gluecks (1950) gave the strongest data linking mesomorphy with delinquency. Critics say mesomorphs may be chosen for gangs, or treated as tough by police, so the link may be social.
5. Heredity, twins, adoption.
| Method | Study | Finding |
|---|---|---|
| Family tree | Dugdale, Jukes (1877); Goddard, Kallikaks (1912) | crime and "feeblemindedness" run in families |
| Twins | Lange (1929); Christiansen (1977) | higher concordance for MZ than DZ twins |
| Adoption | Mednick, Gabrielli, Hutchings (1984) | adoptees' crime closer to biological than to adoptive parents (property crime) |
| Chromosomes | Jacobs (1965), XYY | not confirmed as a cause of violence |
Family studies cannot separate heredity from environment; twin and adoption studies try to. Modern biosocial criminology speaks of genes interacting with environment, not of a born criminal.
6. Other biological lines.
- Endocrine / glandular: Schlapp and Smith, The New Criminology (1928): glandular imbalance and emotional disturbance.
- Neurophysiology: brain injury, abnormal EEG, low arousal (offenders seek stimulation).
- Biochemical: diet, hypoglycaemia, premenstrual syndrome, testosterone, low serotonin, lead exposure.
7. Psychoanalytic explanations.
| Thinker | Idea |
|---|---|
| Freud | weak ego/superego cannot check the id; some offend from unconscious guilt |
| Aichhorn (1925) | latent delinquency: a child left with unchecked impulses; treatment by a warm, permissive home |
| Bowlby (1944) | separation from the mother before age 5 gives an affectionless character (14 of his 44 thieves) |
| Healy and Bronner (New Light on Delinquency, 1936) | delinquency meets emotional needs not met at home |
Psychoanalysis is criticised as untestable, but it shaped case work with offenders and the child-guidance clinic movement.
8. Personality and intelligence.
- Eysenck: conscience is a set of conditioned fear responses; extraverts condition poorly, so they break rules more. Scales: EPQ.
- MMPI (Hathaway and McKinley, 1940s): its scale 4, psychopathic deviate, separates delinquents best.
- Psychopath: superficial charm, no guilt or empathy, impulsive, lies, does not learn from punishment (Cleckley's list; Hare's 20-item PCL-R).
- Intelligence: Goddard blamed feeblemindedness; Goring found low intelligence; later IQ tests on army recruits weakened the claim. Hirschi and Hindelang (1977) said IQ works through school failure.
- Social learning / modelling (Bandura's Bobo doll studies, 1961) links psychology with the sociological theories in CR-CB-04.
Common traps
- ✗ "Lombroso founded the classical school." ✓ Lombroso founded the positive school; the classical school is Beccaria and Bentham.
- ✗ "Lombroso wrote Criminal Sociology." ✓ Lombroso wrote *The Criminal Man* (1876); Ferri wrote Criminal Sociology (1884).
- ✗ "Garofalo gave the law of criminal saturation." ✓ Ferri; Garofalo gave natural crime and the book Criminologia (1885).
- ✗ "Goring confirmed Lombroso's criminal type." ✓ Goring (1913) refuted a physical type, but stressed low intelligence.
- ✗ "Hooton studied twins." ✓ Hooton measured prisoners' bodies (1939); the twin study is Lange's Crime as Destiny (1929).
- ✗ "Ectomorphs are the delinquent type." ✓ Sheldon and the Gluecks found mesomorphs over-represented.
- ✗ "Pyknic, athletic, asthenic: Sheldon." ✓ That is Kretschmer (1921); Sheldon's are endo-, meso-, ectomorph.
- ✗ "The Jukes: Goddard." ✓ Jukes = Dugdale (1877); Kallikaks = Goddard (1912).
- ✗ "Freud: crime comes from too strong a superego only." ✓ Mainly from a weak ego or superego; a harsh superego explains the special case of crime from a sense of guilt.
- ✗ "Maternal deprivation: Aichhorn." ✓ Bowlby; Aichhorn wrote Wayward Youth (latent delinquency).
Quick revision
- Positive school: Lombroso, Ferri, Garofalo; determinism, study the criminal.
- Lombroso: Criminal Man 1876, atavism, stigmata, born criminal, criminaloid.
- Ferri: Criminal Sociology 1884, three factors, law of criminal saturation, penal substitutes.
- Garofalo: Criminologia 1885, natural crime (pity, probity), dangerousness.
- Goring: English Convict 1913, no criminal type. Hooton: American Criminal 1939, organic inferiority.
- Kretschmer: pyknic, athletic, asthenic. Sheldon: endo, meso, ecto; mesomorph delinquent.
- Gluecks 1950: 500 vs 500, mesomorphs 60% vs 31%.
- Dugdale Jukes 1877; Goddard Kallikaks 1912; Lange twins 1929; Jacobs XYY 1965.
- Freud id/ego/superego, guilt; Aichhorn Wayward Youth; Bowlby 44 thieves, maternal deprivation.
- Eysenck: E, N, P, poor conditioning; Cleckley Mask of Sanity; Hare PCL-R.
Go deeper: Deeper (beyond what APPSC Paper I usually asks)
Deeper Advanced
Why the positive school matters for correctional work. Ferri's idea that the response should fit the offender's dangerousness and needs, not only the offence, led to classification of prisoners, indeterminate sentences, juvenile justice and probation with a pre-sentence report. The Probation of Offenders Act, 1958 asks the court to weigh the circumstances of the case and the character of the offender (CrPC 360, now BNSS 401, adds age and antecedents): an individualised, positivist question.
Neo-classical correction. Pure classicism treated a child and an adult the same; pure positivism risked locking people up for what they might do. The neo-classical school (French penal reforms of the early 19th century, e.g. the 1832 revision) kept free will but admitted mitigating circumstances (age, insanity). Modern law is a mix: guilt fixed classically, sentence individualised positively.
Lombroso's lasting legacy. His theory is rejected, but he moved criminology from philosophy to measurement, and his tables of tattoos, slang and handwriting began the case-study method.
Example 1. The law of criminal saturation was given by: (a) Lombroso (b) Ferri (c) Garofalo (d) Goring Solution. Ferri compared society to a saturated solution. Answer: (b)
Example 2. "Natural crime" violates the sentiments of: (a) pity and probity (b) honour and shame (c) justice and duty (d) love and fear Solution. Garofalo's two universal sentiments. Answer: (a)
Example 3. Which body type did Sheldon link with delinquency? Solution. The muscular, active mesomorph. Answer: mesomorph
Practise this topic. Questions on Theories of crime: biological, psychological and sociological, with answers explained.
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