Explanations for Criminal Behavior

What makes a criminal tick? Desperadoes from Jesse James, to John Dillinger and their modern day brethren have offered varying answers to this question, which has preoccupied police agencies, sociologists and mental health professionals--among others--for as long as man's recorded history. Whether criminals are born or made is an argument that has raged through all levels of society, but a look at the historical record reveals some surprising answers--not all of them favoring one perspective over another.

History

The earliest explanations for crime assumed that inherited factors were to blame. Phrenologists held that specific areas of the skull produced the antisocial traits associated with criminality, such as aggression or hostility. The most dramatic use of phrenology occurred at Ruth Snyder's 1927 murder trial, where, unsurprisingly, an expert swore that the defendant's facial features fitted the profile of someone who murdered her husband. The atavist school of Italian criminologist Cesar Lambroso linked unflattering physical characteristics--such as receding hairlines or wrinkled foreheads--to a predisposition for crime or insanity. Other social scientists, such as Henry Goddard, offered studies purporting a genetic tendency toward criminal behavior in certain families over generations. This reasoning was later exposed as unsound, if not racist. However, hereditary explanations for criminal behavior refused to die and even formed the basis of U.S. immigration quotas during the 1920s.

Time Frame

The backlash against the inadequacies of methods used by men like Lambroso, who based his observations on autopsies of convicted criminals, did not stop others from trying to quantify criminal behavior in purely physical terms. For example, during the 1940s, sociologist William Sheldon sought to categorize offenders by body types. In other cases, police groped toward a more straightforward explanation for an especially terrible act of carnage--such as the 18 victims Charles Whitman claimed during his August 1966 shooting rampage. An autopsy showed that Whitman did indeed have a severe brain tumor, but its link with his crimes remained elusive. Abnormal chromosomal patterns enjoyed a brief vogue following Richard Speck's rape and murder of eight nurses in 1966. However, Speck did not have an extra chromosome, and this theory quickly fell out of favor.

Features

Dissatisfied with the physical explanations, other sociologists suggested that criminal behavior resulted from a combination of natural forces and societal pressures. This notion gained ground during the 1920s and 1930s, when social inequities widened dramatically, leading to an explosion of lawlessness not witnessed since the turn of the Civil War. To the so-called "Chicago School," bandits such as Alvin Karpis, Clyde Barrow and John Dillinger were rebelling against unjust social forces that had ground them down to poverty. But this reasoning obscured some inconvenient truths--for example, Dillinger's father owned a grocery, theoretically easing his notorious offspring's need to steal.

Effects

Popular media came under scrutiny during the 1950s as an explanation for concerns about a rise in juvenile delinquency. In his book, "Seduction of the Innocent" (1954), psychiatrist Frederic Wertham examined what he saw as unwholesome elements in horror and superhero comics, while throughout the South, segregationist groups like the White Citizens Council campaigned against the emerging rock 'n' roll scene. During the 1960s and 1970s, social critics assailed violence in movies such as "Bonnie & Clyde," and "The Wild Bunch," which they considered a significant factor in modeling young offenders' future behavior patterns. Despite periodic tinkering with America's movie rating system, the concerns have not abated to this day. The body count racked up by serial murders such as Edmund Kemper, Charles Manson and others raised new concerns about the role of mental illness and whether it could be used as a viable defense within the courtroom.

Considerations

The political dimensions behind varying explanations for crime should never be overlooked, because they inevitably find their way into public policy. Thus, the more liberalized climate of the 1970s--one that allowed greater educational opportunities, conjugal visits and even weekend furloughs to convicted murders--gave way to the newly conservative 1980s and its rollback of privileges for all but the most freshly minted offenders. The role of poverty in causing crime remains as bitterly debated as ever, as does the degree of societal pressure in driving antisocial behavior. Attitudes about wealthy defendants have also undergone a sea change following the 2007-08 economic meltdowns that cost many Americans their home values and life savings. Nearly a century after the first formal attempts to explain criminal behavior began, a consensus seems farther away than ever.

Resources

• Bad To The Bone
• The Charles Whitman Archives: Austin Police Department
• Frederic Wertham: Anti-Comics Crusader Who Turned Advocate