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Introduction
The media has been focusing a lot of youth crime, which appears me to be on the rise. To explore this I have chosen to do research on this and focus on my main question, “What causes a youth to engage in criminal activity?” the main focus of this essay will be on the background of crime and how youth crime has changed, the major factors of what causes youth to engage in criminal activity, media use and perceptions.
Throughout this report a variety of major issues will be discussed, including gender and age, association with antisocial/delinquent peers, family Issues, XYY chromosome, and media/people(s) perceptions. The research indicates that theses are the most influential factors leading to youth engaging in criminal activity. Some other major issues that I haven’t spoken about through this topic are low socioeconomic status, low academic/vocational achievement, truancy throughout schooling, unemployment and boredom.
Background information
In order to answer my question I need to undergo research to comprehend the concept of criminology and to determine how long this area of interest has been studied to ensure any conclusions made are valid. Mikaela Murray (Law Student) (2014) states “criminology is the scientific procedure of studying both sociological and individual criminal actions.” Clifford Sanders also agrees criminology is the study of both social and individual criminal actions but he believes it is divided into separate areas which including psychology economics, political science, natural science, biology and the evaluation and development of people.
The study of criminology involves three different phases. Criminals and crime have been around for as long as societies have existed; the systematic stu...
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...why youth engage in criminal activity Research suggests delinquent peers are a proximate cause than family/parental; family/parental may only be a slight cause of involvement in crime. Some research suggests that criminal propensities can be inherited through genes. Unfortunately, the media portrayals of crime aren’t a true representative of the actual crime trends, or accurately reflecting the level of crime perpetrated by youth. There are many different variables that could cause youth to engage in criminal activity, some of these major variables have been discussed throughout this essay.
There is no distinctive answer for “What causes youth to engage in criminal activity?” this is due to the fact that each individual person lives differently to one another and each situation they live through is different, therefore everyone’s circumstances are never the same.
From 1990 to to the present there has been a sharp increase in juvenile crime across the United States. From 1996 to the present there has been a slight decline from the statistics in 1995(OJJDP). What was the cause for this uprise in juvenile delinquincy? I will discuss 2 different theories to why there was such an increase in juvenile crime rates. I will analyze the rise of the "Gangsta-Rap" culture in the early 1990's and how it may have affected teenagers that are in lower-income families. Many people believe that the increase in real life violence on television is a cause for violence in juveniles. I will discuss the evidence for this theory. It seems to me that the best theory to explain the rise in juvenile crime is the social constructionist theory. Different sub-cultures of teens have higher crime rates than others because of their interests, whether it be the music that they listen to or the types of television programs that they watched as child.
This paper looks at the different theories of criminal behavior that explain why people commit crimes. It goes deeper to analyze the specific theories in a bid to determine why a person may commit a certain crime and another person under the same circumstances may not. The paper focuses on key factors that motivate unruly behavior among people and why such factors are present in some people and not in others. In doing so, the paper leans more on children in order to determine how delinquency behavior is progressively imparted on them as they undergo developmental trajectory.
Not only is criminal justice used to prepare college students, but the study of criminal justice as a scientific discipline, known as criminology is used to make policies. Criminology is used to study crimes and the impacts that they have on society by using the scientific method to research crime control policies. According to Akers, Sellers & Jennings (2017), Several areas that criminology focuses on are the types of crimes committed, the frequency in which crimes are committed, where the crimes occur, and the measures that government takes to react to criminal activities. The research determined through experiments, investigation, and reviews are usually of delinquent youth to determine crime prevention strategies to policies in order to reduce crime during childhood and adulthood. Laws and political stances are largely affected through the criminal justice policies and practices that are implemented through scientific research (Foster,
When the social, educational, financial and health needs of a person are not satisfied through the family then they may be inclined towards criminal activities. There are some other family related factors that affect the behavior of children and they might go for criminal activities. Some of these factors include adaptation of bad parenting practices and styles, neglecting the child, child abuse and trend of criminal behavior in the family which is then learned by the child. It also includes a family history with mental illness, teenage pregnancy, substance use, school dropout and interpersonal conflicts among the family members (Cassel & Bernstein, 2007).
By definition, criminology is the study of crime, criminal behavior and how it pertains to the law. Criminology is considered a scientific technique. Therefore, those who study and carry out its theories are considered scientists. The theories and practices within the subject help criminologists determine the cause and consequence of criminal behavior; also why criminology is so highly regarded among law enforcement and the legal world.
According to Males and Brown article, the primary cause for the youth to get involved in crime is poverty and lack of success. The statistics from California Criminal Justice and Census Poverty for 2010 refers that the lift in economic deprivation and the lack of success or jobs indulge the youth or teenagers more into the life of violent offenses. The news and article exacerbate the rate violent crime and over-represented the young age in violent crime. The peak age for crime means that the young people involved more in crime than older people. The Brown article suggests that the age-crime relationship means that the violent crime rise in young age and then decline with the age. The child who gets involved in crime at an early age becomes the chronic offenders. The teens who have less relationship with their parents, labelled as antisocial by parents, teachers, neighbors and society get more involved in crime.
The three eras that have characterized the field of criminology over the past 100 years are the “Golden Age of Research,” the “Golden Age of Theory,” and an unnamed era that was “’characterized by extensive theory testing of the dominant theories, using largely empirical methods’” (28). The “Golden Age of Research” era spanned from 1900 to 1930 according to John H. Laub. This era is identified as focusing heavily on the collection of data surrounding crime and the criminal. This data was assessed without “any particular ideational framework” (28). The second era, the “Golden Age of Theory,” spanned from 1930 to 1960, also according to Laub. This era is also rather self-explanatory, it is described by the development of theories; however, Laub
Many in the juvenile justice field have tried to understand the cause of juvenile delinquency. There are many different theories describe the cause and effect of variables and how they react. However, through much research, we have concluded there is not just one single path or journey that determines the fate of the juvenile. There are many different risk factors that build in order to increase a youth's chance of becoming an offender. This is kind of like a domino effect. Risk factors are described as the characteristics that present themselves to determine if the individual or youth will become a delinquent. These factors may include; home life, income status, gender, and social. It can either be one or all that play a part in the way the
Every time someone turns on their TV to the news channel, or goes to the news on their phone or computer they see a myriad of crimes that were committed during that week. Crime today is so popular that most of the conversations people start and end with have to do with a certain crime. I decided to do research on why youth crimes are so high today, and what we can do as citizens of this nation to prevent it from happening. So, what causes crime? What leads people to do such heinous things, like brutally murdering someone, stealing, and vandalizing? What causes a human being to act in such barbaric way? Statistics have shown that the leading cause of crime seems to be poverty. Along with poverty it can be said that having violent parents or single parents, and the addiction to violent video games can also lead to crime.
Recognizing the causes of criminal behavior at the individual and community levels and explaining it with various behavioral science methods is the major outcome for this course. During this course students will examine the criminal behavior and the theoretical perspectives that have been developed to explain why and how individuals commit
US: Oxford University Jones, S (2003) Criminology. Great Britain: Cromwell Press. Maguire, M (2002) The Oxford Handbook of Criminology, 3rd Ed. Oxford University Press.
Criminology is the study of crime and criminals; a branch of sociology. More accurately, it is the study of crime as a social trend, and its overall origins, its many manifestations and its impact upon society as a whole. That makes it more a form of sociology than a law enforcement tool. But the trends it studies have a huge impact on the way the police do their jobs, the way society treats its criminals, and the way a given community goes about maintaining law and order. The writer will describe and give examples of the three perspectives of viewing crimes. The perspectives that will be highlighted are the consensus view, the conflict view or the interactionist view. Each perspective maintain its own interpretation of what constitutes criminal activities and what causes people to engage in criminal behaviors (Siegel, p.12).
Brutal, harsh, unforgiving, and relentless . . . the worst effect of poverty is not a tangible dirtiness, but a corruption of one’s very soul. Juvenile delinquency has always been a huge problem, but it has been especially evident in recent years as the juvenile crime rate increased exponentially to more than 1.3 million delinquency cases in just 2010. In 1999, the American public ranked crime as the most important problem facing the nation("Juveniles"). In 1994 there were only 78 youth court programs in operation, whereas in 2010 there were over 1,050 youth courts in operation ("Youth Courts"). The causes of juvenile delinquency are both economic and social. Some specific examples of these factors are bad housing, broken homes, parental negligence, boy and girl gangs, and other harsh neighborhood conditions. While social influences undeniably contribute to juvenile delinquency, it is the economic circumstances that contribute most to continued delinquent behavior amongst juveniles who are in consistent trouble with the law. Current solutions are either skill-based without appropriate support or highly punitive in nature; available resources would be better spent addressing the fundamental economic disparity of communities which primarily causes most of these problems.
Criminology is a social science rather than a branch of law. Although there are several different theories surrounding criminology, they all share a common goal: the search for the causes of criminal behavior in the hopes that this information can be transformed into policies that will be effective in handling or even eliminating crime.
In contrast to crime science’s concentration on finding the right answers to cease crimes against humanity, criminology emphasizes on the significance of investigating both crimes and criminals independently. If criminology is perceived to interpret crimes, then, criminal science is designated to fix