Biological Theories of

crime
By: Suman Bhattamishra
Rashmi Baug
Pallab Das
Theories of crime can broadly be grouped into biological and non-biological
explanations.

Crime and criminal behaviour are as old as human

society itself.
Early theories of crime saw criminals as biologically
different to non criminals. More recent biological
explanations suggest that genes may be partly
responsible for criminal behaviour, while more
modern theories also take into account social and
psychological factors.
Early biological theories: Atavism and
Somatotypes
Early attempts to explain criminal behaviour saw
criminals as differing significantly on a biological level
from non criminals. This could be seen by looking at
facial features or body types.
A: Atavism
Lombroso argued that criminals could be identified by
facial features.
One of the earliest attempts to make a scientific study of
criminal behaviour comes from the work of Cesare Lombroso
(1876). By using measurements from both the heads and faces
of living prisoners, and the skulls of dead criminals he put
forward a theory that criminals differed biologically from
non-criminals. He argued that criminals were not as evolved
as non-criminals, and they were an “evolutionary throwback”
to an earlier stage of evolution. This idea is known as
atavism. He claimed that this caused them to be impulsive
and less able to control their basic urges
For example he argued that criminals had lo
foreheads, shifty eyes and would show a reduced
sensitivity to pain.
For example he said that thieves had flattened noses
but in murderers the nose is “aquiline” like the beak o
a bird. The lips of rapists are fleshy and protruded,
while the lips of “swindlers” (con artists) are thin and
straight.
Evaluation
Lombroso was the first researcher to attempt to study
criminal behaviour in a scientific way. Before him criminal
behaviour had not been studied, and was considered much
more a philosophical or religious issue. It could be argued
that the entire field of criminology owes its foundation to
Lombroso’s work.
However, Goring (1913) attempted to replicate Lombroso’s
findings in a sample of thousands of English prisoners, and
found none of the facial feature identified by Lombroso.
However, although there is little evidence for atavism, Goring
did discover that a common factor amongst criminals tended
to be low intelligence. If (as much modern evidence suggests)
intelligence is caused in part by genes, this might support
Lombroso’s main argument that criminality is genetic.
It could also be argued that in his eagerness to prove his
theory correct, Lombroso may have been biased in his
measurement sn (an investigator effect). The fact that later
research has failed to replicate his findings supports this.
Another issue with this theory is that even if it was found that
there was a relationship between facial characteristics and
criminal behaviour, we cannot then claim that the cause was
atavism. There could be a third factor involved. For example,
people from poor backgrounds are more likely to be criminals,
and are also more likely to have a poor diet. The poor diet may
be the cause of the facia characteristics described by
Lombroso.
B: Somatotypes
Another explanation which links criminal behaviour to
biological factors was put forward by Sheldon (1940). He
argued that somatotypes or body types were linked to
criminal behaviour, and that certain body types were
more likely to lead to criminality. Sheldon argued that all
people can broadly be split into three somatotypes, each
one accompanied with variou personality traits:
1. Endomorph
2. Ectomorph
3. Mesomorph
Endomorphs
Physical characteristics: Endomorphs are soft and fat.
They tend to be overweight, lacking in muscle or tone.
They have wide hips, and fat spread all over their body
including the upper arms and thighs.
However they tend to have slim ankles and wrists.
Personality:
Endomorphs are sociable and relaxed.
Ectomorphs
Physical characteristics: Thin and fragile. Lacking
both in fat and muscle. They have thin shoulders and
narrow hips a thin chest and thin abdomen.
They have thin faces with a high forehead.
Personality: Ectomorphs are fragile people, self
conscious and private. They are emotionally restrained
and thoughtful.
Mesomorph
Physical characteristics: Muscular and hard. They have
board shoulders and narrow waists. Mesomorphs are
muscular, with strong arms and legs. They have very
little body fat.
Personality: Mesomorphs are brave and adventurous,
and enjoy physical activity. They can be aggressive and
domineering, and care little for what people think
about them.
Evaluation
Sheldon carried out research into body types and
delinquency, and found that there was a highe
percentage of mesomorphs in delinquent populations
than non-delinquent. Other studies have replicated this
finding.
Sheldon argued that it was the somatotypes that caused
the criminal behaviour. The strong athletic build of the
mesomorphs allows them to achieve a position of
dominance from a young age, and this assertive and
domineering personality leads to criminal behaviour in
later life.
However, it may be that people who are prone to criminality
end up becoming mesomorphs. Someone who engages in
criminal behaviour may pay more attention to their body, for
example going to the gym to deliberately gain muscle mass. It
could similarly be that a criminal lifestyle leads to more
muscle, in particular needing to maintain athleticism to evade
capture by the police.
Another factor could be testosterone levels . Dabbs et al (1995)
found higher testosterone levels in male prisoners who had
been convicted of various violent crimes. High levels of
testosterone are also linked to muscle growth and strength,
the key characteristics of mesomorphy.
Another possible factor could be labelling. Mesomorph
individual may be labelled as troublemaker early in life;
due not to their personality or behaviour, but simply
because of their size and muscle mass. This label may
influence the young person, and in effect becoming a
self fulfillin prophecy.
Sheldon’s theory does not take into account that people’s
somatotype is not fixed. People’s bodies change
throughout their lives, and an individual may be all three
types at some point in their lives. Sheldon does not detail
whether thi would lead to changes in criminal behaviour.
Contemporary Biological Explanations
While the theories of atavism and somatotypes are
largely discredited, modern psychologists still
investigate biological causes of crime. Two theories are
that crime may be caused by genes, or that there is a
criminal personality type that is inherited.

A: Genes
B: Criminal Personality
A: Genes
Osborn and West (1979) investigated the rates of criminal records
in families. They found that 13% of sons who had non-criminal
fathers had criminal records; for sons who had fathers with
criminal records, this rate was 20%. This evidence seems to
suggest that there may be a genetic link.
 Similarly, Farrington (2002) found evidence for a genetic link by
examining three generations of relatives, including grandparents,
aunts, uncles and cousins. They found that if one relative had
been arrested, there was a higher probability that another relative
had also been arrested. However, similarly to Osborn and West,
the most important relative was the father; if the father had been
arrested, there was a high chance of sons being arrested too.
A meta-analysis of twin studies conducted b
Ishikawa and Raine (2002) found a concordance rate
for criminality of 44% for identical twins, and 21.6%
for non-identical twins, providing further support for a
genetic explanation, as identical twins have identical
genes.
This makes genetic sense as a child shares 50% of their
genes with their father, yet only 25% with grandparents,
aunts and uncles, and 12.5% with cousins. Therefore, we
would expect there to be more similarity between people
who are more closely genetically linked.
Environment effect
However, a big issue in making this assumption is that we
cannot completely discount the effect of the environment.
Not only do fathers and sons share genes, they also share an
environment. It may be that the shared environment causes
the similarities in criminal behaviour. It might be that having
a criminal father may lead to other factors (poverty, poor
education) that could lead to crime. A further finding from
Farrington was that having a young mother and living in a
bad neighbourhood added to the probability of fathers and
sons being arrested. This again confuses the issue of genes
and environment. All of these possible explanations make it
difficult to isolate and measure the effect of genes.
One way to overcome the issue of shared genes and
environment is to use adoption studies. This is when
we compare adopted children to both their birth
parents and their adoptive parents. If children are
more similar to their birth parents, a genetic
explanation is likely, whereas if they are more like their
adopted parents, it is likely due to environmental
factors.
If criminality is genetic, we should be able to identify
the genes responsible. It has been suggested that there
is a link between one variant of the 5-HTTLPR gene
and violent behaviour (Retz et al, 2004). Another study
suggests that there may be a link between the NOS1
gene and impulsivity (Reif et al, 2009)
Both impulsivity and violence are key factors in many
crimes.
Evaluation
Genetics cannot provide a full explanation of criminal
behaviour.
If crime was purely genetic, then there would be a
100% concordance rate between identical twins.
B: Criminal Personality
A final biological theory is that there exists a criminal
personality, which is psychological in nature, but that
develops due to biological factors. This theory was put
forward by Eysenck (1970).
He argues that criminals inherit a type of nervous
system that affects their ability to learn and adapt to
their environment. This nervous system causes the
individual to develop a criminal personality.
The theory goes like this:
We learn through experience to avoid punishment and
to seek out rewards. When we are punished for
wrongdoing, we will eventually stop doing the wrong
thing to avoid the punishment.
How quickly you learn through punishment is
determined by your nervous system. Most people have
a nervous system that learns quickly. However, some
people possess nervous systems that are resistant to
conditioning.
Eysenck argued that personality is made up of two factors,
introversion/extraversion an neuroticism/stability. The
criminal personality is one that is extraverted and neurotic, as
well as showing signs of psychoticism.
Extraverts are outgoing, sociable and stimulation seeking. They
take risks and tend to be thrill seekers. Eysenck argues that this
comes about through inheriting an under aroused nervous
system that needs constant stimulation to maintain the
optimum level of arousal.
Criminals also show signs of neuroticism. This means
characteristics of anxiety and emotional instability.
Psychotic personality types are cold, aggressive and hostile.
Eysenck argues that extraverts and neurotic personality types do not
condition well. They do not learn society’s rules and norm easily as they
do not respond to punishment.
There is some evidence to suggest that criminals differ in terms of
personality from non-criminal populations. McGurk and McDougall
(1981) used a personality test on two groups of students who had been
categorised as either delinquent or non-delinquent. They found that
there was a cluster of students in the delinquent group who showed high
levels of neuroticism and extraversion, and a sub group who showed
extraversion, neuroticism and psychoticism. There was no such pattern in
the non-delinquent group. However, it should be noted that this study
has a large sample bias; all the participants were students and
therefore well educated and of a similar age. This may raise
generalisability issues.
However, just because there is a relationship between the two
factors, we cannot be certain that it was the personality type that led
to the criminal behaviour. It is just as likely that being in prison
could cause higher rates of neuroticism and psychoticism due to the
high level of stress and anxiety the prison environment can cause.
This issue of cause and effect is a problem for Eysenck’s theory as a
whole. He argues that the personality causes the criminal behaviour.
However, the personality might be caused by being a criminal.
The theory also assumes that personality is constant and
unchanging. As personality is often in flux, does that mean that our
likelihood of engaging in criminal behaviour can also change?
Part 3: Overall Evaluation of Biological
Explanations of Crime
What is crime?
While these theories all go some way to explainin some of the
possible causes of crime, what is actually considered to be a crime
may differ according to individual difference as well as differences
betwee cultures and time periods. For example, a parent who beats
their child would be prosecuted in the UK for child abuse, whereas
such behaviour used to be legal and socially acceptable.
If the definition of crime is fluid, how can we pin down the ultimat
cause for criminal behaviour? If someone would be considered to
be a criminal in one country, but not in another, does it make
sense to look to biology to explain their criminal behaviour? For
example, someone caught smoking cannabis in the UK may face
prosecution, yet the same action would be legal in California. Is
that person a criminal?
Social constructionists would argue that crime and
criminality could are bound by culture, and therefore there
is no objective truth that can explain the cause of crime. The
best that we can do is to investigate the causes of crime within the
context or culture in which it occurs, and accept that universal
laws (such as biological explanations) do not exist.
However, others would argue that there are some universal crimes
which all cultures acknowledge as illegal e.g. murder and theft. It
may be more appropriate to use biological explanations for these
types of universal crimes rather than for behaviour that may or
may not be considered criminal depending on which country you
are in.
Determinism and Free will
Are you free to choose your own behaviour, or is
your behaviour determined by forces beyond your
control?
An issue with all of the theories presented here is that they raise
ethical issues in terms of free will. If criminal behaviour can be
explained by your facial characteristics, your body type, your
genes or your personality, can we ethically punish someone for
their crimes? If the cause of their criminal behaviour is a
biological factor that is beyond their control, can we hold an
individual responsible for their actions? Our legal system is
based on the idea of free will; we assume that an individual is
free to act as they choose, and so we can punish them for their
actions. However, all of the biological theories suggest that the
cause of crime may be more deterministic in nature. If this is
true, we may need to rethink our legal system.
A related point is that if the cause of crime is biological,
we should be able to predict who will become a criminal.
This may raise the ethical issue of whether it would be
right to take preventative action. Could we pre-
emptively lock away people who have the gene for
criminal behaviour? This might be an extreme example;
a more realistic issue would be whether or not
someone’s biology could be used as evidence against
them. For example, if you have a defendant in court for
violent behaviour, could the prosecution use the fact
that he carries a particular gene as evidence of guilt?
On the other hand, being able to predict which people are
more predisposed to criminal behaviour may allow us to
put measures in place to prevent the individual from
turning to crime. For example, if a child had the gene for
criminality, perhaps extra lessons in emotion management
and social interaction could be implemented to reduce the
risk. However, on the other hand, someone who knows that
they have a gene for criminality or the criminal personality
may feel helpless to change their fate. They may feel that
they have no free will, and so end up becoming criminals in
a self-fulfilling prophecy.
SAMPLE BIAS
It could be argued that these theories have a gender
bias. A lot of the research has focused solely on men,
and theories have either ignored women, or applied
the same theories to them as to men. There has been
little attempt to investigate criminality in women, and
it may not be appropriate to assume that the reasons
women become criminals is the same as men. Theories
of crime therefore could be falling for a beta bias.
D: Reductionism
A final issue that could apply to each of the theories here is that of
reductionism. It could be argued that each theory provides a
limited explanation of the cause of crime. Crime is complicated, and
given the variety of different types of crime, it is unlikely that one theory
will have the explanatory power to account for every type criminal act.
This is a particular issue with biological theories that ignore the role of
society and culture. In biological theories, all individuals are assessed
equally, with no regard for socioeconomic background or education
level. Are the reasons that a poorly educated, unemployed person
becomes a criminal going to be same as for a well educate wealthy
businessman?
An ethical issue arising from this is that by placing the blame for
criminal behaviour on biological factors, it absolves society and the
government from any responsibility. As poverty and poor education have
been linked to crime, by only looking a biological explanations we may
be ignoring the wider issues.
Crime- Defined
Blackstone defined crime as “an act committed or omitted in
violation of public law forbidding or commanding it”.
John Austin defines crime “a wrong which is pursued by the
sovereignor his subordinates is a crime.”
According to Miller, a crime means “the commission or
omission of an act which the law forbids or commands under
pain of a punishment to be imposed by the State by a proceeding
in its own name”.
Thus it is clear that a crime is what the state through an
enactment of the legislature has declared punishable. Thus,
there can be no crime if the legislature has not made law in this
regard.
Nulla Poena Sine Lege or Nulla Crimen sine lege-
Nothing is punishable without legislation.
This rule is called as principle of legality.
Criminal Law has been defined by Sutherland and
Cressy as ‘ conventionally a body of specific rules
regarding human conduct which have been
promulgated by political authority which apply
uniformly to all members of the class to which the
rules refer and which are enforced by punishment
administered by the state”.