Psychological Theories of Crime

Abstract

Scholars in the fields of psychology and criminology study human behavior. Specifically, criminologists attempt to explain delinquency in childhood and law‐breaking behavior in adulthood. Certain domains of psychology seek explanations for pathology and externalizing problems that lead to diagnoses of conduct disorder and oppositional defiant disorder in childhood and antisocial personality disorder in adulthood. In fact, the onset of externalizing problems in childhood is implicated in offending behavior in adulthood. The common relationship between psychological and criminological explanations for problem behavior is that the objective is to explain delinquency and criminal conduct, that is, behavior that is incongruent with social standards. While both psychology and criminology strive to identify and elucidate the causal factors that lead to delinquency and offending behavior, the theoretical and empirical approaches are substantively distinguishable. This entry discusses the role of self‐control, self‐regulation, and the dual systems model in the etiology of antisocial behavior.