Exam 4: Theories of Causation

______ results from competition for power among many groups.

Policies stressing neighborhood improvement, better education, and job opportunities are based on ______ theories.

The ______ theory involves the notion that before people commit crimes, they rationally consider the risks and rewards.

Scientific theory requires only empirical evidence based upon conceptual schemes.

______ theories of delinquency were initially based on the assumption that delinquency (criminality) is inherited.

Assessing the state of criminological theory toward the end of the 20th century, Bernard (1990) concluded that much progress had been made during the prior 20 years in weeding out theories that cannot be supported or in verifying other theories.

Boisvert, Wright, Knopik, and Vaske (2012, p. 477) noted that low ______ has emerged as a consistent and strong predictor of antisocial and delinquent behaviors.

A ______ may be defined as a set of two or more related, empirically testable assertions.

A testable assertion or proposition is simply a statement of a relationship between two or more variables.

Anomie theory refers to a breakdown of social norms or the dissociation of the individual from a general sense of morality of the times.

All policy and practice in juvenile justice is shaped, intentionally or not, by ______.

Early varieties of ______ theories of delinquency and crime focused on lack of intelligence and/or personality disturbances as major causal factors.

If a trend with respect to theories of juvenile delinquency can be identified, it would appear to be an emphasis on ______ theories based on the recognition that one-dimensional theories are unlikely to provide explanations for a wide range of delinquent behaviors observed.

Recognize and discuss the importance of the relationship between theory and practice.

Chambliss posited that the focus of conflict theories was on the whole political and economic systems as well as class relations within those systems.

Chesney-Lind argued that analysis of the data indicated that changes in arrests of girls for certain violent offences reflected changes in the policing of girls' aggression (including the arrest of girls for minor forms of family violence) rather than actual changes in their ______.

Discuss the strengths and weaknesses of theories under the classical school.

______ theories represent the combining of two or more theories in an attempt to get the theory closer to practice.

A theory must be logically correct and must accurately describe events in the real world.

The ______ approach to explaining crime and delinquency developed during the 1930s and 1940s focuses on the geographical distribution of delinquency.