Michael Gottfredson And Travis Hirschi: General Theory Of Crime

Olivia Mathis

November 20, 2017

Professor Maksuta

General Theory of Crime

General theory of crime, a developmental theory introduced by Michael Gottfredson and Travis Hirschi that links self-control and impulsivity to crime.

This theory is based on that if a person lacks self-control they are more likely to commit a crime than a person with high self-control. This is because one who lacks self-control tends to be more impulsive, insensitive, adventurous, active, self-centered, and are more of the “in the moment” type. While they are usually unstable and incapable of keeping healthy relationships this gives them no sort of shame about how they act and since it’s only them they don’t really care about the consequences after. These acts

They traced it back to if the parents didn’t have a good relationship with their children or didn’t discipline them when they should be and this can start at a very young age. For example, in Australia there was a story released about a 7 year old boy who had taken reptiles out of a Reptile Center and fed them all to one of the zoos crocodiles while years before that his brother had vandalized the zoo. This shows that the parents did not discipline well since the younger brother had no fear of consequences after seeing how the older brother was handled, it also shows that the parents were not paying attention to the fact that their child had disappeared for a period of time. If a child grows up in this type of environment and begins to have these impulsive behaviors their kids will end up experiencing the same thing and this will just keep the cycle going. The GTC suggests that it will only get worse from the childhood

This is not entirely true; a person can grow up and mature or find a new outlet instead of deviance. One can learn how to control their impulsive behavior and have more control over themselves. A change in environment can change a person, in a good or bad way. A criminologist named Gregory Zimmerman found out that in poverty ridden areas where everyone is committing crime people have more of a “nothing to lose” sort of feeling about their actions meaning that this is more of a product of the environment than a self-control