Walter Reckless Containment Theory

All criminological theories make an assumption of human behavior whether it is inherent or developed. Control theories follow that people are inherently self-interested and must be constrained by mechanisms of social control or they will engage in deviance. One social control theory that had been largely ignored by scholars is containment theory. Developed by Walter Reckless over a series of research papers, containment theory follows that individuals are either pushed or pulled into crime. To avoid such pushes and pulls, an inner and outer element buffer individuals from criminal behavior. The inner containment entails an individual’s personality characteristics, beliefs about crime, and

level of self-control while the outer containment

entail the mechanisms of social control that restrain individual’s criminal behavior (e.g., parents, teachers, or legal restraints).