Criminal Behavior Key Terms Chapter 4

Front 1

Behaviorism

Back 1

a perspective that focuses on observable, measurable behavior and argues that the social environment and learning are the key determinants of human behavior

Front 2

Cognitive learning

Back 2

the formation and development of mental concepts, schemas, theories, attitudes, beliefs, and other mental versions of the world

Front 3

Cognitive Processes

Back 3

internal mental processes that enable humans to imagine, gain knowledge, reason, and evaluate information

Front 4

Crimes of obedience

Back 4

illegal acts that are committed under the order of someone in authority

Front 5

Differential association

Back 5

a theory of deviance developed by Ronald Akers that combines Skinner’s behaviorism and Sutherland’s differential association theory. The theory states that people learn deviant behavior through the reinforcements they receive from the social environment

Front 6

Dependent variable

Back 6

the variable that is measured to see how it is changed by manipulations of the independent variable

Front 7

Deindividuation

Back 7

a process by which individuals feel they cannot be identified, primarily because they are disguised or are subsumed within a group

Front 8

Discriminative stimuli

Back 8

according to Akers, social signals or gestures transmitted by subcultural or peer groups to indicate whether certain kinds of behavior will be rewarded or punished within a particular social context

Front 9

Expectancy Theory

Back 9

a theory of motivation that takes into account both the expectancy of achieving a particular goal and the value placed on it

Front 10

Extinction

Back 10

the decline and eventual disappearance of a conditioned or learned response when it is no longer reinforced

Front 11

Frustration

Back 11

an aversive internal state of arousal that occurs when one is prevented from responding in a way that previously produced rewards (or that one believes would produce rewards).

Front 12

Fundamental attribution error

Back 12

a tendency to underestimate the importance of situational determinates and to overestimate the importance of personality or dispositional factors in identifying the causes of human behavior

Front 13

Independent variable

Back 13

the measure whose effect is being studied, and, in most scientific investigations, that is manipulated by the experimenter in a controlled fashion

Front 14

Individual Offender

Back 14

a person who consistently violates the law because of a series of frustrations and disappointments and/or as a matter of personal choice

Front 15

Instrumental learning

Back 15

a form of learning in which a voluntary response is strengthened or diminished by its consequences. Also called operant conditioning.

Front 16

Models

Back 16

individuals or groups of individuals in the environment whose behavior is observed and imitated

Front 17

Moral disengagement

Back 17

the process of freeing oneself from one’s own moral standards in order to act against those standards. The unacceptable conduct is usually undertaken under orders from someone higher in authority or under high social pressure.

Front 18

Observational learning

Back 18

the process by which individuals learn patterns of behavior by observing another person performing the action

Front 19

Punishment

Back 19

an event by which a person receives a noxious, painful, or aversive stimulus, usually as a consequence of behavior

Front 20

Reductionism

Back 20

a research approach that argues that in order to understand highly complex events or phenomenon, one must start examining the simplest parts first

Front 21

Reinforcement

Back 21

(Negative) the reward received for avoiding a painful or aversive condition, or stimuli; (Positive) the acquisition of something desired as a result of one’s behavior

Front 22

Self-serving biases

Back 22

a tendency to attribute positive things that happen to us to our abilities and personalities, and to attribute negative events to some cause outside ourselves or beyond our control

Front 23

Situationism

Back 23

a theoretical perspective that argues that environmental stimuli control behavior

Front 24

Social learning theory

Back 24

a theory of human behavior based on learning from watching others in the social environment. This leads to an individual’s development of his or her own perceptions, thoughts, expectancies, competencies, and values

Front 25

Stimulus

Back 25

a person, event, or situation that elicits behavior

Front 26

Socialized offender

Back 26

a person who violates the law consistently because of learning the behavioral patterns from his or her social environment

Front 27

Variables

Back 27

any entity that can be measured

Front 28

Victimology

Back 28

the scientific study of the causes, circumstances, individual characteristics, and social contexts associated with crime victims