On the consequences of ignoring genetic influences in criminological research
Introduction
As a discipline, criminology has been dominated by sociological (i.e., environmental) explanations of human behavior (Cullen, 2011). Since Durkheim famously proclaimed that, “The determining cause of a social fact must be sought among antecedent social facts and not among the states of the individual consciousness” (Durkheim, 1982:134), sociologists and criminologists have argued that social forces are the most salient influence on human behavior (Udry, 1995). As a result, scholars in criminology often assume that the forces of nature and nurture are, for the most part, mutually exclusive with those factors believed to tap into nurture being most relevant and deserving of empirical observation. Such logic, however, has recently come under renewed scrutiny and no longer appears tenable (Sameroff, 2010).
Indeed, mounting evidence clearly indicates that both nature and nurture play a role in the etiology of many human behaviors (Carey, 2003, Pinker, 2002, Plomin et al., 2013, Turkheimer, 2000) and biological explanations of such behaviors are gaining in popularity among criminologists (Rowe, 2002, Rowe and Osgood, 1984, Simons et al., 2011, Tibbetts, 2011, Tremblay et al., 2005). An emerging group of scholars—motivated by these modern assessments—have suggested that much of the criminological knowledge base should be revisited and perhaps reconsidered against the contrast of biosocial research that clearly implicates both genetic and environmental factors as sources of human variation (Cullen, 2011).
Although research into the genetic underpinnings of antisocial behavior has occasionally appeared in criminological journals (Barnes and Boutwell, 2012, Fishbein, 1990, Walsh, 2000), it has only been in the past decade or so that biosocial criminology has begun to gain prominence and a clear research agenda (see the special issue on genetics and antisocial behavior published in 2013 in Journal of Criminal Justice [Tuvblad & Beaver, 2013]). Biosocial criminologists have, over a relatively short time span, revealed that many of the long held “truths” of criminology are built on shaky foundations that should be recast alongside newly emerging evidence (Cullen, 2009, Walsh, 2002). While it may be an overstatement to say that biosocial criminology is leading the discipline toward a paradigm shift (Kuhn, 1962), an honest appraisal of the criminological discipline will no doubt reveal that the implications of biological and genetic research have recently piqued many scholars’ attention (Rocque et al., 2013, Wright and Boisvert, 2009).1
Like all academic disciplines, criminology has drifted (Matza, 2009[1964]) from one theoretical focus to the next (Elliott, 1985). One can look back over the decades of criminological thinking and see a shift—slight as it may have been at times—in the prevailing theoretical zeitgeist. Thus, criminology as a discipline has shown a tendency to change course when new evidence becomes available. The willingness to redirect attention is certainly a desirable trait of an academic area given that the laws of probability make it unlikely that any one theory (or group of theories) is “true” (Ioannidis, 2005). In general, the incremental phases in which a scientific knowledge base gets built makes an academic discipline like criminology well suited for regular shifts in focus. Nonetheless, a shifting theoretical landscape means that, on occasion, criminology will have to face certain “hard” questions. It would appear that time has, once again, arrived.
The growing body of evidence revealing a genetic influence on criminal/antisocial behavior has reached a critical mass. There are now hundreds of studies that reveal such a link (see any of the six recent meta-analyses on the topic: Burt, 2009a, Burt, 2009b, Ferguson, 2010, Mason and Frick, 1994, Miles and Carey, 1997, Rhee and Waldman, 2002), indicating that the question of whether genes matter is no longer a question at all; they do (Barnes et al., in press). Nonetheless, we will review this literature in the sections that follow. More important, though, is our focus on two fundamental questions facing criminology. The first concerns how (and to what extent) evidence from biosocial criminology should be integrated into modern criminological research and theories. The second is whether and to what degree the evidence from biosocial criminology contradicts prevailing wisdom about the causes of crime. Both questions are addressed in the present study. The former question is addressed in the sections that follow by considering available evidence. The latter question provided the motivation for the analysis.
Section snippets
The standard social science method (SSSM)
Much of criminological research analyzes individual-level data to test hypotheses about the causes of crime (Harris, 1998, Rowe, 1994, Weisburd and Piquero, 2008, Wright and Beaver, 2005). Researchers commonly rely on the standard social science method (SSSM) to gather the data necessary to analyze such questions. The SSSM can be defined as any method of data gathering and/or data analysis that does not allow the researcher to account for genetic influences (Harris, 1998, Plomin et al., 2013).
The case for h2 ≠ 0
Human beings, or Homo sapiens, are animals. By most estimates, modern humans originated in Africa roughly 150/200,000 years ago, and following our migration off the continent, began the process of global colonization. Homo sapiens would go on to establish agricultural practices, wade through industrial revolutions, witness large scale social enlightenments, and achieve technological advances utterly foreign in other species. Indeed, humans are unique in many respects as compared to other animal
The current study
Over the past decade, criminology has witnessed an unprecedented growth in empirical findings indicating moderate-to-large genetic influences on criminal, delinquent, and antisocial behavior (Burt, 2009a, Burt, 2009b, Ferguson, 2010, Mason and Frick, 1994, Miles and Carey, 1997, Moffitt, 2005, Raine, 1993, Rhee and Waldman, 2002). Further, behavioral genetic research has revealed that nearly all human phenotypes are under partial genetic influence (Turkheimer, 2000), including phenotypes often
Simulation strategy
This analysis unfolded in three phases. The first phase dealt with data generation/creation. The statistical software package, R, was used to create simulated observations for three variables: 1) an outcome variable which will be referred to as “Y”; 2) an independent variable which will be referred to as “Criminological Variable”; and 3) a variable tapping omitted genetic factors which will be referred to as “Genetic Factors.” A vector of correlation coefficients used to define the correlation
Findings
Table 1 shows the correlation structure of the three variables utilized in the analyses. Below the diagonal are three letters used to guide the reader through the simulation process. The letter “a” is used to identify the correlation between the Criminological Variable and Y, the dependent variable. Here it is important to realize the Criminological Variable is conceptualized as a single variable that a criminologist may be interested in studying. For instance, one may consider the
Discussion
By many accounts, the criminological discipline was born out of an attempt to associate biology with criminality (Lombroso, 1895, Raine, 2013). Although many suggestions made by early biologically oriented researchers represented logic that was off the mark in varying degrees, science progresses iteratively and with the passage of time biosocial research has achieved important insight into the etiology of human behavior (Pinker, 2002, Raine, 2013). With these points in mind, the purposes of the
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