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This paper examines the social context in which gang violence occurs in a Mexican American community. We argue that gang violence arises in situations where one party impugns the honor of his adversary. This sort of conduct violates the norms of interpersonal etiquette and constitutes, in Goffman's terminology, a violation of "personal space." Gang members fluctuate uneasily between conventional and honor bound responses to these kinds of insults. The paper outlines a theory of normative ambiguity that deals with this movement between two antithetical codes for conduct. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article the authors comment on an article by researchers Steven Box and Julienne Ford. Relying heavily on data derived from self-report delinquency studies, they conclude that the available evidence, while contradictory and confused, cannot be said to support the hypothesis that social class is negatively related to criminal behaviour. On the basis of this conclusion they then proceed to launch an attack on social labelling theory. The authors first lists a number of serious errors in their review of self-report delinquency studies. Following this they present their own review, the conclusion of which differs significantly from that of Box and Ford. Finally they argue that their paper appears to contain a concept of crime that is simply not viable. In developing their argument Box and Ford clearly find themselves on the horns of a dilemma. Their less than consistent efforts at specifying the form of behaviour under consideration is perhaps indicative of their confusion. On the one hand they are anxious to advance general statements that will embrace the activities of adults as well as juveniles. Yet the evidence on which they must rely is confined as they themselves readily admit--almost exclusively to the activities of juveniles or adolescents.

The objectives of the criminal justice system are ambiguous and often conflicting. Attempts to improve law enforcement, on the one hand, and the administration of justice, on the other, result in an impasse which prohibits optimization of the operation of the system. Therefore, quantitative analysis is almost always based on one of two conceptual models: the process model or the component model. This paper introduces a third conceptualization which is described as the crime-specific model. The crime-specific perspective approaches criminal justice problems by considering sub problems categorized according to type of offense. This framework should facilitate planning and action in criminal justice. More pragmatic goals about specific crimes could be set and the evaluation of the achievement of these goals would be more direct. New concepts of organization throughout the system would be produced and the management of day-to-day operations would be streamlined. In order for the crime-specific perspective to be used, two conditions must exist. First, the circumstances surrounding the commission of the offense and the characteristics of the offender must be measurably different for each offense category. Second, these differences must remain stable .over time and across juridictions. This paper explores the extent to which events and offenders meet these constraints. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past few years there has been a considerable shift in the proportion of resources devoted to more operational or management-oriented approaches to criminological research and development. To a large extent this shift, with a few notable exceptions, has been accomplished by the influx of researchers or practitioners from outside the ranks of traditional criminological researchers. Unfortunately, there seems to have been a lack of real understanding of both new and existing methods and approaches and, therefore, a reduction in the degree of acceptance and cooperation between the two groups. By presenting an "economic" approach to a subject of past and present interest and relevance, namely "The Cost of Crime," this paper attempts to begin to alleviate this problem of communication as well as to summarize the work done in this area to date. The paper first deals with problem definitions within an economic framework and then proceeds to develop economic guidelines relevant for a policy-maker in the Criminal Justice System. In so doing, it also lays a theoretical structure for evaluating existing or conducting future research into the cost of crime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As time passes, some people start to commit crime for the first time while others drop out of crime. Despite the large amount of data relating to crime and criminals that is collected by official agencies each year, limited attention so far has been paid to such questions as: (1) how many persons actually started to commit crime in contrast to the number of "first offenders" recorded? (2) how many persons actually gave up crime in a given year compared with those who simply avoided arrest? This paper explores the possibility of developing a method of answers to such questions-a method which, if successfully developed, could lead to an improvement in our understanding of the criminal justice system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses about the behavior dimensions of gang delinquency. Discussion was largely limited to the measurement of individual behavior, rather than individual or group norms, values, or self concepts. First of all the setting of research and methods of gathering data were discussed, which was followed by discussion of the statistical model chosen for analysis of the data, its application in the present instance, and interpretations of the behavior patterns isolated by this procedure. Finally, individual gangs were described in terms of the patterns found among all gang boys studied, and an assessment undertaken of the implications of findings for subcultural theory. Empirically, problem was to determine the nature of behavioral patterns characterizing the boys and gangs studied. The dimensionality of delinquent and criminal behavior has been approached by a variety of clinical and statistical techniques, and occasionally by a combination of these. Several investigators have found self-reported delinquency to scale acceptably when unidimensional scaling methods are employed.

There is no simple relationship between ascribed social status and delinquency. Both the status structure of the residential community and the extent to which delinquency is a function of a cultural tradition in a residential community affect the delinquency life-chances of a boy at each ascribed social class level. The largest proportion of delinquents for any status group comes from the more homogeneous status areas for that group, while the delinquency life-chances of boys in any status group tend to be greatest in the lower status areas and in high delinquency rate areas. Evidence presented in the paper for types of conforming and deviating boys lend support to the conclusions that (1) there is more frequent and serious delinquent deviation in the lower than in the middle stratum when self-reports of delinquent deviation are examined, (2) that the career oriented delinquent is found only among lower class boys, (3) that the major type of lower status boy is a conforming non- achiever while the conforming achiever is the major type in the middle class, (4) that conformers are more likely to be isolates than are non-conformers, and (5) that peer-oriented delinquency is the most common form of delinquent organization at both lower and middle status levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although the objective of the large study of which one facet is here reported was to test certain hypotheses with respect to causal factors in integration, this paper is not concerned with causes. But something must be said on this subject in order to make clear why the data concern only four cities. The studies through 1946 indicated that there was great variation among large American cities in integration as measured positively by welfare effort and negatively by crime, and that more than three-fifths of the variance was attributable to two causal factors—degree of heterogeneity of the population in terms of nationality and race, and in- and out-migration of the population. It was also found that the residual, unexplained variance in integration was much greater for some cities than for others. It was presumed that other causal factors were working strongly in the cities whose integration scores could be predicted least accurately from their population composition and mobility scores.

Presents an introduction to July 1973 issue of the "Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency."

Differential association has been the most widely disseminated of the criminological theories, yet has remained untested. An innovation in the intellectual life of the theory has suggested a means of testing its adequacy but not its validity. Recent papers have suggested that the theory is inadequate by its failure to consider nonsocial (noninteractive) determinants of behavior. This paper reports a review of empirical studies which allow the effects of social and nonsocial independent variables to be contrasted and a randomized two-factor design experiment of the effect of a social and a nonsocial variable on theft behavior. Both the experiment and the literature review suggest that nonsocial variables should be considered by theories of human behavior. The evidence does not support differential association theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The national index of crime published annually by the FBI is one of the most commonly used social indicators. Many authors have criticized the FBI's index, an unweighted sum of the reported "index crimes" for failing to account for the differing seriousness of the heterogeneous crimes in, the index. Sellin and Wolfgang (1962) provide a procedure fop developing crime-seriousness weights. An intense public debate has raged over which of these is "correct." This paper compares the FBI and the Sellin-Wolfgang indexes for reported crimes in the U.S. over the 1960-72 period, and finds that the two have been almost perfectly linearly related, Thus, the Sellin-Wolfgang index, even though conceptually correct and of value for other purposes, contributes no significant information to a national crime index. Other crime indexes are explored, and conclusions generalized for other social indicators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The JUSSIM model is an interactive computer program for which an accompanying data file describes the flow diagram of a criminal justice system, the branching ratios of the flow between stages, the resources consumed, and the costs and work loads. This model was implemented to help develop a plan for a local criminal justice planning agency. The paper reports on the experiences in collecting the relevant data, the analyses performed with the model, and the usefulness of the model for the decision makers in the planning agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper treats. the problems of performance measurement for crime control activities. The existing performance measurements are strongly dominated by the apprehension-oriented clearance rate. The practical and conceptual problems associated with the clearance measure are discussed as an introduction to a conceptual framework for crime control performance measures. The frame- work extends beyond the measures of operating agency performance to other classes of measures which are derived from a broader system definition. These additional classes of measures related to (1) economic disincentives to criminal activities and markets, (2) crime prevention, (3) community assistance and control, and (4) quality of life parameters, detailed suggestions for the class of operating agency measures; and external or system based classes of measures are provided to indicate the utility of the conceptual framework. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the fundamental character of recidivism as a measure of correctional effectiveness, and its wide use in all aspects of the theory and operations of the crime control process, there is surprising misconception regarding its use and measurement. This paper uses probabilistic models to examine two types of potential misconception. The first arises from alternative definitions of recidivism based on the stage in the criminal justice process at which recidivism is measured. The second arises from alternative methods of sampling criminal careers. The analysis helps to clarify possible interpretations of recidivism data, including those reported by the FBI under "Careers in Crime." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the following questions: (1) Are there any differences between the inmates and staff of a correctional institution in their judgments of the severity of various offenses? (2) What is the extent of difference in severity ratings made by inmates during various stages of incarceration? (3) To what extent does an offender differ from staff and other inmates in judging the severity of his own offense? Three inmate groups and three staff groups completed a form measuring offense severity. They rated thirty-nine offenses on a 0- to 10-point scale. Inmates were divided into early, middle, and late phase groups for analysis, and staff groups were administrative, clinical, and correctional personnel. A total of 221 participants completed the scale --142 inmates and 79 staff members. Ratings on each offense were combined to give a median score for that offense. Offenses were then ranked from the most severe to the least severe for each group. Various tests were performed on these rankings to determine the extent of differences in rated severity. Results showed that there were no significant differences between in- mates and staff of a correctional institution in their rank-ordering of offenses, although some differences in overall weighting occurred (based on the means of each group's overall scale). inmates who were in either the early or late phase of their institutional careers tended to see all offenses more severely; however, this varied with the type of offense. In the offense categories of narcotics and false pretenses (checks and forgery), there were significant differences between the ratings of the actual offender and the inmates and staff of the institution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports the findings of a study that related a series of background and treatment variables to the likelihood of success or failure on probation for 791 California adult offenders. Thirteen variables on which the 415 probation successes and the 376 failures differed significantly were divided into three categories: social background, antisocial behavior, and conditions of probation. The greatest differences between the two groups were in the antisocial behavior category. Probationers with a past history of disciplinary problems in the military, a juvenile record, or an adult record were much more likely to fail on probation. The type of crime the failures commit (property: auto theft, check offenses, forgery) suggests elements of career offenders. In terms of social background, the failures were more likely to come from disadvantaged circumstances: lower educational level and lower socio-economic status. They are also more unstable, as reflected in a high incidence of marital instability and a greater tendency to move from job to job. Finally, certain conditions of probation, especially the ordering of restitution, were more prevalent in the case histories of the failures than of the successes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been proposed that the identification of boys with delinquent commitments might be indexed more appropriately by the official delinquency records of a boy's friends than by the boy's own records. This hypothesis was examined within a population of seven hundred junior-high-school boys by collating in formation from police records with responses from a questionnaire survey which contained sociometric items, a self-report delinquency scale, and an attitudinal index of delinquency commitment. The findings indicate that a boy without a police record but with friends who are officially delinquent is likely to have a high delinquency commitment. However, a boy with a police record who has friends without records is also likely to have a high delinquency commitment, it is suggested that the combined use of the arrest records of the juvenile and of his friends promises to provide a much better means of identifying boys with differential commitments than the use of either measure alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main empirical question for this paper is whether boys in close friendship groups have the same specific patterns of delinquent behavior. The delinquent behavior of boys in close friendship triads was compared with that expected for six kinds of delinquent behavior. Two ways of accounting for the observed distribution were examined, one based on a random model and the other on a deduction from differential association theory. We conclude that the probability of an individual committing a specific kind of delinquent act depends upon the commission of the act by other members of the triad, though this is not independent of the social class of boys. The actual delinquent behavior of boys in triads departs somewhat less from the random than the differential association hypothesis, at least for the more serious offenses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discussions of crime and conflict have been characterized by imprecision in defining and relating the two concepts. This has contributed to confusion about the subject matter and research aims of criminology, to a tendency to introduce new theoretical formulations before older alternatives have been adequately explored, and to an investment of resources in piece-meal instead of cumulative research. Since formalization is an aid to the clearer statement and more thorough exploration of theoretical alternatives, an effort is made to develop a system of formal propositions as a basis for research. This paper includes (1) a summary of conceptualizations found in the literature, (2) discussions and suggested resolutions of the basic conceptual issues, and (3) a Presentation of the theoretical scheme as it has so far been developed, i.e., of a set of propositions stating conditions under which the probability of conflict between legal authorities and subjects vanes and, given a conflict, conditions under which the probability of criminalization of subjects varies, it is concluded that further elaboration of propositions requires additional exploratory and descriptive research, and that rigorous formalization would be premature until the various hypothesized relationships have been more thoroughly examined in empirical research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The major objective of this paper is to describe with a high degree of specificity the more significant economic, demographic and social determinants, and dimensions of crime areas in a large urban community. The basic data include two series of crime statistics, "offenses known to the police" and "arrests," totaling over 65,000 cases, along with detailed economic, demographic, and social statistics from the 1950 decennial census. A 38 x 38 correlation matrix, based on 20 crime indices and 18 economic, demo graphic, and social variables was derived. This matrix was analyzed by the principal axes technique. Eight factors were extracted and retained for orthogonal rotation. To determine how the basic dimensions derived for the community as a whole are related to specific areas, standard factor scores for each of the eight factors were computed for the 93 census tracts in the city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There appear to be both similarities and differences between the conditions surrounding the punishment of war criminals and those surrounding the punishment of domestic criminals. Most criminologists agree that punishment has a limited place in any program of crime prevention, but that its use has been generally ineffective. Sutherland's classical treatment of this subject is probably generally acceptable to most. It must be admitted, however, that the effects of punishment on the apprehended criminal are better known than its effects upon the potential criminal. It is also agreed that the sole purpose of punishment is the prevention of crime, delinquency and exploitative behavior generally. It will be the thesis of this brief and all-too-dogmatic paper that the principles of domestic criminology apply generally to the field of international behavior. That where they do not apply, because of differences in the surrounding conditions, those differences argue for even less effectiveness of punishment in the international than in the domestic field.

The Zones of Mexico City which produce the most crime seem to be either central or peripheral. As in North American cities the areas with highest percentages of conventional criminality tend to be located near the central business district. Perhaps more obviously than in cities of the United States the home addresses of notorious white-collar criminals are in the better residential neighborhoods. Whether the incidence of these unrecorded crimes of the upper class would show a rate equal to that of the recorded crimes of the lower class, or whether an index to the bribe-taking activities of the middle class in the areas between would show as high a rate as either, it is not possible to say. It is the purpose of this paper to describe and analyze criminogenesis in these central and peripheral zones. Because of the slow growth that typified most of its long history and its more recent rapid development, Mexico City has shifted in basic configuration from the plaza-centered structure of the older Mexican cities.

The article discusses delinquency treatment in the controlled activity group. According to the author, a fundamental problem of social control in a complex society is the maintenance of social ties to those personalities who breach conventions. In simpler societies the great strength of primary relationships serves to prevent serious breach, or where serious breach has occurred, of drastic severance of social ties. But in industrial societies, breach of convention as defined especially in the criminal law leads to the application of sanctions which weaken ties to family, kin and community. By a widening of social distance accomplished by the withdrawal of social contact and sympathy the recidivist offender is as effectively separated from his society as though he were physically exiled. Repeated application of punishment extends the separation into a cleavage from which finally emerges a segregate culture-group, the criminal underworld, equipped with its variant philosophy and culture values, its occupational techniques and its social roles. Paradoxically, it is only through success in this half-world that the criminal personality can achieve a role in organized crime or in crime-politics. The control of organized crime, criminal syndicates and racketeering, then, involves the elimination of the social process, which creates the backbone of organized crime, the criminal personality. This paper proposes to deal with the genetic aspect of this problem, namely the process of differential association.

The article presents information on some of the programs of the sociological society of the U.S. which was formed in the year 1938. American Documentation Institute, which operates Biblioflim Service, has served over 2500 scholars with about 7000 items totaling hundreds of thousands of pages since 1934. This is a non-profit document copying service on 35-mm. film or 6 x 8 photoprints made there from. The cost is one cent per page for film or ten cents for photoprints. The American Sociological Society will hold its 1938 annual meeting at Detroit, Michigan, December 18, 1930. The hotel at which the meeting will be held and the tentative program will be announced as soon as possible. International Criminology Society will hold its first International Congress in Rome at the end of September, 1938. Six themes will be discussed, the first three of which will call forth resolutions. These are etiology and diagnosis of juvenile delinquency and the effects of such research on legal institutions, personality of the criminal, the criminological preparation of the judge and his role in the fight against delinquency; Criminal prophylaxis in various countries and Ethnology and criminology and precautionary measures in various countries.

The article presents the criticisms of Michael Hakeem's recent book "Group Problems in Crime and Punishment," The author protests against certain statements which he regards as incorrect and misleading. The reason, which was of course unknown to Mr. Hakeem, was that the inclusion of this essay was originally not intended; it was only shortly before the manuscript of the book had to be sent to the printer that this essay was included in the place of another paper which had to be omitted because of its length. It was too late then to revise the Lombroso paper, and this last minute change may explain, though it does not excuse, Hakeem's failure to draw attention to this fact in his preface. The reviewer, however, in singling out this chapter to justify his charge that "revision appears on the whole to have been quite limited" gives the totally wrong impression that very little of the material included in this collection has been brought up-to-date. In fact, Hakeem have taken great trouble to provide each of the remaining twelve chapters, with the exception of material published shortly before the appearance of the book, with footnote references to recent literature

The article discusses oblique references. The statement by researchers that delinquency is fundamentally related only to anomie and not to poor socio-economic conditions is interpretable only if it is recognized that anomie and socio-economic conditions are fundamentally related. This means that the hypothesis that relationship is statistical, is misleading. It is possible to agree with the conclusion that two (at least) factors are derived from the data and still not accept the apparent rigidity of the research interpretation. The distribution of the items on the two factors is within a restricted range, the seven relevant ones being within approximately 62 degrees. Further, the items are distributed even though there are two apparent clusters. This does not suggest the discreteness of interpretation of the items suggested in the research and supported by various techniques. In fact, The basic issue of clarity of structure involves consideration of the sampling of variables and not merely the analysis of these particular data.

Results of surveys of public opinion regarding topics of importance to criminal justice are widely available from a variety of sources. In addition to national pollsters who regularly include such questions in their periodic pools, governmental commissions often conduct in-depth surveys on specialized topics. Although these public opinion data offer a wealth of critical information which can be of value to criminal justice planners, practitioners, and academians alike, these data have been largely ignored. The primary purpose of this paper is to explore the nature, scope, and sources of public opinion data which are currently available. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In view of the shortcomings of sociological theories on crime and deviance this paper urges a research strategy aimed at the discovery of empirical regularities. As one such example, data from Uniform Crime Reports and the U.S. Census are used to study the relation of criminal differentiation to age and occupational differentiation. Criminal differentiation is high among the young, decreasing until the early thirties and then increasing. That is, individuals in the late teens tend to be arrested for offenses that are relatively rare in other age groups. The increase in criminal differentiation after age 30 does not reach the high levels of the late teens. Criminal differentiation and occupational differentiation are found to be directly related for two census years, 1950 and 1960. Theoretical implications of these findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four problems characterize much of the past research on the relation of social factors to juvenile delinquency: measurement of social background, one-dimensional indexes of delinquency, bias in measurement of delinquency, and nonparametric statistical tests. These problems may be overcome in part by using specific, proximal measures of background; multiple indexes of delinquency; anonymous self-reports of delinquency incidence; and parametric statistics such as components analysis and regression or analysis of variance. The present paper demonstrates the use of these methods in a pilot study of about 400 public high-school students in Chicago. The components analysis shows the factor pattern of delinquency varies in samples of boys and girls; hence multiple rather than single indicators must be used. The regression analysis shows that different types of delinquency are functions of different combinations of family background, ethnicity, and sex; for example, boys, especially white boys, in the sample more often reported car thefts; and Negro girls reported more frequently than white girls of having engaged in gang fights. Several methodological implications are drawn from the findings for future research on delinquency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

All criminologists agree that crime is much more commonly found in urban than in rural or suburban environments. Crime is not uniformly distributed, however. The structural characteristics of metropolitan and urban life, the social matrix itself, which seem to exert a powerful criminogenic influence on the population. This paper accounts for the different kinds of delinquent behavior and motivation hypothesized by Cohen, Cloward and Ohlin, Lander, Harriet Wilson, Morris, Mays, Sprott, Downes and various other criminologists. All can be brought under the even wider umbrella of the Shaw-Burgess-McKay concept of the delinquent area. Delinquency areas are lower class; they can be either homogeneous or anomic, closely-knit or socially disconnected. Middle class and white collar crime is, by contrast, not locality-based to any degree. As far as adults go, the kinds of offenses which the higher status and income groups are most likely to commit are ones fairly closely associated with the workplace rather than with the home territory. For middle class youngsters, home and school combine to treat peccadilloes as matters of private concern and either of school or family discipline. If this analysis is in broad measure true, it would account for the preponderance of lower class individuals in official criminal statistics.

This paper utilizes "critical incident" data to analyze exploratory attempts to in crease inmate-staff collaboration in a community delinquency experiment. Analyses indicated that (1) in. mates and staff liberally shared information regarding problem behavior; (2) the majority of incidents were precipitated by only a minority of persistently deviant persons; and (3) the emergent program culture was increasingly effective as a social-control mechanism. However, this institutional culture or code may have been overly punitive and restrictive. Discussion of the complex pressures which led to this situation highlight the consequences of individual and systemic interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper is intended to analyze Richard A. Cloward and Lloyd E. Ohlin's theory of "delinquency and opportunity." In this analytical work, the authors attempts an application of rigorous evaluative criteria-drawn from works of philosophers of science-to the theory under review. In this article, the second mode of analysis has been adopted and therefore the Cloward-Ohlin theory will be analyzed in the context of justification. Although the theory of "delinquency and opportunity" has attained recognition in professional (academic) as well as in administrative circles in the U.S., the theory still lacks the rigour that characterizes a logically acceptable scientific explanation. In the absence of a set of clearly stated propositions and deductively connected postulates, well-defined operational concepts, and also in the absence of adequate empirical evidence, it is hard to uphold Cloward and Ohlin's theory of "delinquency and opportunity" as a scientific explanation of the phenomena of delinquent subculture.

The article focuses on delinquency, which refers to the failure of personal and social controls for producing behavior in conformity with the norms of the social system to which legal penalties are attached. Personal control is defined as the ability of an individual to abstain from meeting needs in ways which are in conflict with the norms and rules of the community. On the other hand, social control is defined as the ability of social groups to make norms or rules effective. It is stated that delinquency results when there is an absence of norms and rules governing behavior in conformity with the norms of the social system to which legal penalties are attached.

The article presents the study which is concerned with sixth-grade boys in the highest delinquency areas in Columbus, Ohio, who have not become delinquent and who are not expected to become delinquent. In order to study the non-delinquent boy, all 30 sixth-grade teachers in schools located in the highest white delinquency areas in Columbus were asked to nominate those white boys in their school rooms who would not, in their opinion, ever experience police or juvenile court contact. Treating each nominee separately, the teachers were then requested to indicate their reasons for the selection of a particular boy. Of the eligible students, 192, or just over half, were selected and evaluated by their teachers as being "insulated" against delinquency. A check of police and juvenile court records revealed that 16 of those nominated had some type of law enforcement record and these boys were eliminated from further consideration. Repeated neighborhood visits failed to locate 51 others. In the remaining cases both the boy and his mother were interviewed.

This article presents a report of the Liaison Officer of the National Association of Social Work. The National Association of Social Work was originally formed by a merger of seven separate organizations. It included a Social Work Research Group. This is where sociologists were most active. It became the new organization's Research Section. After this fall, it will be renamed the Council on Research of the National Association of Social Work. The Council will be expected to assume leadership for the application of research methods to social work practice. It is scheduled to continue such activities as the encouragement of nationwide studies, their publication and the circulation of their reports. During the last year, the National Association of Social Work Research Section sponsored an Institute in Child Welfare Research and a Conference on the Nature of Social Work Knowledge. The National Association of Social Work also received a Ford Foundation grant to take a new look at social problems. Papers have been assigned to specialists to survey the state of knowledge on such topics as poverty, delinquency, deterioration of the inner city, and out-of-wedlock births.

The focal point of the activities of the American Prison Association is the annual congress, which took place last year in Biloxi, Mississippi, on October 21-26 and was attended by the author. The program is made up of contributions not only of the American Prison Association, but of a whole group of affiliated organizations, such as the National Probation and Parole Association, Medical Correctional Association, National Conference of Juvenile Agencies, Correctional Service Associates, etc. Thus it represents the major yearly event in the correctional field of the U.S. The participation of the American Sociological Society through its representative was duly recognized. A detailed analysis of the sessions of the congress is not intended in this purposely brief report. However, few major items should perhaps be brought out. sociological criminology, which has made outstanding contributions in the past to the development of the correctional attitude and practices in crime and delinquency control in the U.S. should continue to do so in the future.

The author says that he does not agree with those scholars who deny the significance of general crime figures, for the general level of criminality is the resultant of two relevant social forces, the pressure of the law on the population, and the distribution of revolting and submitting attitudes in the population. The author also maintains that it is scientifically incorrect to speak of the general movement of criminality on the basis of figures concerning only one type of criminality, if the offenses against property were representative for offenses in general, the respective curves would coincide but they do not. The author adds that he does not explain the increase of the number of convictions in French courts of medium and lowest jurisdiction by a decrease in the number of convictions in the courts of assize. His contention is that the general number of convictions increased during the years studied and that the distribution of convictions among jurisdictions was affected by the practice of shifting cases from higher to lower courts by the prosecutors who intentionally omitted certain aggravating aspects of the offenses in order to establish the competence of the lower court.

This article attempts a critical review of research into the causes of delinquency, introducing this main subject with an account of the various attempts at preventive research that have occupied the center of the stage, as of 1955. This preventive research is, in brief, an attempt to predict delinquency, or to detect susceptibility to delinquency, in the individual child at an early age. This research has therefore no direct bearing on the, very large and varied collection of less persistent and more casual delinquents. But it can be argued that its indirect bearing on the general problem is considerable. Nevertheless the assumption is still strong that serious delinquency is usually and mainly a product of severe personal emotional disorder, and that conversely where there is no severe emotional disorder but only the influence of a delinquent neighborhood the resulting delinquency will be usually casual and transitory. Another and more far-reaching conclusion is that delinquency research in its accepted form of delinquent-centred research is getting nowhere.

The article presents updates on issues and events related to several journals on education in the U.S. The list of article that are included in the "American Review" of Reviews for May 2006 is presented. Professor Cesare Lombroso prepared a brief paper telling the story of his early discoveries relating to the genesis of crime, shorty before his death in 1909.

The article provides some insights into the psychic effects of the weather, based on the paper written by J.S. Lemon in the "American Journal of Psychology." He emphasized the influence of weather on the health and temperament and the customs and habits of men of all ages. Suicide is known to depend upon the weather and it has been calculated that in India, 48 percent of certain crimes disappear when hot weather gives place to cold weather.

This article attempts to give meaning to insanity from the psychological viewpoint. The outstanding symptom of the complex, from the point of view of the relation between insanity and crime, is thus the destructive passion which flames up in the mind of a man dominated by an unconscious phantasy whenever any interference is offered to that phantasy and which does not stop even at murder. The murderous wishes are directed primarily against anyone who would force the facts of reality on the mind of the dreamer. The dreamer does not want to be disturbed or robbed of his illusion, but deep in his unconscious mind he knows the danger that confronts him. With the poor orientation towards the external world which marks the temperament, a man will not dare to carry out his murderous designs unless he knows his enemy to be someone weaker than himself, or unless he catches him at a disadvantage. Apart from the temperament which in any individual affords a predisposition towards psychological severance from the external world and towards an exclusive relationship with the internal psychic forces, certain other conditions must be formulated before arriving at a psychological conception of insanity which is logical and complete.

Intervention effects have been minimized or denied in delinquency literature. The theoretical and methodological difficulties of assessing intervention effects are discussed. A set of methods featuring the interrupted time series experimental design are developed and illustrated with data from the Provo Experiment. Pronounced effects of intervention are found, independent of the effects due to maturation and differential opportunity. The findings comport closely to a social control model and provide little support for labeling theory. Replications and elaborations of the design are urged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A key decision in the correctional process is determining when to release an offender to parole. Setting the optimum time to be served is difficult. One of the purposes of this study is to see it research based on past experience can provide some future guidelines for determining optimum time for different types of offenders. The Uniform Parole Reports (UPR) program, sponsored by the National Probation and Parole Institutes, provides the research base for this study. The study groups consisted of males convicted of burglary offenses who were paroled and reported to UPR. These groups consisted of 7,200 parolees in 1968 and 7,600 parolees in 1969. The standard UPR definition of parole outcome for a one- year follow-up was used as the criterion variable. An experience table with different offender classifications was developed to achieve the maximum logical differentiation as to parole outcome. The parole outcome rates for the 1968 classifications ranged from 26 percent to 87 percent with a favorable adjustment at the end of one year. The classifications developed for 1968 parolees fairly accurately predicted the 1969 parolees' experience. In the process of developing the of fender classifications, supportive evidence was found for the maturation concept In 21 of 22 comparisons, the older parolees had more favorable outcome rates than the younger parolees. The number of months served showed no consistent relationship to parole outcome for any classification. This study does not assess imprisonment as a punishment device or as a means of custody. it does suggest that the vast sums being spent on correctional institutions, as a crime reduction device, need further evaluation if we are to stern the growing crime rate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One approach in practical criminology, which some call social work, is based on a disease model for most crimes. We have adopted another approach: for certain classes of crime, we have likened the occurrence of an offense to an accident or random event. Thus, we have drawn heavily on studies of the occurrence of accidents and of accident proneness, which have used probabilistic models to account for these phenomena. In this way we should be able to investigate different accounts of the processes of crime and social control which generate criminological data. Although aggregate in formation on offenders and their offenses is usually sparse, we have attempted to test various theories using these data. Without such an attempt, we cannot evaluate the general applicability of conclusions drawn from the more usual research conducted on easily accessible samples which may be a collection of extreme cases. We find, however, that the different theories are inadequately specified, and that the collection of aggregate data is not normally designed to test them. Unless there are improvements in both theory and data, we shall not be able to distinguish between the various theories of crime and its social control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The case is strong for systematically studying children in need of help - those who display danger signals at an early age. These are the children who are likely to experience increasing difficulties, with a concommitant handicapping of their potential. The need at this point is for a practical, acceptable, and efficient means of screening large numbers QI young children. Past attempts to provide such a method have not met the stringent requirements. One approach, though, appears promising - that of focusing upon a child in the school environment. It is there that data about the total child are readily obtainable. The reported pilot work indicates this information can be systematically collected and applied to the assessment and prediction of behavior difficulties. However, this possibility has not been explored adequately; the definitive research has not been done. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the past, conceptual differences between behavioral and legal definitions made a synthesis between the two approaches extremely difficult The present study utilizes a relatively new nonmetric measurement technique- the Multi-dimensional Scalogram Analysis (MSA)-in an attempt to conceptually analyze the four relevant components of a criminal offense: a) the criminal law norm (legal norm), b) the actor (offender), c) the act (offense), and d) the object (victim). A theoretical model, assuming interaction among the four components C)], the criminal offense, was constructed and an empirical analysis of crime within the framework of a legal definition was undertaken. Based on the definitions used in the study, several relation ships were studied between act reus reus and mens rea, the legal norms violated, the offender, the criminal act, and the object of the criminal act. The empirical findings suggest that the bask structure of the criminal offense is comprised of the dyadic relationship between the offender and the victim. Actus reus elements appear to be after-the- fact intervention for the assessment of damages of injuries and the mens rea elements are also imputed after the fact to the offender in order to punish his indeterministic evil intent The implications of the findings for research on administration of criminal justice and sentencing are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes an attempt to determine whether arming the police does or does not tend to increase the level of violence in a community. The study was carried out in Australia where states which are relatively homogeneous in respect of the population composition, culture, and general regulations regarding the ownership and carrying of firearms, pursue quite different policies in regard to police armament. It was found that rates of killing and wounding by and of the police appear to be highest in those states which follow the American policy in relation to arming the police and lowest in those states which maintain the English tradition of a disarmed police force. Moreover, although there is a direct correlation between the rate of killing police and the general homicide rate, the risk of being killed for policemen, which is always higher than for ordinary citizens, is relatively much higher in states which have adopted the American police firearms policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]