Criminology Commons^™

Girls In The Juvenile Justice System, Ryan Michelle Donley

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Juvenile crime has been a controversial topic of debate since the Industrial Revolution. More recently many studies on juvenile crime have turned their attention to sex differences in committing crime and being processed through the justice system. Current statistics of arrest, adjudication, and placement rates for different types of status offenses and criminal offenses will show whether Chesney-Lind’s and other researchers’ conclusions that juvenile females are treated more harshly within the juvenile justice system still holds true twenty years later. Given the literature review and the national juvenile crime statistics, there is strong evidence that suggests females continue to be …

Examining Juvenile Crime And Recidivism, Charles M. Watson

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

High juvenile recidivism rates are a dilemma that is plaguing the juvenile justice system and the treatment facilities that operate within. There is little understanding of the causal relationship between recidivism rates, treatment types, and the demographics of the residents at the various treatment facilities. The purpose of this research is to identify the common flaws existing in current treatment practices and to utilize social labeling theory as a means of gaining a better understanding of this issue.

Social Disorganization Theory And Crime In West Virginia, Billy Crum

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

The purpose of this study is to test the social disorganization theory by determining how a community’s ability to maintain social control effects crime rate, especially in areas of West Virginia that are experiencing rapid social change. Do lack of social controls and rapid social change effect crime rates in rural areas, and if so, what kinds of crimes are likely to be effected? This study is going to attempt to answer this puzzling question. This study uses poverty rate, unemployment rate, and high school dropout rate as the independent variables, and crime rate as the dependent variable.

A Durkheimian Analysis Of Anomie And Deviance In The National Football League: An Exploratory Case Study, Eric M. Carter

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

The purpose of this study was to determine whether Durkheim’s concept of anomie applies to National Football League players. This study was an attempt to discover if and why NFL players are more likely to commit deviant acts. Why do these players that seemingly have everything throw their lives away by committing crimes? This study attempts to address these questions by linking Durkheim’s classic anomie theory with the deviance in the NFL.

In Durkheim’s book, The Division of Labour in Society (1893), anomie emerges through society’s transition from mechanical to organic solidarity. In this, economic change is too fast for …

Rural And Urban Police Officer Attitudes Toward Psychologists And Psychological Services, Kara Gettman

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Psychologists are frequently called upon to work with law enforcement personnel, yet little research has been conducted to examine the attitudes of police officers toward psychologists and psychological services. The purpose of this study was to survey police officers in both urban and rural settings in an attempt to gauge their attitudes toward psychologists and psychological services. The researcher designed the questionnaire that was used because no single assessment instrument currently exists which measures all of the potentially relevant variables The attitudes assessed included the perceived need for psychologists and psychological services, the preferred roles for psychologists in law enforcement …

Adolescent Attitudes Toward Violent Behavior, Scott J. Gaugler

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

In this study, a sample of 126 high school students in a large Appalachian high school were surveyed about their use of alcohol and other illegal drugs, involvement in delinquent and violent acts, association with peers who committed delinquent and violent acts, and attitudes toward violence. Attitudes toward violence were conceptualized according to Techniques of Neutralization (Sykes & Matza, 1957).

An Analysis Of Prison Sentence Disparity In West Virginia, Deanna J. Shields

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

The sentencing of individuals is a very important stage in the Criminal Justice System in the United States. The sentence is the basic decision which determines how, where, and for how long an offender should be dealt with by the state (LaBeff, 1978, p. 1). This study will focus on the question of whether or not sentence disparity exists in West Virginia.

Sentencing processes in our Criminal Justice System today are in keeping with the “Treatment Model” of Corrections . According to Fogel (1975) in We Are The Living Proof, the treatment model has three main goals: (1) diagnosis …