Gottfredson and Hirschi argue that most crime and delinquency can be seen as the pursuit of relatively immediate and easy benefits or immediate and momentary pleasures, and therefore acts of delinquency and crime tend to be disproportionately undertaken by individuals with relatively low self-control. For self-control theory, important negative consequences can include physical harm, legal sanctions, removal from educational institutions, or disappointment or disapproval of family, teachers, and friends. It is related to concepts such as self-regulation and impulsivity in psychology (Baumeister & Heatherton, 1996 Moffitt, Poulton, & Caspi, 2013), time discounting and skill formation in economics (Heckman, 2006), and social control in sociology (Hirschi, 1969). On the one hand, general reviews of the empirical literature on deterrence and incapacitation support the expectations of self-control theory by finding little support for severity of sanctions, sanctions long removed from the act, and selective incapacitation for “serious offenders.” On the other hand, experimental studies from education, psychology, and criminology generally support the idea that early-childhood family and educational environments can be altered to enhance self-control and lower expected delinquency, crime, and other problem behaviors later in life.Īs Gottfredson and Hirschi use the term, self-control refers to the ability to forego immediate or near-term pleasures that have some negative consequences and to the ability to act in favor of longer-term interests.
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Gottfredson and Hirschi argue that self-control theory is inconsistent with reliance on the criminal justice system to affect crime levels. Researchers have long studied variations in age effects, particularly seeking continuously high levels of offending for the most serious offenders, but reviewers have found that the evidence for meaningful variability is not convincing.įor public policy, self-control theory argues that the most promising approach for crime reduction focuses primarily on prevention, especially in early childhood, and secondarily on situational prevention for specific types of crimes. The theory’s expectations about the age distribution of crime, versatility of offending, and stability of individual differences over long periods of time also receive substantial support. The posited important role of the family in the genesis of self-control is consistent with substantial bodies of research, although some researchers argue in favor of important genetic components for self-control. These relationships appear to be strong throughout life, among most groups of people, types of crime, in the United States and other countries, and over time. Most reviews find substantial empirical support for the principal positions of the theory, including the relationship between levels of self-control and delinquency, crime, and other problem behaviors. As a result, self-control theory is likely the most heavily researched perspective in criminology during the past 30 years. Self-control theory applies to a wide variety of illegal behaviors (most crimes) and to many noncrime problem behaviors, including school problems, accidents, and substance abuse.Ī considerable amount of research has been undertaken on self-control theory and on Gottfredson and Hirschi’s general theory of crime. As such, it acknowledges the general decline in crime with age, versatility in types of problem behaviors engaged in by delinquents and offenders, and the generally stable individual differences in the tendency to engage in delinquency and crime over one’s life-course.
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Self-control theory was initially constructed to reconcile the age, generality, and stability findings of criminological research with the standard assumptions of control theory. Persons with relatively high levels of self-control do better in school, have stronger job prospects, establish more stable interpersonal relationships, and attain higher income and better health outcomes. Once established, differences in self-control affect the likelihood of delinquency in childhood and adolescence and crime in later life. An individual’s level of self-control is influenced by family or other caregiver behavior early in life. Self-control is defined as the ability to forego acts that provide immediate or near-term pleasures, but that also have negative consequences for the actor, and as the ability to act in favor of longer-term interests.
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Gottfredson and Hirschi advanced self-control theory in 1990 as part of their general theory of crime.