Evaluate biological explanations as a cause of criminal and anti- social behaviour. (16)

Hormones can be used to explain criminal behavior as males have higher levels of testosterone and statistics show that males commit more crime than females. This is a strength of the biological explanation as it is reductionist as it reduces criminal and anti- social behaviour down to simple biological factors which makes it easier to predict that males are more likely to commit crime or that females with higher levels of testosterone could explain why some females commit crime when others do not.

Damage to the pre-frontal cortex can also be used to explain criminal behaviour as it causes the offender to have impaires decision making which may cause them to make the wrong decision and commit crimes such as stealing cars or getting into fights. Research used to support biological explanations are often low in ecological validity as they test the functioning of the brain using scans such as Raine et al. who used a blurred number task to access the activity of the pre-frontal cortex so this is not representative of how the brain would function when offenders is in the process of committing crime. Also, using scientific equipment means that qualitative data about why a crime was committed is not collected, just which parts of the brain may have been involved so could be less useful in helping us to understand causes of…