What is crime? Crime is an act of immoral and harmful behaviour. As crime is prohibited by the criminal law it is seen as an act against society. People who study crime are called criminologists. Criminology has many theories, which are based on biology, sociology and psychology. As we are looking at the psychology side of criminology, this again has many different theories to explain the way criminals behave.

There are various theories and explanations that have been used to account for the behaviour of criminals. Some of these theories include biological, psychoanalytic and social learning. The two I aim to look at and consider are biological and the social learning theories.

All of the theories attempt to explain criminal behaviour all represent part of the classic psychological debate of the nature versus the nurture debate. This being that behaviour is a result of our heredity of the environment. Then this being in relation to crime, are we born bad or made bad? Do we choose to go out and commit crime or do we have a built in program to go out and commit crime.

When we talk about the biological side of it we are talking about how our genes set limits

To conclude people who turn to crime will commit it for all sorts of very different reasons. If people believed what is stated in all the theories about crime then this would make policing a very easy job. However this is not the case and not all criminals' will look the same and act the same. There maybe some links to how and why people tun to crime in these theories, but however not all criminals will fit in to the theories. No matter if the person is from that of the biological or learning theories the majority of people will be able to link the problems to that of the environment, peer pressure or that of their place and standing in society.

However his work has been criticised on the grounds of methodological and on the grounds he rated the body types of his subjects himself. We all tend to stereo type criminals due to way of thinking. People will often say when reading or watching television " he/she looked like a criminal." All of this stereotyping is caused by media influence, television. Films and television make all criminals be seen as if they come from the same stable, this is to make it easier so that we recognise them.

Hormonal physiology is the study on how hormones can effect the behaviour of a person. There have been many different studies looking at the relationship between hormonal and criminal behaviour. One of great interest is that of the sex hormone testosterone. These hormones have a role in the sexual differentiation and behaviour. One psychologist Thiession 1990 makes a point that evidence suggests that normal levels of testosterone at our sexual maturity are associated with violence in committing rape. This is however not instrumental in causing rape. Even though hormones can be involved in the make up of criminals so also can be the learning process, this being we do things which are passed on from our parents, elders and so on. This process is called the learning process, there are theories based on how this will effect a criminal.

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Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)