A03: Eysenck's Theory - Psychological Explanations

• Evaluation 


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• -ve: Outdated - A03 & Eysenck

  Theory has been criticised for being outdated.

  Both for having an outdated view of personality and for using tools that have not been updated over time, to measure personality.

  • The EPI was devised in the 1970s and researchers argue that since then, out understanding of personality has evolved considerably.

  This is a limitation as it suggests that trying to quantify people with the EPI will result in an invalid score and a more up to date methid is required. Since them, other models have been designed that cater for a wider range of traits.
• -ve: Real life application: A03 & Eysenck

  Real life application

  • Strength of this theory is that there could be positive implications as a result of claiming that personality is a key indicator of criminal tendencies.
  • This theory could contribute to developing parental schemes, school strategies or programmes that help to decrease levels of neuroticism & psychoticism, this reducing likelihood that kids may develop the 'PEN' criminal personality type.

  This would then allow criminal behaviour to be prevented, and for early detection of those who may end up committing crimes in the future.
• +ve & -ve: A03 & Eysenck

  Eysenck & Eysenck (1977) compared 2070 male prisoners scored on the EPI with 2422 controls (non criminals). (groups sub divided into age groups 16-69 years).

  • Prisoners scored high on P, E & N. (higher scores vs control which accords with the predictions of the theory)

  However, Farrington et al (1984) reviewed this study and reported that offenders tend to score high on P. But not always no E and N (little evidence of consistent differences in EEG measures between E & I which casts doubt on the physiological basis of Eysenck's theory.

  • McGurk & McDuggall (1981)
• Cultural Bias: A03 & Eysenck

  Cultural bias

  Bartol & Holanchock (1979) looked into cultural differences

  • They studied Hispanic & African-American offenders in a maximum security prison in New York and divided these into 6 groups based on their criminal history and the nature of their offence.
  • It was revealed that all 6 groups found to be less extravert than a non criminal control group.

  Bartol et al suggested that this was because their sample was a very different cultural group than that investigated by Eysenck, which questions the generalisability of the criminal personality.
• Overly Simplisitc

  • Moffitt (1993)
  • Digman's (1990)
• + Esyenck: RS

  Eysenck & Eysenck (1977) compared 2070 male prisoners' scores on the EPQ with 2422 male controls.

  • On measures of E, N and P (across all the age groups that were sampled) prisoners recorded higher average scores than controls.

  This agrees with the predictions of the theory that offenders rate higher than average across the 3 dimensions Eysenck identified.
• COUNTERPOINT to Eysenck: RS

  However, Farrington et al. (1981) conducted a meta-analysis and reported that offenders tended to score high on measures of P, but not for E and N.

  • Also inconsistent evidence of different cortical arousal in extraverts and introverts (Kussner 2017)

  This means some of the central assumptions of the criminal personality have been challenged.
• -Eysenck - All offending is explained b personality A03

  Moffitt (1993) distinguished between offending behaviour that only occurs in adolescence (adolescence - limited) and that which continues into adulthood (life-course-persistent).

  • She considers persistence in offending behaviour to be a reciprocal process between individual personality traits and environmental reactions to those traits.

  This is a more complex picture than Eysenck suggested, that offending behaviour is determined by an interaction between personality and the environment.
• -Eysenck: Cultural factors not taken into account A03

  Bartol & Holanchock (1979) studied Hispanic and African-American offenders in a New York maximum security prison, dividing them into 6 groups based on offending history & offences.

  • All 6 groups were less extraverted than a non-offender control group. Bartol and Holanchock suggested this was because the sample was a different cultural group from that investigated by Eysenck.

  This questions the generalisability of the criminal personality - it may be a culturally relative concept.
• -Eysenck: Measuring Personality A03

  The usefulness of the EPQ us that we can see how the criminal personality differs from the rest of the population across different dimensions.

  • However, personality, personality type may not be reducible to a 'score' in this way. The criminal personality is too complex and dynamic to be quantified.

  This may undermine any claims Eysenck made about being able to identify 'natural' offenders using the EPQ as personality may not be static.