Psychodynamic:

• AO3:

  STRENGTH:

  • research to support the link between criminality and Superego
  • Goreta 1991 conducted a Freudian style analysis on 10 offender referred from psychiatric care
  • In all assessed, disturbances in Superego formation was diagonsed
  • Offenders stated they experienced unconscious feelings of guilt and anxiety
  • Goreta explained this as a consequence of an over-harsh superego due to he guilt and anxiety manifesting as a response to the desire to commit immoral behaviours and offend
  • This is support for the psychic conflicts and an over-harsh superego as a basis for offending
• AO3:

  LIMITATION:

  • However, the central principles of the inadequate Superego theory are not supported.
  • If correct we would expect harsh, punitive parents to raise children who constantly experience feelings of guilt and anxiety.
  • Evidence suggests, parents who rely on harsher forms of discipline tend to raise children who are rebellious and rarely express feelings of guilt or self-criticism (Kochanska et al. 2001).

  This calls into question the relationship between a strong, punitive internal parent and excessive feelings of guilt within the child.
• AO3:

  LIMITATION

  • Bowlbys theory is based on a association between maternal deprivation and offending
  • Lewis 1954 analysed data from interviews with 500 youths found that maternal deprivation was a poor predictor of future offending + the ability to form close relationships in adolescence
  • If there's a link between child who had a prolonged separation from their mum + offending in later life not necessarily a causal relationship
  • There's other reasons for this apparent link IE the maternal deprivation maybe due to growing up in poverty - might explain later offending