This file contains the key information, studies and evaluation points on the atavistic form. These studies have been sourced via several sources including the AQA second-year psychology textbook (found on the illuminate publishing website). This saves a lot of time you may spend searching for infor...
Evaluation of the atavistic form
- Sheldon (1949): Found that male delinquents were much more likely to be mesomorphs than male
students of a similar age. Also found that were least likely to be ectomorphic.
- Goring (1913): Found evidence that criminals tended to have lower than average intelligence (primate
like)
- Lombroso: Examined 383 living criminals. Found 21% had at least one atavistic trait and 43% had at
least five.
S - Glueck (1970): Found delinquents tended to mesomorphs
- Price (1966): Suggested that males with an extra Y chromosome (XYY), were predisposed towards
violent crime. XYY individuals are above average height and below average intelligence.
Kretschmer: Studied 4000 criminals and found that they fell into one of 4 types. Leptosomes tended to
be pretty thieves. Athletic people tended to commit violent crimes. Pyknic people tended to commit
crimes of deception and violence. Mixed people tended to commit more than one crime or crimes
against morality (e.g. prostitution).
P N/A
- Scientific racism: The traits that he identified to be more common with criminals are traits found in
black and African people. Eberhardt found that “stereotypically looking” black people are much more
likely to get the death penalty than those who were less “stereotypically black looking”, even if they had
committed similar offences.
I
- Alpha + Beta bias: Androcentric theory as it’s bases on male perspective and excludes female
perspective as he believed they were passive and unimportant. He generalised the findings of male PP’s
to females.
A N/A
- Charles Goring (1913): Compared 3000 criminals with non-criminals. Found no differences between
C the two, except criminals were smaller and lower intelligence.
✘No control group – means these traits could also be found in general population
✘ Lacks temporal validity
✘Goring’s findings may be because criminals grow up in areas with lack of education
✘Lombroso’s findings may be because criminals grow up with poverty, poor diet, illness and disease
E ✘Prisons and young detention centres often force prisoners to work out or chase them, which makes
them have more of a mesomorphic body type. Prisoners may feel an urge to develop a mesomorphic
body type in order to protect themselves
✘ Ears and noses tend to get longer as we age, so long ears and nose could be an age thing
D N/A
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