• Genetic theories believe criminality is inherited

• the closer you are related to someone criminal the higher the likelihood of sharing the same characteristics this is known as a concordance rate

• so if my parents are crimson there is a higher concordance rate than if my cousin was a criminal

• one way it can be studied is twins

• two types Monozygotic and Dizygotic twins

• MZ - 100% same DNA = higher concordance rate

• DZ - 50% same DNA like siblings

  6 marker

• Ishikawa and Raine 44% concordance in MZ and only 22% in DZ

• Lange 10/13 MZ twins both served time in prison compared to 2/17 in DZ

  
  

• genetic theories believe criminality is inherited

• genetic theories believes the closer you are related to someone criminal the higher likelihood of sharing the same characteristics known as concordance rate

• if my parents are criminal i have a higher chance of being criminal compared to if my cousin was a criminal

• one way to show this is adoption

• if higher concordance rate with biological parents compared to adoptive parents criminality must be inherited

• Hutchings and Mednick studied 14,000 adopted sons. They found that sons were more likely to have a criminal record if a birth parent also had a record finding a 20% concordance rate but only a 14% concordance rate with adoptive parents

  6 marks

• Mednick et al found no relationship between criminal records of adoptive parents and children but there is with biological parents and their offspring

• Crowe found a 50% concordance rate between biological mother and only 5% with adoptive mother

  
  

Examine the strengths of biological theories to explain criminality (6)

Describe one genetic theory (6)

Describe the genetic theories (9)