Week 1_________________________________________________________________________ 2
An Overview of Life Course Theory and Research – benson _______________________ 2
Week 2_________________________________________________________________________ 6
Turning Points in the Life Course: Why Change Matters to the Study of Crime (Laub &
Sampson, 1993) ______________________________________________________________ 6
Adolescence-Limited and Life-Course-Persistent Antisocial Behavior: A
Developmental Taxonomy (Moffitt, 1993) _______________________________________ 8
Week 3________________________________________________________________________ 11
The Crime Drop and the Security Hypothesis (Farrell, Tseloni, Mailley, & Tilley, 2011)
____________________________________________________________________________ 11
Environmental Criminology (Sidebottom & Wortley, 2015/2016) _________________ 13
Week 4________________________________________________________________________ 16
Does the intergenerational transmission of crime depend on family complexity?
(Anker & Andersen, 2021) _____________________________________________________ 16
The Association Between Adverse Childhood Experiences, Neuropsychological
Deficits, and Experiences of Exclusionary Discipline in Early Childhood (Novak, 2022)
____________________________________________________________________________ 18
Week 5________________________________________________________________________ 21
Changing Contexts: A Quasi-Experiment Examining Adolescent Delinquency and the
Transition to High School (Freelin, McMillan, Felmlee, & Osgood, 2022) __________ 21
Peers and Offender Decision-Making (Hoeben & Thomas, 2019) _________________ 23
Week 6________________________________________________________________________ 27
Value orientations, life transitions, and desistance: Assessing competing
perspectives (Thomas, Nguyen, & Jackson, 2023) _______________________________ 27
Desistance from Crime during the Transition to Adulthood: The Influence of Parents,
Peers, and Shifts in Identity (Copp, Giordano, Longmore, & Manning, 2020) _______ 29
, Week 1
An Overview of Life Course Theory and Research – benson
I. Key Arguments (Main Arguments & Critical Points)
The main goal of the life course perspective is to understand the diversity of paths
individuals take through life, attempting to explain, for instance, why two children born into
similar disadvantaged circumstances may follow dramatically different trajectories (e.g., one
becoming a criminal, the other a doctor).
The LCP is not an explicit theory of anything, but rather an emerging paradigm or a way of
thinking about human lives and development.
Core Principles Guiding LCP Research:
1. Historical Time and Place: Human development is profoundly influenced by social
and historical conditions and changes. The life of an individual carries the imprint of
their particular social world. Examples include the dramatic effects of wars, economic
depressions (like the Great Depression of the 1930s), or social policies (like China's
"sending-down" policy) on educational, family, and occupational trajectories.
2. Timing in Lives (The Life Stage Principle): The impact of individual and social
events is determined by the age at which they occur. The same event can have
dramatically different effects depending on the life stage of the person experiencing it
(e.g., an arrest for drug use at age 11 versus age 23).
3. Linked Lives: Individual lives are interconnected, and events or changes in the lives
of others (such as family members or friends) can have a significant impact on one's
own trajectories. For example, a mother's incarceration can negatively affect a child's
psychological and social development.
4. Human Agency: Individuals actively construct their own life course through
choices and actions they take, operating within the opportunities and constraints
imposed by history and social circumstances.
Critical Arguments:
The life course perspective has been closely connected to the criminal career paradigm,
which leads to a significant limitation: a class-biased conceptualization of crime. The vast
majority of research focuses on ordinary street crime (Index crimes) and utilizes samples
based almost entirely on persons who have been arrested or incarcerated. This approach
ignores offenders who often do not appear in official statistics, such as those who commit
white-collar crimes. Since research suggests that careers in white-collar crime differ
substantially from street crime, the factors identified by LCP researchers as determinants of
street crime trajectories may not apply to white-collar criminals.
Another theoretical challenge is the definition of Human Agency, which is often described
as a "slippery" or "quasi-mystical" concept that is difficult for scientists to measure and
predict precisely.
An Overview of Life Course Theory and Research – benson _______________________ 2
Week 2_________________________________________________________________________ 6
Turning Points in the Life Course: Why Change Matters to the Study of Crime (Laub &
Sampson, 1993) ______________________________________________________________ 6
Adolescence-Limited and Life-Course-Persistent Antisocial Behavior: A
Developmental Taxonomy (Moffitt, 1993) _______________________________________ 8
Week 3________________________________________________________________________ 11
The Crime Drop and the Security Hypothesis (Farrell, Tseloni, Mailley, & Tilley, 2011)
____________________________________________________________________________ 11
Environmental Criminology (Sidebottom & Wortley, 2015/2016) _________________ 13
Week 4________________________________________________________________________ 16
Does the intergenerational transmission of crime depend on family complexity?
(Anker & Andersen, 2021) _____________________________________________________ 16
The Association Between Adverse Childhood Experiences, Neuropsychological
Deficits, and Experiences of Exclusionary Discipline in Early Childhood (Novak, 2022)
____________________________________________________________________________ 18
Week 5________________________________________________________________________ 21
Changing Contexts: A Quasi-Experiment Examining Adolescent Delinquency and the
Transition to High School (Freelin, McMillan, Felmlee, & Osgood, 2022) __________ 21
Peers and Offender Decision-Making (Hoeben & Thomas, 2019) _________________ 23
Week 6________________________________________________________________________ 27
Value orientations, life transitions, and desistance: Assessing competing
perspectives (Thomas, Nguyen, & Jackson, 2023) _______________________________ 27
Desistance from Crime during the Transition to Adulthood: The Influence of Parents,
Peers, and Shifts in Identity (Copp, Giordano, Longmore, & Manning, 2020) _______ 29
, Week 1
An Overview of Life Course Theory and Research – benson
I. Key Arguments (Main Arguments & Critical Points)
The main goal of the life course perspective is to understand the diversity of paths
individuals take through life, attempting to explain, for instance, why two children born into
similar disadvantaged circumstances may follow dramatically different trajectories (e.g., one
becoming a criminal, the other a doctor).
The LCP is not an explicit theory of anything, but rather an emerging paradigm or a way of
thinking about human lives and development.
Core Principles Guiding LCP Research:
1. Historical Time and Place: Human development is profoundly influenced by social
and historical conditions and changes. The life of an individual carries the imprint of
their particular social world. Examples include the dramatic effects of wars, economic
depressions (like the Great Depression of the 1930s), or social policies (like China's
"sending-down" policy) on educational, family, and occupational trajectories.
2. Timing in Lives (The Life Stage Principle): The impact of individual and social
events is determined by the age at which they occur. The same event can have
dramatically different effects depending on the life stage of the person experiencing it
(e.g., an arrest for drug use at age 11 versus age 23).
3. Linked Lives: Individual lives are interconnected, and events or changes in the lives
of others (such as family members or friends) can have a significant impact on one's
own trajectories. For example, a mother's incarceration can negatively affect a child's
psychological and social development.
4. Human Agency: Individuals actively construct their own life course through
choices and actions they take, operating within the opportunities and constraints
imposed by history and social circumstances.
Critical Arguments:
The life course perspective has been closely connected to the criminal career paradigm,
which leads to a significant limitation: a class-biased conceptualization of crime. The vast
majority of research focuses on ordinary street crime (Index crimes) and utilizes samples
based almost entirely on persons who have been arrested or incarcerated. This approach
ignores offenders who often do not appear in official statistics, such as those who commit
white-collar crimes. Since research suggests that careers in white-collar crime differ
substantially from street crime, the factors identified by LCP researchers as determinants of
street crime trajectories may not apply to white-collar criminals.
Another theoretical challenge is the definition of Human Agency, which is often described
as a "slippery" or "quasi-mystical" concept that is difficult for scientists to measure and
predict precisely.
