I hope this presentation is well received. I was nervous while I was speaking!

1. Samantha Obazee
Governors State University

2.  “Birds of a feather flock
together.”
 Correlation between the
criminal lifestyle and choice
of friends?
 Important to social
psychologists and
Photo courtesy of
criminologists (Boduszek et http://laist.com/attachments/la_zach/
al., 2012, p. 21) inmates-wildfires-prisoners.jpg
◦ Helps determine who is
more likely to commit a
crime
 Criminal friends influence
criminal

3.  Social Learning Theory (Lilly, Cullen, & Ball, 2011, p.
57)
◦ Differential Association Theory
 Peer associations
 Social attitudes
 Albert Bandura (Boduzsek et al., 2012, p. 19)
◦ Vicarious learning
 Exposure to positive attitudes towards criminal
behavior (Boduszek et al., 2012, p. 20)
 More than criminal attitudes
◦ Criminal friends = criminals

4.  133 Male Violent Offenders (Boduszek et al., 2012, p.
21)
◦ Ages 20 to 66
◦ Nowogard High Security Prison
◦ Recidivists
 The Measure of Criminal Attitudes and Associates
[MCAA] (Boduszek et al., 2012, p. 22)
◦ Two-part questionnaire
 Part A: Quantifies criminal associations
 Part B: 46 questions
 Likert Scale
 Agree/Disagree

5.  V = Attitudes towards
Violence
 E = Sense of
Entitlement
 I = Criminal Intent
 A = Attitudes towards
Criminal Associates
 CF = Associations with
Photo courtesy of Boduszek et al.
Criminal Friends (2012)
 REC = Recidivism

6. Photo courtesy of Boduszek et al.
(2012)

7.  “Although an individual can
acquire criminal-typical
attitudes and beliefs and have
such attitudes be both
available and accessible within
the cognitive structure, their
mere presence or accessibility
alone is insufficient to predict
or give rise to criminal
Photo courtesy of Boduszek et al.
behavior.” (Boduszek et (2012)
al., 2012, p. 27)
 Sense of entitlement and
attitudes towards criminal
associates are mediated by the
role of associations with

8.  Pros
◦ First empirical support for the hypothesis (Boduszek et al., 2012, p. 26)
◦ Consistent with previous research
 American
 Canadian
 Swedish
◦ Adds to multicultural criminological literature
 Criminal behavior is universal
 Cons
◦ Retrospective
 “Impossible to determine whether or not the criminal attitudes reported by
the participants in the study were present at the time they committed their
crimes, or at least present to the same level of intensity.” (Boduszek et
al., 2012, p. 27)
◦ A person can enter a prison with low levels of criminal attitudes and
develop more of these attitudes

9. Boduszek, D. et al. (2012). Criminal
attitudes, recidivistic behaviour, and the mediating role
of associations with criminal friends: An empirical
investigation within a prison sample of violent
offenders. Europe's Journal Of Psychology, 8(1), 19-
28. doi:10.5964/ejop.v8i1.296
Lilly, J. R., Cullen, F. T., & Ball, R. A. (2011). Rejecting
Individualism: The Chicago School. Criminological
theory: Context and consequences (5th ed., p. 57).
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.