The Invisible Woman. Joanne Belknap
culture. Thus, Sutherland and Cressey’s gender-neutral approach exists only in words, not in content. What is additionally disturbing is the easy acceptance of Sutherland and Cressey’s view of males as “free to engage in a range of behaviors” and the view of girls as belonging in the family (Naffine, 1987). Further, girls’ perceived tendency toward abiding the law is portrayed as dull rather than as positive and moral (Naffine, 1987).
Feminist criticisms of DAT have centered mainly on Sutherland and Cressey’s decision to avoid discussing girls and women in any meaningful way (see K. J. Cook, 2016; Leonard, 1982; Naffine, 1987). K. J. Cook (2016, p. 336) takes this on most effectively by citing Sutherland and Cressey (1974) as stating “no other trait has as great a statistical importance as does sex in differentiating criminals from noncriminals,” and yet this was followed by their dismissal of sex and gender. K. J. Cook (2016) states, “And so, with the stroke of the pen, Sutherland and Cressey proclaim that the leading predictor of crime is inconsequential to understanding the causes of crime, and amputated gender from serious consideration by the scholarly community for decades to come” (p. 336). Some feminists have suggested, however, that DAT is a useful way of examining male and female delinquency rates and of explaining gender differences. Two points are important. First, girls’ relatively lower crime rates may largely be a result of the constraints they experience compared with boys. For example, at least traditionally, girls have been expected to stay closer to home, are more likely to have curfews, are more likely to be disciplined (particularly for minor infractions and sexual experimentation), and are generally provided less freedom than their brothers and other boys. The differential socialization of girls and boys, then, is believed to result in different or gendered behaviors of girls and boys (see Hoffman-Bustamante, 1973; Leonard, 1982; Lorber, 1994; Messner, 2000; Allison Morris, 1987; Ridgeway & Correll, 2004; Risman, 2004). The second point is that the increase in girls’ delinquency rates in the past couple of decades might be explained by females’ increased freedom. Even Cressey (1964) asserted that where there is greater gender equality, the association between crime and gender is likely to be lower.
Although Sutherland and Cressey failed to examine the relevance of DAT for an explanation of girls’ criminality, others did so, and DAT provides some useful insight to girls’ lower offending behaviors relative to boys’. For example, while finding support for DAT and a strong relationship between delinquent friends and delinquent behavior for both girls and boys, Hindelang (1971) reported that girls had fewer delinquent friends and less delinquent behavior than boys did. Giordano (1978) found delinquent girls were significantly influenced by their peers, but more so by their girl peers than their boy peers. Mears, Ploeger, and Warr (1998) found that while girls reported greater moral disapproval of all types of offenses, this could not solely explain boys’ higher rates of offending. Rather, it was this greater moral disapproval combined with the ability or desire to better block their delinquent peers’ influence that accounted for girls’ lower offense rates. Heimer and De Coster (1999) found that emotional bonds to families resulted in less attachment to violent behavior for girls (but not boys), traditional views of gender decreased girls’ (but not boys’) violence, and boys (but not girls) learned violence from aggressive friends and coercive parental discipline.
Social Learning Theory (SLT)
Social learning theory (SLT) originated in the late 1930s, with renowned psychologist B. F. Skinner positing the stimulus–response determinants of human behavior (i.e., with various stimuli, how do people respond?). Skinner’s explanations of behavior were via operant conditioning, or how behaviors are reinforced or modified via punishment and rewards (Ferster & Skinner, 1957; Skinner, 1938). N. E. Miller and Dollard’s Social Learning and Imitation, published in 1941, also posited the stimulus–response concept whereby behaviors are typically learned habits that are reinforced through social interactions. Albert Bandura furthered this theory, including a study comparing aggressive and nonaggressive boys (e.g., Bandura, 1973; Bandura & Walters, 1959). Akers and Burgess (e.g., Akers, 1985; Burgess & Akers, 1966) then integrated SLT and operant conditioning into Sutherland’s differential association theory (DAT, as a more comprehensive approach to explain criminal behavior, whereby operant conditions can move learners toward or away from crime. One of the encouraging aspects of SLT is that if criminal behavior can be learned, it can also be unlearned. Given that feminist scholars (see Giordano & Copp, 2019) and race scholars (e.g., Du Bois, 1899; Muhammad, 2010) have long held that environment/culture are the determinants of gender and race inequality, respectively, it is not surprising that they tend to support the posited parts of SLT.
M. B. Harris’s (1996) extensive overview of research on physically (not sexually) aggressive behavior found it more consistent with SLT than BSET, stating that “cultural norms and gender role stereotypes, previous experiences with aggression, attitudes toward the aggression of others, and judgments of the justifiability of retaliation are even more important influences on aggression” than are biological factors (p. 141). Rader and Haynes (2011) make a compelling argument for using SLT to study gendered fear of crime socialization: Women’s fear of crime is higher than men’s not because they are more likely to be victims, but because they are more likely to be victimized by rape and they are socialized by society to be afraid of rape. Notably, a study of women’s gun ownership from 1973 to 2010 found that despite gun manufacturers’ increased marketing to women (using women’s fear), there was; a decline in women’s gun ownership; researchers concluded that “hobbies and lifestyle factors may better explain women’s interests in firearms” than their fear of crime (Koeppel & Nobles, 2017, p. 43).
Social Control Theories (SCTs)
The theories discussed thus far have focused on what makes people break the law. Conversely, social control theories (SCTs) are more concerned with explaining what compels most of society to abide by the law.
Social Bond Theory (SBT): Conventional Ties
In his 1969 book Causes of Delinquency, Hirschi describes social bond or control theory (SCT) as focusing on what motivates people to obey laws. Given that girls are more law-abiding than boys, it seems an ideal question to include them (Naffine, 1987). Additionally, where delinquent boys were often celebrated and revered in prior theory that focused on why some people (boys and men) commit crimes, in Hirschi’s approach, the conforming (law-abiding) boy becomes ennobled and lauded as responsible, while the image of law-abiding girls in research testing the other theories are depicted as lifeless, boring, and dependent. In the prior studies asking, “Why do people offend?” the criminal boy is portrayed as exciting, instrumental, and masculine. In fact, Schur (1984) points out that men who conform are labeled “successful,” whereas there is little or no reward for conforming women. “What all this seems to indicate is a profound criminological tendency to devalue the female and value the male even when they are doing precisely the same things” (Naffine, 1987, p. 67).
Hirschi’s SCT examines four categories of “social bonds” that prevent youths from acting on their criminal desires: attachment, commitment, involvement, and belief. Specifically, youths’ offending likelihood is related to their ties to (1) conventional people (especially parents), (2) conventional institutions and behaviors in employment and recreation, and (3) the rules of society. Although Hirschi contended that “social controls are gender neutral” (Chui & Chan, 2012, p. 372) and he included girls in his sample, oddly, he only analyzed data from boys, and only white boys, with whom he confirmed the social bond hypothesis that, indeed, the (white) boys with stronger conventional ties were less likely to report delinquency. Like Sutherland and Cressey, then, Hirschi (1) promised a non-sex-specific theory, (2) started with girls and boys in the study, and (3) for no apparent reason left out the girls (Naffine, 1987). Or, as one of the first gender-race criminology scholars, Mann (1984), points out:
Travis Hirschi stratified his samples by race, sex, school, and grade. He included 1,076 black girls and 846 nonblack girls; but in the analysis of his data Hirschi admits “the girls disappear,” and he adds, “Since girls have been neglected for too long by students of delinquency, the exclusion of them is difficult to justify. I hope I return to them soon.” He didn’t. (p. 263)
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