Page 15 - Flipbook: Sociology Shortcuts Issue 5: Situational Action Theory

In terms of propensity (a combination of levels of personal morality and self-
control) analysis of PADS+ data revealed two distinct groups:

1. Crime-averse youth rarely, if 2. Crime-prone youth, on the other
ever, committed crimes. This hand, held personal values and
(majority) group held personal moral beliefs that saw nothing
values and moral beliefs that particularly wrong with certain types
closely-aligned with law-abiding of crime and were not particularly
behaviour. In general they saw concerned about breaking the law.
crime as morally wrong and exerted This group had far lower levels of
a level of self-control over their self-control and their behaviour
behaviour that avoided law- tended to be impulsive and
breaking even when they found opportunistic.
themselves exposed to PROPENSITY
criminogenic settings. The most This was particularly evident in
crime-averse young people in the highly criminogenic settings: the
sample, around 15% of this group, most crime-prone 15% of this
accounted for less than 1% of group, for example, were
crime. responsible for around 60% of all
youth crime.

“Many young people

are ‘crime-averse’ and

simply don’t perceive

crime as a possible

course of action – it

doesn’t matter what

the situation is”:

Per-Olof Wickstrom

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