Theory Explaining Crime in Gender Specific Approach

Gender-Specific Theory of Delinquency Several theories have strived to explain delinquency and crime within the society, most of which center around the individual and the personal make up or biology, yet others focus on the surrounding that the individual grows up in and the people they interact with.

There are theories that are gender specific in that they tend to explain how the fact that an individual is of a given gender is a predisposition to get involved in some given crime or delinquency within the society, one of such theories which will also form the focus of the paper is the social learning theory. The society often ascribe gender specific roles that the girls and the boys are implicitly expected to adhere to.

The girls are often expected to take up some form of behavior, often subtle, though effective way of perpetuating the responsibilities and characters that are deemed feminine. The same applies to the male members of the society where they are required to portray some kind of behavior which will significantly distinguish them from the female gender. The different gender may not be directly lectured on how to behave but will interact with same gender that behave in such a manner as modeled by the society, hence imbibing the behavior.

Once an individual starts imbibing and reacting by embracing or rejecting a given behavior of the gender, the society will then make the behavior pronounced through punishing or reinforcing the behavior displayed. This is often not universally applied but is gender specific, with the members of the society modeling the girl or the boy into a behavior that they are supposed to adhere to. The children will then adopt to the generally accepted behavior of their gender (Smith M. & Berge Z., 2009:Pp440).

This is the trend that applies to the delinquency that the children finally find themselves in. Often, the society deems boys to be more cunning and stubborn especially at the teenage, they are seen to like forming groups of peers and generally engage in small time fist fights, facts that do not raise any alarm among the parents generally. This means that these are behaviors that are generally accepted among the boys.

It helps explain the predominance of boys in the boy gangs where there are even violent trends of induction when a new member would like to join. It is also generally acceptable that girls will grow up at some stage to be involved with rebellious activities like locking themselves in their rooms, be with some boyfriend and attend some girl parties with elder men.

Once such behaviors are generally accepted within the society, the new members of the society grow up to the inculcated into them, with reinforcement and punishments given by the parents in an effort to model the individual (Albert Badnura, 1971:Pp5). Girls may be admonished more if they engage in fights as compared to young boys who may be appreciated for expressing their manly side and defending what is rightly their. Boys of the other hand may be admonished if they are seen hanging around company of older females.

Reaction to such stimulus will eventually shape the behavior of the different genders in varying ways hence dictating the kind of crimes that the girls and boys may engage in as they grow up. It is such societal forces that.