6.2.2: Psychological Explanations

 6.2.2: Psychological Explanations

 Psychologists focus on abnormalities within the individual. Instead of genes, they examine what are called personality disorders. Their supposition is that deviating individuals have deviating personalities (Euler et al. 2019) and that subconscious motives drive people to deviance. 

Researchers have never found a specific childhood experience to be invariably linked with deviance.

 For example, some children who had “bad toilet training,” “suffocating mothers,” or “emotionally aloof fathers” become embezzling bookkeepers—but others become good accountants

. Just as college students and police officers represent a variety of childhood experiences—both good and bad—so do deviants. 

Similarly, people with “suppressed anger” can become freeway snipers or military sharpshooters—or anything else.

 In short, there is no inevitable outcome of any childhood experience. Deviance is not associated with any particular personality.