Over the centuries, three “schools” of criminology have emerged: biological, psychological, and sociological. This discussion focuses on the various sociological schools of crime causation and the theories associated. The Chicago School of criminology is considered to be the foundation for the sociological study of crime in the United States. Its origins date back to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries in Europe with the credit going to the writings of Emily Durkheim, Max Weber, and Auguste Comte. The sociological perspective shifted the focus from the internal factors of individuals (biological or psychological) to external, environmental factors (sociological). In Durkheim’s book, The Division of Labor in Society, he writes about consequences of shifting from a small town society, he calls “mechanical,” to a modern, large “organic” society (Durkheim, 1997). From this, the term anomie came about. Anomie is “a lack of norms or clear social standards. Because of rapidly shifting moral values, the individual has few guides to what is socially acceptable (Siegal, 2015). In the early twentieth century, a group of sociologist, Robert Ezra Park (1864-1944), Ernest W. Burgess (1866-1966), Louis Wirth (1897-1952), and other colleagues at the University of Chicago researched the connection between environmental factors and crime. This became known as the Chicago School of criminology. The sociologists studied how the effect of community factors, such as poverty, affected crime rates. The conclusion was that some communities were just “natural areas” for crime but those with high poverty rates had a much higher crime rate (Siegel, 2015).

The theories associated with this time period are social structure theory and the social process theory. The social structure theory emerged from the original Chicago School sociological vision. This theory claims that an individual’s social status regulates their behavior. Those who live in poverty experience failure, frustration, and social pressure which often leads to criminal behavior (Siegel, 2015). The social process theory focuses attention on socialization. These theorist believe that children learn to commit crime by watching and modeling the actions of those they admire (Siegel, 2015).

Durkheim, E. & In Simpson, G. (1993). Emile Durkheim on The division of labor in society. New York: Macmillan.

Siegel, L.J. (2015). Criminology: The core (5^th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.