Eysenck's personality types as an explanation of criminality

1. Eysenck (1964) explained criminality through personality, arguing that the personality you are born with makes offending more or less tempting.
2. He treated personality as largely inherited, and that is what makes this a biological explanation rather than a learning one.
3. He described personality using dimensions, so a person sits somewhere along a scale rather than falling into a fixed box.

Extraversion and introversion

1. Extraversion describes someone outgoing and sociable who becomes bored easily and looks for excitement and stimulation.
   1. Eysenck linked this end of the dimension to offending, because someone who seeks excitement finds risky behaviour more tempting.
2. Introversion is the opposite end of the same dimension, describing someone quiet and reserved who is content with calm surroundings.
   1. An introvert is less drawn to risk, so Eysenck expected offending to be less likely at this end.

Neuroticism

1. Neuroticism describes how emotionally unstable someone is, meaning how anxious, moody and easily upset they are.
2. The opposite end is emotional stability, describing someone calm and even-tempered under pressure.
3. Eysenck argued that high neuroticism raises the risk of offending, because strong reactions can tip into impulsive acts that a calmer person would not commit.

Psychoticism

1. Psychoticism describes someone cold and aggressive who lacks empathy and shows little concern for how other people feel.
2. Eysenck saw this dimension as the one most closely tied to serious and violent offending, because someone who does not feel for a victim has less holding them back.

How the dimensions combine

1. Eysenck argued that the risk is highest when someone scores towards the extreme on more than one dimension at the same time.
2. Someone high in extraversion and high in neuroticism is both drawn to excitement and quick to react, a combination he thought was hard to socialise into following rules.
3. Adding a high psychoticism score removes much of the concern for others that would otherwise hold the behaviour back.

Strengths of the theory

1. A strength is that the dimensions can be measured with a personality questionnaire, so the theory produces scores that can be tested against real groups instead of only being described.
2. A second strength is that it has a practical use, because identifying a raised risk early could allow support to be offered before any offending starts.

Weaknesses of the theory

1. A weakness is that the evidence rests on self-report, and people can answer dishonestly or to look better than they are, so the scores may lack validity.
2. A second weakness is that many people who offend do not fit the pattern, and one personality profile cannot cover offences as different as fraud and violence.

Turning this into marks

1. Name the dimension and say what a person who scores high on it is like.
2. Quote the behaviour in the scenario that shows the dimension, because that link carries its own mark.
3. The mark most often lost is balance, so pair a strength with a weakness whenever you weigh the theory up.