| Gottfredson and Hirschi's "general" theory of crime, by definition, applies only to acts of force or fraud in the pursuit of self-interest committed by offenders with low self-control and a short time horizon. While the range of crimes thus described is impressive, it does not encompass everything. The present project uses the approach taken by Gottfredson and Hirschi by inferring the nature of the offender from the characteristics of crimes themselves, but examines crimes that, by definition, fall outside of control theory: hate crimes, war crimes, terrorism, and corporate and organizational crimes. The project aims to identify psychological constructs thought to underlie these other crimes and to test whether they are more successful than constructs based on low self-control and related concepts in explaining various types of crimes. A typology of crimes and their relevant psychological constructs will be presented, as well as data from our preliminary qualitative studies and psychometric investigations.
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Updated 05/20/2006