Integrating Mainstream Criminological Theory Into the Biosocial Perspective: an Empirical Analysis Joseph A
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Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2014 Integrating Mainstream Criminological Theory into the Biosocial Perspective: An Empirical Analysis Joseph A. Schwartz Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF CRIMINOLOGY AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE INTEGRATING MAINSTREAM CRIMINOLOGICAL THEORY INTO THE BIOSOCIAL PERSPECTIVE: AN EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS By JOSEPH A. SCHWARTZ A Dissertation submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Degree Awarded: Summer Semester, 2014 Joseph A. Schwartz defended this dissertation on May 22, 2014. The members of the supervisory committee were: Kevin M. Beaver Professor Directing Dissertation Stephen J. Tripodi University Representative William B. Bales Committee Member Thomas G. Blomberg Committee Member The Graduate School has verified and approved the above-named committee members, and certifies that the dissertation has been approved in accordance with university requirements. ii To my beautiful and loving wife Jen, you are my best friend, greatest advocate, and the source of my happiness. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS First and foremost, I would like to acknowledge my mentor, Dr. Kevin Beaver. I am sure that whatever feeble attempt I make to demonstrate just how much of an impact Dr. Beaver has had on my life will be fully inadequate. Dr. Beaver’s patience, commitment, intellectual prowess, and generosity are simply unparalleled. I truly admire his endless hunger for knowledge and his fearless pursuit of it. Dr. Beaver has taught me so much more than the fundamental aspects of research and teaching, he has taught me to aggressively pursue my goals, the true value of hard work, and how to answer the questions I seek to answer. Perhaps even more importantly, he has taught me how to be a better person. Through example, he has shown me how to be a better husband, and one day, how to be a better father. I am certain that my efforts will pale in comparison, but I hope that I will be able to pass some of the knowledge and experiences he has instilled in me to my future students. Thank you so much for taking me under your wing, your efforts have not gone unnoticed and I will never forget the guidance and support you have provided. I would also like to acknowledge the scholars who were generous enough with their time to serve on my dissertation committee: Dr. William Bales, Dean Thomas Blomberg, and Dr. Stephen Tripodi. Your support, guidance, and advice through this process has been invaluable not only in regard to the improvement of my dissertation but also to my development as a scholar and a criminologist. To receive input from scholars of this caliber is truly an honor and I am deeply grateful for the time and energy they have contributed to this project and my scholarly evolution. I would like to especially acknowledge Dean Thomas Blomberg for his influential advice and guidance during the latter portion of my graduate career. I sincerely appreciate each and every conversation we have engaged in, and I thank you for your perpetual support. I would also like to acknowledge the multitude of other scholars who I have had the honor of interacting with and learning from. First, I would like to thank the faculty in the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at FSU for challenging me to reach my potential and for providing the necessary support along the way. In addition, I would like to sincerely thank the faculty of the Department of Criminal Justice at California State University, San Bernardino for sparking my interest in criminology and for encouraging me to pursue my goals. iv I would like to especially acknowledge the assistance of Dr. Gisela Bichler, Dr. Larry Gaines, Ms. Mary Schmidt, Dr. Pamela Schram, and Dr. Stephen Tibbetts. Without the encouragement of Dr. Schram I likely would not have pursued a graduate degree and without the guidance of Dr. Tibbetts I may still be unaware of the causal influences of biology on the underlying etiology of behavior. Thank you for all of your advice, support, and guidance during my entire career as a student, I am certain that I would not have been able to accomplish my goals without you. I would also like to thank my fellow graduate students at Florida State. I have been fortunate enough to have forged many friendships during my time in Tallahassee. I cannot express how grateful I am for the times I was able to share with many of you. I can honestly say that I will look back fondly over my time as a graduate student at FSU, and I have plenty of stories to share with my future graduate students and colleagues (most of which revolve around conversations or experiences in the Hecht House basement). A special acknowledgement is in order for Eric Connolly and Joe Nedelec. I am certain that my time as a graduate student would have been far less productive and certainly less entertaining had I not been fortunate enough to cross paths with the two of you. Thank you both for your friendship, support, and guidance. Words simply cannot describe the amount of support I have received from my family. I would like to sincerely thank my father, Joe Schwartz, and mother, Kim Schwartz, for their unwavering support and guidance over the course of my entire life. They both have instilled in me the importance of hard work and striving to achieve excellence in all I do. Thank you both for being such amazing parents. I would also like to thank my younger brother Allan Schwartz, whose strength, tenacity, and drive are enviable (as difficult as that is for an older brother to admit). I am excited to see what your future, with my future sister-in-law Brittany Hernandez, holds. I would also like to thank my younger sister, Shavaun Schwartz. I am certain that my trips back home would have been far less entertaining without our conversations. In addition, my fashion sense has certainly benefited from your advice (and ridicule, for that matter). I would also like to thank my grandmother, Ann West, and grandfather, Al Schwartz, both of whom have provided me with invaluable advice and support. Thank you both so much, I love you very much. Finally, I would like to thank my wife’s family who have taken me in as one of their own, and allowed me to move their daughter across the country. I am extremely grateful for their patience, understanding, and support over the past several years. v I have saved my final acknowledgement for my beautiful and loving wife, Jen. I simply cannot imagine going through this entire process without her love, support, and friendship. You are my rock, and I can say with certainty that I would not have been able to attempt, let alone accomplish, this achievement without you. I am fully aware of the sacrifices you have made in order for me to pursue my dreams. How you were able to tolerate all of the times I have babbled on about something I was working on, or the long nights and weekends I had to spend working, or the holidays we had to spend away from family and friends back home without even one complaint is nothing short of remarkable and exemplifies just how simply amazing you are. The fact that you were so willing to sacrifice your own goals and dreams so that I could selfishly pursue my own speaks directly to your generous and loving nature. Simply put, you are the most beautiful and amazing woman I have ever met, as long as I have your support I know that I can accomplish anything. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I’m sure that I have omitted several others who have guided or supported me along the way. I have been fortunate enough to have come across many, many people who have impacted my life in so many different ways and to name them all here would require far more space than has been allotted. I would like to sincerely thank each and every one of you. This research uses data from Add Health, a program project directed by Kathleen Mullan Harris and designed by J. Richard Udry, Peter S. Bearman, and Kathleen Mullan Harris at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and funded by grant P01-HD31921 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, with cooperative funding from 23 other federal agencies and foundations. Special acknowledgment is due to Ronald R. Rindfuss and Barbara Entwisle for assistance in the original design. Information on how to obtain the Add Health data files is available on the Add Health website (http://www.cpc.unc.edu/addhealth). No direct support was received from grant P01-HD31921 for this analysis. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Tables ................................................................................................................................. xi List of Figures ............................................................................................................................. xiii Abstract ........................................................................................................................................ xiv CHAPTER 1 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM ........................................................................ 1 1.1 Research Questions ............................................................................................................... 4 1.2 Outline..................................................................................................................................