“Successful” Offending: The Salience of Performance Criteria for Understanding and Addressing Crime

ABSTRACT

Drawing on prior work that views criminal behavior as potentially stemming from factors similar to those that influence conventional behavior, we argue that extant theories may provide a foundation for conceptualizing and explaining different dimensions of offending and that, at the same time, new theories may be needed to do so. In particular, we highlight that criminal behavior may be motivated by a variety of performance criteria similar to those used to evaluate success in athletic, occupational, or vocational activities. This paper develops a conceptual framework that advances this argument. It then highlights how taking into account the possibility for offending to be motivated or influenced by performance-based considerations may lead to new hypotheses or theories and more effective policy.

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Eli Mears and Emily Leventhal for a dinner discussion that led to this paper, Tiffaney Tomlinson for assistance in hunting down articles, and the Editor and reviewers at Deviant Behavior for guidance in and suggestions for strengthening it.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

Notes on contributors

Daniel P. Mears

Daniel P. Mears is a Distinguished Research Professor at Florida State University’s College of Criminology and Criminal Justice. A Fellow the American Society of Criminology and recipient of the Bruce Smith, Sr., Award from the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, he conducts research on crime and policy. He is the author of American Criminal Justice Policy (Cambridge University Press) and Out-of-Control Criminal Justice (Cambridge University Press), each of which received the Academy’s outstanding book award.

Mark C. Stafford

Mark C. Stafford is a Professor at Texas State University’s Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology. He also has been a faculty member at Washington State University and the University of Texas at Austin, where he was a founder of the Center for Criminology and Criminal Justice Research. In addition, he was a postdoctoral fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University and at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Professor Stafford was the IEAT-FORD Chair of Criminality, Violence, and Public Policy in the Institute of Interdisciplinary Advanced Studies at Federal University of Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil. He has published extensively on deterrence and rational-choice behavior, victimization and fear of crime, and causes of crime and delinquency. He is a co-author of American Delinquency (Wadsworth) and Sex Crimes and Sex Offenders (Routledge).