Perception and Choice: Comparing Situational Action Theory and Social-Psychological Views on Self-Control.

• In Event: WG-PLACE 4: Perspectives on Crime and Criminal Behaviour

Abstract

Situational Action Theory (SAT) (Wikström et al., 2012) offers a well-tested (Pauwels et al., 2018) but still discussed (Hirtenlehner et al., 2022; Kroneberg and Schulz, 2018) view on the situational process of criminal acts. The situational analysis in this regard focuses on the interaction of personal morality and aspects of the setting when perceiving a criminal action alternative, as well as deterrence and self-control when choosing such an action alternative. Compared to other theoretical perspectives (Gottfredson and Hirschi, 1990; Hofmann et al., 2012), the role of self-control is rather restricted and is only relevant under certain circumstances. With an interest of empirically comparing explanations of crime, this view is contested by another explanation that has no criminological background, but a cybernetic one. In the context of the so-called control theory (Carver, 2004; Carver and Scheier, 1982, 2008), a hierarchical regulation system is used to explain human behavior. Thus, humans are viewed as goal directed acting beings. This perspective is elaborated to be comparable to the perception and choice view of SAT. It is argued, that self-control can be seen as a set of strategies under the perspective of control theory where one of these strategies influence the perception of action alternatives, while another set is relevant for the aspect of choosing (criminal) action alternatives. Results show that SAT is in general better suitable to explain the perception of a criminal action alternative and the intention of a criminal act, but that the explanation of perceiving criminal action alternatives could profit from theoretical integration.

Author

• Adrian Jakob, Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences