The varying purposes of prison labor and labor-oriented programs are discussed in light of positive and classical criminological theories relating employment/unemployment, income, and crime. Labor programs, based on the punitive classical model, have utilized labor as punishment, assuming a reduction in recidivism would result; applications of positive theories have assumed that more substantial post-release employment, achieved by prison labor programs through habituation, anti-idleness, skill enhancement, or bonding, would also result in a reduction in recidivism. / Through the development of critical explanations of the relationship between the state, punishment, and labor, it is argued that effective labor programs would not be achieved due to competing, and more important, concerns of the state under capitalism. In addition, programs geared to change at the individual level would fail to address more important structural concerns, resulting in no substantial change in unemployment or crime rates. Hypotheses are developed to test alternate assumptions of the classical, positive, and critical models. / Using two years of follow-up data on 1210 ex-offenders released from the Florida Department of Corrections, the relationship between post-release employment and rearrest, as well as the impact of prison labor programs on these two indicators were studied. Results showed primarily weak, non-significant, negative relationships between employment level and crime, caused by the extremely low variance in employment status of ex-offenders and by surprisingly lower recidivism rates for unemployed than for underemployed offenders. No prison labor to labor-oriented program was found to significantly effect recidivism rates. While participants in two programs, community work release and vocational education, had higher post-release employment levels than non-participants, the weak impact of these programs failed to result in any reduction in recidivism rates. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 45-08, Section: A, page: 2660. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1984.

Using data for 193 United States Standard Metropolitan Statistical Areas in 1970 and 1972, an attempt was made to explain the sources of variance in the official rates of homicide, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, larceny and auto theft. It was hypothesized that variance in crime rates was a function of the capacity to control conduct among metropolitan areas. Capacity to control was said to reside in the degree of organization, the extent of participation and the amount of resources devoted to formal control in a metropolitan area. Income inequality, overcrowding and population mobility were used as indicators of metropolitan organization. Marriage rates, voting rates and money deposited in savings accounts were used as positive indicators of participation; divorce rates were used as a negative indicator. Employment in education and employment in law enforcement were used as indicators of resources devoted to formal control. Region, median income, the rate of black residents, the rate of poor families, the rate of unemployed and population size were used as control variables. Multiple regression analyses using ordinary least squares and two-stage least squares solutions were performed to test the hypotheses and to compare the findings to those of earlier researchers. A total of 150 relationships were examined and of those, 44 were in accord with hypothesis. Income inequality, overcrowding, population mobility, police strength, the rate of blacks, the rate of unemployed and population size were found to be the most important predictors of the crime rates. The results were interpreted as providing limited support for the control perspective upon which the study was based. The strain perspective was also supported. Only the relationship between race and the crime rates could be construed as supportive of the cultural deviance perspective. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 44-07, Section: A, page: 2252. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1983.

Evidence relevant to the hypothesis that androgens alter nervous system functioning in ways that enhance human tendencies to engage in criminal behavior was the focus of the dissertation. Among the major lines of evidence were the following: (1) Restricting the inquiry initially only to criminal acts which victimize fellow social group members (victimful offenses), evidence reviewed that age and sex variables appear to be related to victimful offenses (or their nonlegal equivalent) in quite consistent ways in all human societies ever studied. (2) Notably similar victimizing behavior has been documented in many other species, and variability in such behavior seems to be highly influenced by androgenic effects upon the nervous systems of the animals involved. (3) The most important brain part which appears to be perinatally and pubertally androgenized in such ways as to increase the probability of victimizing behavior is the reticular activating system (and its supporting autonomic nervous tissue). The effects of androgens on this arousal control mechanism are subtle and complex, but they generally seem to consist of causing an organism to be less sensitive to whatever impact it is having upon it's environment. (4) The other two general brain portions which appear to have their functioning altered by androgens in ways which increase the probability of victimizing behavior are the "emotion control" portion and the "higher thought" portion. Overall, androgenization of the emotion control portion appears to make seizuring more likely in the face of emotionally provocative environmental stimuli. Androgenization of the higher thought centers seems to render organisms somewhat more inclined toward spatial-wholistic styles of thought, rather than logical (and, in humans, linguistic) styles of thought. (5) Considered together, it is concluded that these three / apparent effects of androgens on the nervous system make mammals generally more likely to victimize fellow social group members. In the case of humans, one of the major effects is an increased probability of victimful criminal behavior (or its nonlegal equivalent). / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 44-10, Section: A, page: 3169. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1983.

The Quaker era in American corrections is traditionally characterized in criminological literature as the brief experiment with substitution of imprisonment for the sanguinary corporal and capital punishments of England and the other colonies by William Penn in 1682, and as the subsequent rebirth of the philosophy by Philadelphia Quakers between 1790-1840. / The premise underlying this research is that the origin and evolution of American correctional philosophy cannot be fully and accurately understood from any perspective that limits the Quaker influence to early periods of American history. The study elaborates the direct and indirect influence of a Quaker social reform movement which began in Europe in 1670 and continues today as a vital and viable force behind correctional public policy in the United States. Although the strength and impact of the Quaker social reform movement, the "holy experiment," as William Penn termed it, has waxed and waned over the past three centuries, the efforts of the Society of Friends to attain social justice in correctional reform has been a continuous social reform movement. / The present research interprets the Quaker correctional reforms in America as a single social movement which evolved in distinct stages over a period of three hundred years. The theoretical frame of reference is a social contextual perspective, which considers the events in the social, political and economic context of the time. / The evolution of the American correctional philosophy can be seen as a single, extended social movement which began with the Quaker persecution in Europe and the subsequent migration to America; evolved into an utopian effort to establish a new and better means of dealing with the criminal; and, further developed into a reform effort, diffusing the gospel of the "penitentiary" and the new "prison discipline." Its basic philosophy remained for the next one hundred years the foundation of American correctional policy, only to be reexamined in the mid-twentieth century and found wanting by the same reformers who established it, and the struggle for reform began again. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-03, Section: A, page: 1068. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

This critical examination of existing criminal laws and regulatory schemes governing the manufacture, sale and possession of narcotic substances seeks to analyze and consider the implications of complex recent pharmacological findings regarding endorphins, the endogenous opiate-like chemicals. Focusing primarily upon current federal laws, the writer finds them to be of problematic utility and when viewed in the context of the new psychopharmacological evidence not rational in a legal sense. Selected bodies of literature from the social, medical, and legal disciplines are reviewed in order to seek plausible, if presently theoretical, answers to pertinent questions raised by the recent scientific data. After presenting an overview of the existing laws and the most relevant pharmacological data the writer proceeds to develop the bases for his thesis that existing laws are inconsistent with the implications of the combination of psychopharmacological discoveries with criminal law and judicial practice. Further, the consequences of that inconsistency are discussed, including issues of constitutionality and due process under contemporary statutory structures. In the legislative-oriented component of the dissertation, an attempt is made to propose the enactment of new federal law(s), in order to avoid a legal impasse with regard to criminal controls on narcotic substances that may be precipitated once synthetic endorphin-like chemicals are generally available. A new category of "drug" substance under applicable food and drug law and criminal statutes is proposed, the pharmacological recognition of which may have significant impact upon domain assumptions in criminology and upon criminal legislation and judicial practice. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 47-03, Section: A, page: 1069. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1986.

A host of studies have examined the religiosity-deviance relationship in a variety of ways. Various measures of religiosity and deviance have been utilized in many different settings to determine the relationship between religious commitment and deviance. These studies essentially attempted to discover the degree to which religiosity acts as a social control mechanism in preventing delinquency and criminal activity. / The present research takes two areas that have been neglected in the religiosity-deviance literature as points of departure. The first area by-passed by scholars in the study of religious commitment as a means of rehabilitation. The second area overlooked by researchers is the study of religious commitment among prison inmates. Social control theory provides the theoretical rationale in which these two neglected areas are examined. / Several methodological shortcomings in the religiosity-deviance literature are addressed in the present research through the construction of religiosity indexes and the use of path analysis. This is done in an effort to more accurately measure religiosity. / This study examines data collected on the inmate population (n=782) released from 1978 through 1982 at the Apalachee Correctional Institution (ACI), in Chattahoochee, Florida. Religious variables, religiosity indexes, and institutional adjustment indexes, represent the three sets of variables scrutinized in the analysis in order to determine the impact of religiosity upon institutional adjustment of prison inmates. / The findings indicate that those inmates exhibiting the greatest degree of religious commitment are no more likely to attend institutional church services or activities than inmates exhibiting little or no religious commitment. More importantly, religiosity of prison inmates does not have a statistically significant impact upon their institutional adjustment. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 46-01, Section: A, page: 0269. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1984.

By a 1978 legislation, the State of Florida legislated to commit itself to the alternative education concept. Having recognized that the regular school program was not satisfying the academic needs of certain students, thereby leading to apathy, disruptiveness, truancy, poor scholarship, failure and delinquency, the Legislature urged that school districts establish alternative education programs as positive educational remedies. / This study proposed to provide an empirical assessment of the outcome of Florida's experiment with alternative education. / To avoid bias in findings associated with the use of aggregate data alone, two levels of measurement were performed. At the macro-level, statewide education data were examined. At the micro-level, case study and participant observation were conducted at a North Florida alternative school. Other schools were visited, and interviews conducted with school authorities, legislators and state agency personnel. Questionnaires were administered to students at the alternative school. / The analysis of the statewide data showed general program ineffectiveness. The alternative school study showed appreciable improvements in student affective and behavioral growth, in attitude toward school and in scholarship, and high academic and occupational aspirations, despite low standard-test performance. / Methodologically, the study showed that aggregate data obliterate differences between programs, fail to identify successful programs, and the reasons for success or failure. Substantively, it showed that school districts may have inadequately implemented the program, although individual programs, committed to the alternative education philosophy and praxis, may have been successful in its implementation and outcome. These findings suggest that efforts to reform institutions without changing the system are unlikely to succeed, and that evaluators should be sensitive to the dynamics and complexities of policy development and implementation. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 48-03, Section: A, page: 0751. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987.

Racial minorities and lower class persons are, relative to the general population, overrepresented in our courts, jails, and prisons. Conflict theory asserts that this empirical fact is a result of racial and class discrimination while functionalists claim minorities and less economically advantaged persons commit more crime and, therefore, are more likely to be prosecuted and punished. / This study measured the effect of race and class on five prosecution decisions and several in/out and length of punishment decisions. Some 125 past studies were categorized based on the specific prosecution or punishment measure employed. A host of methodological characteristics and measures of the findings of each study were coded and analyzed in a "meta-analysis" format to determine the overall level of race and class discrimination evidenced in past research. / The analysis of past studies revealed that, when the punishment measures were disaggregated, there was convincing evidence of race or class bias in specific decision points in the state's prosecution and punishment apparatus. The need for more studies with higher levels of methodological rigor was evident from summary statistics indicating the number of studies which have controlled for key variables, the number of cases sampled, etc. / An analysis of two jurisdictions in Florida was conducted in which five prosecution decisions, seven in/out punishment, and eight length of punishment measures were used. The punishment measures were further specified by whether they indicated sentencing to or time served in jail, incarceration, or prison. / Forty hypotheses emanating from conflict theory were empirically tested using two multivariate modeling techniques; probit (in/out decisions), and ordinary least squared regression (length of punishment measures). Ten of the forty hypotheses were supported with the data. Blacks and whites were equally likely to be prosecuted at five different stages. Blacks were significantly more likely to be punished (an "in" decision) in four of the seven probit models. Lower class persons were more likely to have charges pursued against them and to be prosecuted than upper class persons. Four hypotheses predicting an inverse relationship between class and punishment were supported, all of which involved in/out decisions. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 48-03, Section: A, page: 0751. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1987.

In the early 1900s researchers began to examine various dimensions of the human personality. Throughout the years this research has solidified the notion that there are several master traits that every individual possess to some degree or another that can adequately account for most of the between person variation in personality. One of the most well-known models is the five-factor model of personality. This model divides the personality of an individual into five master traits: extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness, agreeableness, and openness to experience. The five-factor model has garnered a plethora of empirical support and has been found to be stable over the life course, manifest across cultures, and apply to all demographics of people. Research has also demonstrated that certain behaviors, such as drug use and criminal involvement, vary by where someone falls on the personality spectrum for each trait. While this type of research is not new, it is rarely done in the field of criminology. As such, this dissertation seeks to address this gap in criminological knowledge by exploring whether drug use outcomes and criminal outcomes vary by across personality traits. Specifically, it will examine whether 12 drug use measures and 13 criminal involvement measures are affected by personality traits. The focus of this dissertation will be to highlight the personality differences that emerge for different types of drug use and criminal involvement. This is important because prior research has emphasized that relationships exists rather than comparing relationships between personality traits and different measures of drug use or crime (i.e. neuroticism affects marijuana use, but not alcohol use). Additionally, this dissertation examines the effects of personality traits measured as both a continuous variable and a series of quartiles to determine whether the effects of personality on drug use and criminal involvement vary by level of personality traits. The findings suggest that the effects of personality on drug use and criminal outcomes do vary by the type of drug or crime measured. There were also significant differences between analyses that examined personality as a continuous variable and the quartile analyses. This dissertation also discusses implications for criminological theories, policy, and future research. / A Dissertation submitted to the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Spring Semester 2017. / April 6, 2017. / Crime, Drug use, Five-Factor Model, Personality / Includes bibliographical references. / Marc G. Gertz, Professor Directing Dissertation; Maxine D. Jones, University Representative; Kevin M. Beaver, Committee Member; Carter H. Hay, Committee Member.

The purpose of this study was to determine whether delinquent reading underachievers differ from delinquent reading achievers relative to the types of offenses committed. More specifically the study sought answers to the following research questions: (RQ(,1)) Do delinquents who are reading underachievers differ from other delinquents who are reading achievers with respect to the types of offenses committed? (RQ(,2)) Are delinquent reading underachievers more prone to commit the following offenses than delinquent reading achievers?: (1) status offenses; (2) person offenses; (3) property offenses; (4) drug offenses; (5) alcohol offenses; (6) sex offenses; and (7) other offenses. / A random sample of 300 Virginia training school delinquents was chosen from a population of 1,116 using a table of random numbers. Thirty-eight of the sample were discarded because of mental handicaps (IQs below 90 based on the Kuhlmann-Anderson Intelligence Test). Thus, 262 delinquents were actually involved in the study. / The first step in the treatment of data was to classify each delinquent as a reading achiever or underachiever. Reading underachievers were defined as students who are reading two or more years below their expected potential as measured by the Wide Range Achievement Test (Reading). Forty-one of the 262 delinquents were females. Twenty-eight were classified as reading achievers. The remaining 221 delinquents were males. Of this number, 181 were classified as reading underachievers and 40 were classified as reading achievers. / The second step in the treatment of data retrieved from a central file was the tabulation of offenses committed by both reading achievers and underachievers for each category. / A chi-square test and a test of proportion were used to test the hypotheses generated for this study using a 5 percent significance level. / Results indicated that delinquent reading underachievers differed from delinquent reading achievers relative to property offenses. / The researcher recommends that: (1) Instructors emphasize the relevancy of their subject matter to life situations. (2) Reading failures be given maximum opportunities to succeed through early diagnosis and effective remedial programs. (3) Correctional authorities review current practices to effectuate correctional reform for failures in general and reading failures in particular. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 43-12, Section: A, page: 4049. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1982.