CRIMINOLOGY COMPREHENSIVE EXAM READING LIST
SOCIOLOGY (PHD)
Kent State University – University of Akron
MAJOR
THEORY AND METHODS
Overview
Cullen, Francis T., John Paul Wright, and Kristie R. Blevins (eds). 2008. Taking Stock: The
Status of Criminological Theory, Advances in Criminological Theory Series volume 15.
New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction.
Classical / Rational Choice
Nagin, Daniel S. 1998. “Criminal Deterrence Research at the Outset of the Twenty-First
Century.” Crime and Justice: A Review of Research 23: 1-42.
Nagin Daniel S, and Greg Pogarsky. 2001. “Integrating Celerity, Impulsivity, and
Extra-Legal Sanction Threats Into a Model of General Deterrence: Theory and
Evidence.” Criminology 39:865-91.
Piliavin, Irving, Rosemary Gartner, Craig Thornton, and Ross L. Matsueda. 1986. “Crime,
Deterrence, and Rational Choice.” American Sociological Review, 51: 101-119.
Roshier, Bob. 1989. Controlling Crime: The Classical Perspective in Criminology. Chicago, IL:
Lyceum Press.
Social Disorganization/Social Ecology
Bursik, Robert J. Jr. 1988. “Social Disorganization Theories of Crime and Delinquency:
Problems and Prospects.” Criminology, 26:519-552.
Sampson, Robert J. and Byron Groves. 1989. “Community Structure and Crime: Testing Social
Disorganization Theory.” American Journal of Sociology, 94:774-802.
Shaw, Clifford and Henry H. McKay. 1969. Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press.
Stark, Rodney. 1987. “Deviant Places: A Theory of the Ecology of Crime.” Criminology, 25:
893-909.
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Strain
Agnew, Robert. 1992. “Foundation for a General Strain Theory of Crime and Delinquency. “
Criminology, 30: 47-87.
Agnew, Robert, Timothy Brezina, John Paul Wright, and Francis T. Cullen. 2002. “Strain,
Personality Traits, and Delinquency: Extending General Strain Theory.” Criminology 40:
43-71.
Messner, Steven F. and Richard Rosenfeld. 2007. Crime and the American Dream. Belmont,
CA: Wadsworth.
Merton, Robert K. 1938. “Social Structure and Anomie.” American Sociological Review, 3:
672-682.
Subculture
Cloward, Richard. 1959. “Illegitimate Means, Anomie, and Deviant Behavior.” American
Sociological Review. 44:588-608.
Cohen, Albert K. 1955. Delinquent Boys. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Miller, Walter B. 1958. "Lower-Class Culture as Generating Milieu of Gang Delinquency."
Journal of Social Issues 14:5-19.
Wolfgang, Marvin E. and Franco Ferracuti. 1967 (reprinted 2001). The Subculture of
Violence: Toward an Integrated Theory in Criminology. New York: Tavistock
Publications. Ch 1 and 3
Differential Association/Social Learning
Burgess, Robert L. and Ronald L. Akers, Ronald. 1966. “A differential associationreinforcement theory of criminal behavior.” Social Problems 14: 128-147.
Matsueda, Ross L. 1988. “The current state of differential association theory.” Crime &
Delinquency, 34:277-306.
Sykes, Gresham and David Matza. 1957. “Techniques of Neutralization: A Theory of
Delinquency.” American Sociological Review 22:664-673.
Tittle, Charles R., Mary Jean Burke, and Elton F. Jackson. 1986. “Modeling Sutherland’s
Theory of Differential Association: Toward and Empirical Clarification.” Social Forces
65: 405-432.
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Labeling/ Shaming
Becker, Howard S. 1963. Outsiders. New York: Free Press.
Braithewaite, John. 1989. Crime, Shame, and Reintegration. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Hay, Carter. 2001. “An Exploratory Test of Braithwaite’s Reintegrative Shaming Theory.”
Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 38:132-153.
Paternoster, Raymond and Leeann Iovanni. 1989. “The labeling perspective and delinquency:
An elaboration of the theory and assessment of the evidence.” Justice Quarterly, 6: 359394.
Schur, Edwin M. 1971. Labeling Deviant Behavior. New York: Harper and Row.
Control Theories
Costello, Barbara and Paul R. Vowell. 1999. “Testing Control Theory and Differential
Association: A Reanalysis of the Richmond Youth Project Data.” Criminology 37:815842.
Gottfredson, Michael R. and Travis Hirschi. 1990. A General Theory of Crime. Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press.
Hirschi, Travis. 1969 (reprinted 2002). Causes of Delinquency. Reprint. New Brunswick, NJ:
Transaction.
Kornhauser, Ruth R. 1978. Social Sources of Delinquency. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press.
Pratt, Travis C. and Francis T. Cullen. 2000. "The Empirical Status of Gottfredson and Hirschi's
General Theory of Crime: A Meta-Analysis." Criminology 38:931-964.
Routine Activities
Cohen, Lawrence E. & Felson, Marcus. 1979. “Social change and crime rate trends: A routine
activities approach.” American Sociological Review, 44: 588-608.
Osgood, Wayne D. Janet K. Wilson, Jerald G. Bachman, Patrick M. O’Malley, and Lloyd D.
Johnston. 1996. “Routine activities and individual deviant behavior.” American
Sociological Review, 61: 635-655.
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Lifecourse / Developmental
Piquero, Alex R., David P. Farrington, and Alfred Blumstein. 2003. “The Criminal Career
Paradigm.” Crime and Justice: A Review of Research 30: 359-506.
Sampson, Robert J. and John H. Laub. 1993. Crime in the Making. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press.
Marxist and Feminist
Chesney-Lind, Meda. 2006. "Patriarchy, Crime, and Justice: Feminist Criminology in an Era of
Backlash." Feminist Criminology 1:6-26.
Daly, Kathleen and Meda Chesney-Lind. 1988. "Feminism and Criminology." Justice Quarterly
5:497-538.
Greenberg, David. 1993. Crime and Capitalism: Readings in Marxist Criminology.
Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press.
Hagan, John, A. R. Gillis, and John Simpson. 1985. "The Class Structure of Gender and
Delinquency: Toward a Power-Control Theory of Common Delinquent Behavior."
American Journal of Sociology 90:1151-1178.
Spitzer, Steven. 1975. “Toward a Marxian Theory of Deviance.” Social Problems 22: 638-651.
Methods / Data issues
Biderman, Albert D., James P. Lynch, J.L. Peterson. 1991. Understanding Crime Incidence
Statistics: Why the UCR Diverges from the NCS. New York, NY: Springer.
Chilton, Roland and John Jarvis. 1999. “Victims and Offenders in Two Crime Statistics
Programs: A Comparison of the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) and
the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS).” Journal of Quantitative
Criminology, 15: 193-205.
D’Alessio, Stewart J. and Lisa Stolzenberg. 2003. “Race and the Probability of Arrest.” Social
Forces, 81: 1381-1397.
Elliott, Delbert S. and Suzanne S. Ageton. 1980. “Reconciling race and class differences in
self-reported and official measures.” American Sociological Review 44: 95-110.
Feenan, Dermot. 2005. “Criminological Research: Understanding Qualitative Methods.” Howard
Journal of Criminal Justice 44:553-555.
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Gottfredson and Hirschi. 1987. “On the methodological adequacy of longitudinal research.”
Criminology, 25: 581-614.
Hindelang, Hirschi and Weis. 1981. Measuring Delinquency. Beverly Hills: Sage.
Hirschi, Travis and Hanan C. Selvin. 1996 (reprinted 2006). Delinquency Research: An
Appraisal of Analytic Methods. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.
Keiser, Kees, Siegwart Lindenberg, and Linda Steg. 2008. “The Spreading of Disorder.”
Science, 322: 1681-1685.
Maxfield, Michael G. 1999. “The National Incident-Based Reporting System: Research and
Policy Applications.” Quantitative Criminology, 15(2): 119-149
Steffensmeier, Darrell, Hua Zhong Jeff Ackerman, Jennifer Schwartz, and Suzanne Agha. 2006.
“Gender Gap Trends for Violent Crimes, 1980 to 2003: A UCR-NCVS Comparison.”
Feminist Criminology, 1: 72-98.
CORRELATES OF CRIME AND KEY TOPICS IN CRIMINOLOGY
Definitions of Crime
Fredrichs, David O. 1992. “White collar crime and the definitional quagmire: A provisional
solution.” The Journal of Human Justice, 3: 5-21.
Quinney, Richard. 1970 (reprinted 2001). The Social Reality of Crime. Boston, MA: Little,
Brown Chapter 1 (The Social Reality of Crime) and Chapter 7 (Societal Organization and
the Structuring of Behavior Patterns)
Sutherland, Edwin H. 1945. "Is 'White-Collar Crime' Crime?" American Sociological Review
10: 132-139.
Tappan, Paul W. 1947. “Who is the Criminal.” American Sociological Review. 12:96-102.
Turk, Austin. 1969. Criminality and the Legal Order. Chicago, IL: Rand McNally.
Types of Crime (5-10)
Many criminologists focus on a particular type of crime. For example, they may become an
expert at Domestic Violence, Homicide, Drugs and Alcohol, White-Collar Crimes, Corporate
Crimes, or Juvenile Violence, to name just a few possibilities. No one is expected to be an
expert on all these topics. However, part of developing as an independent scholar is to become
more informed about what is known in the field about a topic you are interested in. While some
of this may be factual in nature, it is more important to focus on understanding your topic
theoretically and how / why it is an important topic in the study of crime. Therefore, you need to
select a specific type of crime that you are interested in and find 5-10 articles or books that allow
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you to start to develop your expertise in this area. While it may be useful to find one or two
classic pieces on your topic, it is more important to focus on recent research.
Age
Hirschi, Travis and Michael Gottfredson. 1983. "Age and the Explanation of Crime." American
Journal of Sociology 89:552-584.
Lauritsen, Janet L. 1998. “The age-crime debate: Assessing the limits of longitudinal self-report
data.” Social Forces, 77: 127-155.
Moffitt, Terrie E. 1993. “Adolescence-Limited and Life-Course Persistent Antisocial Behavior:
A Developmental Taxonomy.” Psychological Review, 100: 674-701.
Stolzenberg, Lisa and Steward J. D’alessio. 2008. “Co-offending and the Age-Crime Curve.”
Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency. 45: 65-86.
Sex and Gender
Ferraro, Kathleen J. 2006. Neither Angels nor Demons: Women, Crime, and Victimization.
Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press.
Hagan, John and Kay Fiona. 1990. "Gender and Delinquency in White-Collar Families: A
Power-Control Perspective." Crime & Delinquency 36:391-407.
Heimer, Karen, and Stacy DeCoster. 1999. "The Gendering of Violent Delinquency."
Criminology 37: 277-281.
Miller, Jody. 2002. “The Strengths and Limits of ‘Doing Gender’ for Understanding Street
Crime.” Theoretical Criminology. 6: 433-460.
Steffensmeier, Darrell, and Emilie A. Allan. 1996. “Gender and Crime: Toward a Gendered
Theory of Female Offending.” Annual Review of Sociology. 22: 459-487.
Steffensmeier, Darrell, Hua Zhong, Jeff Ackerman, Jennifer Schwartz, Suzanne Agha. 2006.
"Gender Gap Trends for Violent Crimes, 1980-2003." Feminist Criminology 1:72-98.
Race and Class
Braithwaite, John. 1981. "The Myth of Social Class and Criminality Reconsidered." American
Sociological Review 46:36-57.
Chambliss, William J. 1973. “The Saints and the Roughnecks” Society 11: 24-31.
Hagan, John, H. Foster and D. Schulman. 2006. “Profiles of Punishment and Privilege: Secret
and Disputed Deviance During the Racialized Transition to American Adulthood.”
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Crime, Law and Social Change. 46: 63-83.
Messerschmidt, James W. 1997. Crime as Structured Action: Gender, Race, Class, and Crime
in the Making. California: Sage Publications.
Petterson, Ruth D. and Lauren J. Krivo. 2005. “Macrostructural Analyses of Race, Ethnicity,
and Violent Crime: Recent Lessons and New Directions for Research.” Annual Review
of Sociology, 31: 331-356.
Sampson, Robert J. 1987. “Urban black violence: The effect of male joblessness and family
disruption.” American Journal of Sociology, 93: 348-382.
Wright, Bradley R. Entner, Avshalom Caspi, Terrie E. Moffitt, Richard A. Miech, and Phil A
Silva. “Reconsidering the Relationship between SES and Delinquency: Causation but
Not Correlation.” Criminology, 37: 175-194.
Wright, Bradley R. Entner and C. Wesley Younts. 2009. “Reconsidering the Relationship
between Race and Crime.” Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, 46: 327-352.
Other Correlates (5-10)
There are many other correlates of crime such as Families, Peers, Schools, Media, Drugs and
Alcohol, and Mental Health to name a few. You need to select one of these and find 5-10
articles or books that address how this area is a correlate of crime.
Theoretical Integration
Bernard, Thomas J. and Jeffrey B. Snipes. 1996. “Theoretical integration in criminology.”
Crime and Justice, 20: 301-348.
Hirschi, Travis. 1979. “Separate and Unequal is Better.” Journal of Research in Crime and
Delinquency 16: 34-38.
Messner, Steven F. Marvin D. Krohn and Allen E. Liska. 1989. Theoretical Integration in the
Study of Deviance and Crime. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Crime Control
Austin, James and John Irwin. 2000. It’s About Time: America’s Imprisonment Binge.
Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Beckett, Katherine. 1997. Making Crime Pay. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Blomberg, Thomas G. and Stanley Cohen (eds). 2003. Punishment and Social Control. (2nd
Edition). New Yorkm NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
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Cohen, Stanley. 1985. Visions of Social Control: Crime, Punishment and Classification.
Cambridge: Polity Press.
Garland, David (ed). 2001. Mass Imprisonment: Social Causes and Consequences. Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage.
Garland, David. 1990. Punishment and Modern Society: A Study in Social Theory. Chicago, IL:
University of Chicago Press.
Hil, Richard and Rob Robertson. 2003. “What sort of future for critical criminology?” Crime,
Law, and Social Change, 39:91-115.
Pager, Devah. 2003. “The mark of a criminal record.” American Journal of Sociology, 108:
937-975.
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