Deck 8: Explaining White Collar Crime: Theories and Accounts

Question 1

The demonic explanation for criminality is associated with all but which of the following?

A) Exorcism
B) Trial by ordeal
C) Therapeutic rehabilitation
D) Corporal punishment

Answer 1

C

Question 2

Which of the following is not an understanding of the term theory given in the text?

A) An interpretation of the meaning of some dimension of reality
B) An account of the world with a fundamentally normative component
C) An approach to how social reality is constructed
D) An explanation not yet proven by research

Answer 2

D

Question 3

Involvement with white collar crime is most likely to be associated with which of the following factors?

A) Serious mental illness
B) Relative normality
C) Drug addiction
D) Low intelligence

Answer 3

B

Question 4

Which of the following is not one of the fundamental elements invoked to explain criminal behavior?

A) Motivation
B) Skill
C) Opportunity
D) Incompetence

Question 5

With regard to the relationship between social class and involvement with crime:

A) lower class individuals have been found to be overrepresented for all types of offenses
B) middle class individuals have been found to have lower self control than lower class individuals
C) some criminologists have claimed that criminality is more pronounced among the powerful and privileged than among the powerless and underprivileged.
D) middle and upper class individuals have been found to be overrepresented for all types of offenses

Question 6

Studies on white collar crime and its association with mental illness, drug addiction, and intellectual aptitude have found evidence of which of the following?

A) Most white collar criminals are extremely intelligent and often addicted to drugs
B) Most white collar criminals are suffering from an inferiority complex
C) White collar criminals may have above-average intelligence
D) Most white collar criminals suffer from severe mental illnesses

Question 7

In terms of character as well as personality, those who refrain from engaging in white collar crime are most likely to be which of the following?

A) Insecure individuals
B) Narcissists
C) Individuals obsessed with power and control
D) Individuals with a strong sense of moral integrity

Question 8

When we are attempting to explain white collar crime, the following require explanation:

A) criminality and criminalization
B) crime, criminality, and criminogenic factors
C) crime, criminalization, and criminaloid tendencies
D) crime, criminality, and criminalization

Question 9

Which of the following is the best definition of a theory?

A) A comprehensive explanation
B) A hypothesis
C) A formal version of an explanation
D) An account

Question 10

With regard to the relationship between white collar crime and personality:

A) most white collar offenders have been shown to have abnormal personalities
B) most white collar offenders appear to fall within the range of normal personality types
C) white collar offenders will always be more prone to risk-taking than non- offenders
D) white collar offenders will always be more oriented toward conformity than non- offenders

Question 11

Which of the following statements about the influence of biogenetic factors on white collar crime is true?

A) White collar offenders tend to have a different biogenetic make-up than non-offenders from the same social class
B) White collar offenders typically do not "look like criminals" and so may be less likely to have criminality imputed to them
C) Lombroso's notion of "born criminals" can be correlated with white collar criminals
D) Biogenetic conditions such a schizophrenia, clinical depression and alcoholism have been shown to be major factors in white collar criminality

Question 12

When we focus on individual or organizational motivations, we are primarily concerned with which of the following factors?

A) Criminality
B) Crime
C) Criminalization
D) Criminal law

Question 13

An explanation for white collar crime which focuses on the structural conditions pertaining to society and organizations belongs to which of the following levels?

A) Macro-level
B) Meso-level
C) Micro-level
D) Meta-level

Question 14

According to the text, almost anything we might say about white collar crime is rooted in assumptions about all but which of the following?

A) The nature of reality
B) Human nature
C) The nature of society
D) The nature of the physical world

Question 15

In a 2008 survey of the literature on personality and white collar crime, which was not described as a personality attribute of offenders?

A) Charisma
B) Lack of integrity
C) Feelings of invincibility
D) Narcissism

Question 16

The specific views of Freud on crime can be best linked with white collar crime which has a _____ character.

A) violent
B) self-destructive
C) materialistic
D) deceptive

Question 17

The process whereby particular activities, entities and individuals come to be defined as criminal is best characterized as:

A) criminality
B) crime
C) criminalization
D) criminal law

Question 18

The demonic explanation for criminality:

A) readily lends itself to empirical verification
B) has had no influence historically
C) is closely associated with "in-the-world" influences
D) is not typically invoked today, but is hardly extinct

Question 19

An explanation for white collar crime which focuses on the offender, and individual propensities and choices belongs to which of the following levels?

A) Macro-level
B) Meso-level
C) Micro-level
D) Meta-level

Question 20

Biographical accounts of several notorious white collar offenders associate all but which of the following personality and character traits with their criminal conduct?

A) Obsessions with power and control
B) A sense of superiority
C) Reclusiveness
D) Narcissism

Question 21

What process is characterized by the top managers in organizations attempting to protect the good reputation of the organization by providing statements on how decisions should be made while creating incentives for lower-level managers to take deviant or illegal actions on behalf of the organization?

A) Decoupling
B) Rationalizing
C) Steering
D) Marshalling

Question 22

The rational choice perspective on criminal behavior stresses all but which of the following factors?

A) Reasoning and strategic planning
B) Adaptation to particular circumstances
C) The influence of cultural values
D) Weighing of costs and benefits

Question 23

Corporate involvement in crime seems to be linked with which of the following factors?

A) A lack of readily available illegitimate opportunities
B) A relative intolerance of violations on the part of society or the community
C) Strong regulatory laws
D) An economic climate promoting aggressive pursuit of profit

Question 24

Rationalizations for corporate crime would include all but which of the following?

A) The laws or regulations are incomprehensible and too costly
B) Conventional offenses are no different from corporate offenses
C) Competitors are violating the laws with impunity
D) The violations are economically necessary or do little harm

Question 25

Which of the following is not an internal variable linked with corporate crime?

A) Level of industry concentration
B) Size of the corporation
C) Financial performance
D) Corporate subculture

Question 26

Donald Cressey criticized the treatment of corporate crime by other researchers (e.g., Sutherland; Clinard and Yeager) on which of the following grounds?

A) Little serious harm is done in the name of corporations
B) The full potential of corporations to act is not adequately addressed
C) Corporations are not persons, cannot learn, do not have motivations, and cannot form intent
D) The criminality of corporations is much worse than the criminality of individuals

Question 27

Which of the following is not an external factor linked with organizational crime?

A) The political environment
B) Economic conditions
C) The diffusion of responsibility through different divisions
D) Normative traditions within industries

Question 28

A general theory of crime:

A) attempts to identify the different factors which explain different forms of crime
B) attempts to explain different forms of crime with the same general explanation
C) attempts to develop clear explanations for variations of crime rates over time
D) attempts to explain crime by the same types of factors which explain natural phenomena

Question 29

Which of the following criticisms has not been directed at general theories of crime?

A) They explain different types of activities too simplistically
B) They explain different types of activities too broadly
C) They provide no clear basis for explaining variations between conventional and white collar crime rates over time
D) They can only explain conventional but not white collar crime

Question 30

Which of the following theories, unlike most theories, raises the question of why someone does not engage in criminal behavior?

A) Social control theory
B) Social bond theory
C) Differential association theory
D) Interactionist theory

Question 31

Organizations with specific goals have been characterized as:

A) rational systems
B) natural systems
C) open systems
D) closed systems

Question 32

Which of the following phrases does not refer to the control balance theory proposed by Charles Tittle?

A) Function of the control balance ratio
B) Surplus of control fosters criminal behavior
C) Deficit of control fosters criminal behavior
D) Equal balance of control fosters innovation

Question 33

When we say that the Ford Motor Company produced unsafe cars, we are treating the organization as:

A) a sum of individual actions
B) an actor
C) an abstraction
D) a nonentity

Question 34

With regards to corporate or organizational crime, the text stresses that:

A) in a strictly literal sense organizations can act
B) individual identity can never be subordinated to the demands of the organization
C) the total organization is typically involved in organizational crime.
D) the organization and its resources make many crimes possible

Question 35

The concept of "bounded rationality":

A) suggests that rationality is unlimited
B) takes into account the fact that choices are often based upon incomplete (or defective) information
C) refers to the roots of rationality in early development
D) pertains to the many different boundaries between rational and irrational behavior

Question 36

What type of theory focuses on how a fraud spreads among investors via social networks?

A) Network
B) Diffusion
C) Differential
D) Interactionist

Question 37

Braithwaite and Fisse's defense of the notion of corporations as directly responsible for criminal actions stresses all but which of the following factors?

A) Corporations collectively carry out spectacularly complex tasks, which no individuals could carry out independently
B) Corporate policies are the equivalent of corporate intentionality
C) Corporations can legitimately be said to have emotions and feeling
D) If corporations can formulate policy, they can also be affected by punishment

Question 38

Which of the following statements made about white collar crime from the perspective of labeling theory is true?

A) White collar offenders are especially vulnerable to being labeled criminals
B) Those in the white collar class are more likely to be in a position to shield themselves from being labeled criminal
C) Only conventional offenders will engage in further offenses after they have been labeled criminal
D) White collar offenders are immune from the stigma of the label of convicted criminal

Question 39

The structural perspective in criminology focuses on which of the following?

A) The nature of face-to-face interaction
B) The influence of social conditions or such factors as the distribution of power and resources
C) The role of physical structures such as buildings and houses
D) The structure of personality as a factor in behavior

Question 40

The idea of the organization as a context or environment which can influence individual attitudes and behavior in a criminal direction is explained in which of the following perspectives?

A) Social psychological
B) Structural
C) Ecological
D) Systemic

Question 41

When attempting to explain white collar crime, only the explanation of
criminalization is required.

Question 42

Which of the following factors did Marx and Engels see as the primary cause of crime, including white collar crime?

A) Material need
B) Biogenetic endowment
C) The capitalist system
D) Immorality

Question 43

Which phrase best applies to general strain theory?

A) Explains the non-utilitarian, malicious, and negativistic character of some lower class delinquency as an alternative way of achieving status
B) Contends that the particular form of illegal conduct is significantly a function of the structure of opportunity
C) Illegal behavior arises as a means of combating the strain caused by an enduring situation in a society in which a generalized goal of material success is promoted,
But the means to achieve such success legitimately are not equally distributed
D) A social psychological syndrome of experiencing negative emotions arising from strains (or negative dimensions) in one's environment

Question 44

The notion that illusions (including the ultimate illusion of money) have replaced a more substantial dimension of reality is associated with which of the following strains of critical criminology?

A) Left realist
B) Peacemaking
C) Feminist
D) Postmodernist

Question 45

The earliest explanation of criminality could be called demonic, or spiritualistic.

Question 46

Explanations for white collar crime which focus on the nature of the economic system, or societal values, can be said to emphasize which of the following factors?

A) Individualistic
B) Structural
C) Meso-level
D) Instrumental

Question 47

Rationalizations or neutralizations invoked by white collar offenders are likely to include all but which of the following?

A) Denial of responsibility for any intentional wrong-doing
B) Denial of identifiable injury as a consequence of law-breaking
C) Condemnation of condemners with the claim that the laws themselves are an unwarranted interference with free enterprise
D) Condemnation of the application of civil as opposed to criminal laws to their activities

Question 48

According to the text, the pervasive existence of white collar crime seems to offer
a powerful refutation to the proposition that criminality can be generally
explained by biogenetic factors.

Question 49

The theories in this chapter reflect one understanding of the term theory.

Question 50

Meso-level factors focus upon individual propensities and choices.

Question 51

Contemporary forms of radical criminology, such as left realism, peacemaking criminology, feminist criminology, and postmodernist criminology, have been principally concerned with which of the following?

A) Explaining individual criminality
B) Explaining how capitalism produces crime
C) Explaining how crime is conceived of and constituted, and how it should be responded to
D) Explaining why crime rates are declining

Question 52

Which phrase best applies to institutional anomie theory?

A) Contends that the particular form of illegal conduct is significantly a function of the structure of opportunity
B) Sets forth the core theme that competition for limited resources in a society, such as American society that puts such central emphasis upon the
Goal of individual monetary success, will promote crime
C) Illegal behavior arises as a means of combating the strain caused by an enduring situation in a society in which a generalized goal of material
Success is promoted, but the means to achieve such success legitimately
Are not equally distributed
D) A social psychological syndrome of experiencing negative emotions arising from strains (or negative dimensions) in one's environment

Question 53

According to the text, conflict theory is primarily concerned with which of the following?

A) Explaining crime
B) Explaining criminality
C) Explaining the process of criminalization
D) Explaining criminals' biogenetic attributes

Question 54

Despite the array of activities encompassed by the term white collar crime, the
author of the text holds that a single, general theory or explanation can be formulated for
white collar crime.

Question 55

In accounting for different levels of involvement of men and women in white collar crime, feminist criminology would be most likely to emphasize which of the following factors?

A) Women are less interested in money than men
B) Women are not by nature inclined to be competitive
C) Women have been excluded from decision-making roles in the white collar world by the gendered structure of inequality
D) Women are less likely than men to be concerned with providing for their families

Question 56

Integrated theories of white collar crime are best described as those which:

A) incorporate insights from different theoretical traditions and account for white collar crime on several different levels
B) focus on explaining why white collar crime occurs more frequently in integrated as opposed to segregated social settings
C) incorporate all versions of individualistic explanation for crime into a single theory
D) focus on explaining why white collar crimes are cannot be accounted for by reference to any factors applicable to conventional crimes

Question 57

There are many studies of the biological make-up of white collar offenders.

Question 58

In a Freudian approach, white collar crime would be linked with tensions and
conflicts between different aspects of the self (ego, id, and superego).

Question 59

The roots of white collar criminality in early childhood experiences have been
fully demonstrated, especially in studies conducted by Freud.

Question 60

In a spiritualistic perspective white collar crime could be regarded as reflecting a
"sacred void" in the face of relentless secular and materialist forces.

Question 61

The criminal law and criminal justice system have largely incorporated the
premises of classical or rational choice theory.

Question 62

Diffusion theory focuses on how a fraud spreads among investors via social
networks.

Question 63

It has been found that top managers typically order middle managers, in very
direct terms, to violate laws in order to maximize profits.

Question 64

Studies have shown that many white collar criminals share certain personality
traits.

Question 65

Those who have prominently promoted the neo-classical and rational choice
perspective have focused most of their attention on white collar criminals, not
conventional offenders.

Question 66

Studies exploring the relevance of personality in white collar crime have for the
most part not produced any clear evidence of psychological abnormality on the
part of white collar offenders.

Question 67

There is a general consensus that external factors are more important than internal
variables in determining whether or not corporate crimes will be committed.

Question 68

According to Hirschi and Gottfredson's general theory of crime, an attempt to
satisfy self-interest can be applied to explaining white collar but not conventional
offending.

Question 69

In a study of white collar delinquency, Hagan and Kay found that males from the
employer class were somewhat less likely than others to engage in illegal copying.

Question 70

Corporations are less likely to engage in corporate crime when the political
or economic climate promotes aggressive pursuit of profit.

Question 71

Many students of white collar crime have insisted that the corporation can be
regarded as directly responsible when it comes to crime.

Question 72

Among contemporary students of white collar crime, there is a division between
those who regard personality as a negligible factor and those who believe it is
significant.

Question 73

The large-scale financial crimes of the 1980s have been linked with the "structural
embeddedness" of financial organizations and corporations in networks largely
beyond traditional forms of social control.

Question 74

Rationales for involvement in illegal activity cannot be generated on the corporate
level, but only exist on the individual level.

Question 75

There is clear evidence that white collar offenders have lower IQs than their white
collar peers who do not commit offenses.

Question 76

Studies have consistently found that larger corporate size and increased external
profit pressure leads to illegality.

Question 77

The liquor industry and the automobile industry are cited as industries with
conditions strongly constraining or limiting illegal activity.

Question 78

Organizations may be said to create opportunities for illegal conduct.

Question 79

An increasingly common view in the social sciences today is that human behavior
reflects a mixture of rational choice, emotional input, and value commitments.

Question 80

Middle managers seem to believe that internal factors take precedence over
external moral values or expectations in guiding their actions on the job.