Question for Sociologists / Criminologists

[Igor Suman]

Are there more Juniors in jail ?

 

Do prison populations have a greater proportion of men who have the same name as their father,

than the general population ?

 

e.g. John Smith Jnr , Joe Bloggs III, i.e. the "mini-me" phenomenon.

[ecoli]

Are there more Juniors in jail ?

More Jurniors than what?

 

Do prison populations have a greater proportion of men who have the same name as their father, than the general population ?

 

e.g. John Smith Jnr , Joe Blogs III,

i.e. the "mini-me" phenomenon.

 

Do you think these people are more apt to commit crimes? I'm not sure if I buy that.

[Igor Suman]

Do you think these people are more apt to commit crimes? I'm not sure if I buy that.

 

If someone could answer my question it would demonstrate whether men named after their father are more likely to become criminals.

[ecoli]

If someone could answer my question it would demonstrate whether men named after their father are more likely to become criminals.

I suggest you turn to the literature for that, if such a study exists, you'd be more likely to find out about it through your own search. We don't have to many sociologists here. At least not that I know about.

[Igor Suman]

We don't have to many sociologists here. At least not that I know about.

 

Other people who come into contact with criminals may be able to answer this question,

e.g. prison officers, parole officers, police officers, social workers, etc.

[ecoli]

again, you're better off searching the literature. Or, failing that, try to contact someone directly about this.

[Dak]

i had a quick look, but couldn't find anything.

 

i know that statistitians either do, or at least used to, look through prisoner data and try to find any correlations, and any that were found were published, so i'd tentatively say that if nothing can be found in the literature indicating a correlation then there probably is none.

 

having said that, there was alot of 'fuzz' when i searched, i.e. lots of stuff about senior prison officers, junior (as in minor) offenders, papers on the subject by dr Bob McBobson jr, etc, so i might have just missed it.

[Igor Suman]

Thanks for your interest Ecoli & Dak,

If I find anything I will post a link here.

[Sisyphus]

If there's any relevant studies, they'd be in journals of psychology, I think.

 

I wouldn't be surprised if it were true to a small degree. I've seen firsthand the ways people act when acutely aware of trying to live up to a father. Fathers who give their sons their own name are probably more likely to be demanding in this regard, and sons who go "junior" more likely to compare themselves in that way.