ATTITUDES AND VALUES OF YOUNG INMATES PLACED IN CORRECTIONAL FACILITY
ATTITUDES AND VALUES OF YOUNG INMATES PLACED IN CORRECTIONAL FACILITY

Summary/Abstract: Criminal attitudes and values are important factors that affect deviant and criminal behaviour. When such values, beliefs and opinions support criminal behaviour, they are criminal attitudes. In this context, criminal attitudes are considered to be one of the four factors (besides friends, family, and antisocial personality) that increase the risk of recidivism. Young offenders often have a negative attitude towards the law and use neutralization techniques to avoid the criminal responsibility, In relation to the question: how the criminal attitudes and values are acquired, learned or recognized, within the criminology literature we can met several ways: through the techniques of neutralisation or rationalization of deviant behaviour, through identification with other offenders; and by rejecting the conventional norms. This paper examines the criminal attitudes of the young inmates placed in correctional facility located in Ohrid, North Macedonia. The analysis is based on qualitative data collected by using in depth interview with young inmates to capture their attitudes and experiences in relation to their criminal attitudes. The collected data was divided into three categories and several subcategories: (1) neutralization techniques: rejecting responsibility, rationalizing certain behaviours and condemning others, (2) rejecting conventional norms: a critique of the system and the law and (3) identification with perpetrators and acceptance of the criminal views from the peers.

• Details
• Contents