Socio-Psychological Determinants of Recidivism

This article examines the socio-psychological determinants of recidivism. At the socio-psychological level, the determinants of crime are manifested in the criminogenic impact on the individual from small social groups. The closest environment has the most serious influence on the formation of personality. This environment is represented by such small social groups as the family, educational and work teams, everyday and informal milieu. Repeat offenders have no family connection and contacts with educational and work teams. Most repeat offenders are unmarried, they do not work or study. Family desocialization of criminals, their negative attitude towards educational and work activities lead to alienation from the main social institutions and positive microgroups, which is accompanied by joining an informal antisocial environment and establishing strong ties with it. In the course of the study, the author generalized criminological views on the determination of recidivism, analyzed information on the characteristics of repeat criminals, and studied the data on the level of recidivism among those convicted to various measures of criminal liability and the statistics of convictions. The author also surveyed the staff of penitentiary institutions about the causes and conditions of recidivism, and convicts who committed a repeat crime and were serving imprisonment. When studying the determinants of crime recurrence, it is necessary to take into account the criminogenic influence of the factors that determined the primary crime, including at the level of small social groups. After conviction, criminals, as a rule, do not change their immediate environment and contacts, and continue to lead the same way of life. Deficiencies in the punishment system also play a criminogenic role in the determination of recidivism. As a result of the study, the author comes to the conclusion that, at the socio-psychological level, the repeated commission of crimes is due to the absence of positive changes in the convicts' microenvironment with a negative immediate environment retaining its influence and also due to the ineffectiveness of the current punishment system, which is unable to ensure the correction of convicts and prevent recidivism.

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