Graduation Year

2013

Document Type

Thesis

Degree

M.A.

Degree Granting Department

Criminology

Major Professor

Shayne Jones

Keywords

corporate crime, general theory of crime, personality traits

Abstract

Gottfredson and Hirschi's general theory of crime (1990) has received a great deal of empirical examination in the criminology, yet the application of this theory to white-collar crime offenders has not received a great deal of attention. Research that has been conducted in the realm of white-collar crime has yielded mixed support for low self-control in explaining such offenses (Simpson and Piquero, 2002; Reed and Yeager, 1996; Langton et al., 2006; Blickle, 2006). The current study seeks to supplement the literature by focusing not simply on the direct causal links between self-control and white-collar offending, but also exploring how attitudes play a role between self-control and intentions to engage in white-collar crime. Specifically, this study examines whether attitudes towards environmental offending mediate and moderate the relationship between self-control and intentions to engage in environmental white-collar crime. The results indicated that attitudes toward environmental offending did have a mediating effect, but the effect of attitudes did not significantly vary as a function of self-control. Subsequently, simple slopes analysis found that the effect of attitudes was only significant among those with average and high levels of self-control. Implications for the general theory of crime and future directions for white-collar crime research are discussed.

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