A weakness of One weakness of explaining behaviour as being down to nurture is that to truly understand the influence of nurture, longitudinal case studies showing development must be used which can lead to issues with subject attrition. For example, Farrington’s research showed that most criminals in the study dropped out because they did not want to expose their crimes. Therefore leading to bias and unreliable research that explains the nurture debate.
One strength of explaining behaviour as being due to nature is that it can produce determinist arguments to explain the causes of behaviour. For example, Brunner’s research into genes and serotonin focuses on the way we are born, ie our genes and the characteristics inherited from our parents as a cause of criminal behaviour, ignoring other factors such as free will. This is a strength because it increases our understanding of extreme behaviours in society.
The Nature debate produces deterministic arguements, which increases our understanding of society.
The Nature debate is quite reductionist as it ignores influences of nurture behaviour. Which is a weakness as theres only one focus for criminality, and ignores the influences of other possible factors.
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