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A Swedish national twin study of criminal behavior and its violent, white-collar and property subtypes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 May 2015

K. S. Kendler ,
H. H. Maes ,
S. L. Lönn ,
N. A. Morris ,
P. Lichtenstein ,
J. Sundquist  and
K. Sundquist
K. S. Kendler*
Affiliation:
Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA Department of Psychiatry, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA Department of Human and Molecular Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA
H. H. Maes
Affiliation:
Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA Department of Human and Molecular Genetics, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA
S. L. Lönn
Affiliation:
Center for Primary Health Care Research, Lund University, Malmö, Sweden
N. A. Morris
Affiliation:
Department of Criminal Justice, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA
P. Lichtenstein
Affiliation:
Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
J. Sundquist
Affiliation:
Department of Criminal Justice, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA Stanford Prevention Research Center, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA
K. Sundquist
Affiliation:
Department of Criminal Justice, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA, USA Stanford Prevention Research Center, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA
*
* Address for correspondence: K. S. Kendler, M.D., Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics of VCU, Box 980126, Richmond, VA 23298-0126, USA. (Email: kendler@vcu.edu)
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Abstract

Background

We sought to clarify the etiological contribution of genetic and environmental factors to total criminal behavior (CB) measured as criminal convictions in men and women, and to violent (VCB), white-collar (WCCB) and property criminal behavior (PCB) in men only.

Method

In 21 603 twin pairs from the Swedish Twin Registry, we obtained information on all criminal convictions from 1973 to 2011 from the Swedish Crime Register. Twin modeling was performed using the OpenMx package.

Results

For all criminal convictions, heritability was estimated at around 45% in both sexes, with the shared environment accounting for 18% of the variance in liability in females and 27% in males. The correlation of these risk factors across sexes was estimated at +0.63. In men, the magnitudes of genetic and environmental influence were similar in the three criminal conviction subtypes. However, for violent and white-collar convictions, nearly half and one-third of the genetic effects were respectively unique to that criminal subtype. About half of the familial environmental effects were unique to property convictions.

Conclusions

The familial aggregation of officially recorded CB is substantial and results from both genetic and familial environmental factors. These factors are moderately correlated across the sexes suggesting that some genetic and environmental influences on criminal convictions are unique to men and to women. Violent criminal behavior and property crime are substantially influenced respectively by genetic and shared environmental risk factors unique to that criminal subtype.

Keywords

CrimeSwedentwin.

Information

Type
Original Articles
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 45 , Issue 11 , August 2015 , pp. 2253 - 2262
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

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