Women criminality--the influence of socio-familial history and status

Our interdisciplinary study aims at the influence of social and familial history and status in a sample of Romanian female offenders. We collected data regarding the social and familial environment and status in the moment of committing a crime from 235 women incarcerated in four Romanian prisons. We applied a 67 item questionnaire conceived by the members of the research group. The items we compared refer to: the type of offence, the offender's marital status and the number of children in the moment of committing the crime, the situation in the family of origin and the offender's evaluation of the relationship with the parents and brothers, the monthly income, the type of relationship with the partner as described by the offender, history of substance abuse and violence in the family of origin and in the own family. We also analyzed the answers regarding the motivation for the criminal act. The paper shows the distribution of various types of criminal offences in correlation with the level of education, the relevance of a stable familial environment and monthly income. The history of criminality, substance abuse and interpersonal violence in the families of origin is also taken into account.