Low Self-Control, Staged Opportunity, and Subsequent Fraudulent Behavior

Abstract

Since its conception, A General Theory of Crime has attracted a considerable amount of interest among criminologists. At this particular juncture, the extant research literature has generally been supportive of Gottfredson and Hirschi’s theory. However, opportunity, a critical element of low-self-control theory, remains conspicuously untested. Although some empirical studies have examined this theoretical concept, they have neglected to take into consideration the issue of temporal ordering. The current investigation addressed this oversight by presenting a pool of research participants with an actual and controlled opportunity to commit fraudulent behavior in a natural setting.