Stick-up, street culture, and offender motivation

Motivation is the central, yet arguably the most assumed, causal variable i n the etiology of criminal behavior. Criminology's incomplete and imprecise understanding of this construct can be traced to the discipline's strong e mphasis on background risk factors, often to the exclusion of subjective fo reground conditions, lit this article, we attempt to remedy this by explori ng the decision-making processes of active armed robbers in real-life setti ngs and circumstances. Our aim is to understand how and why these offenders move from an unmotivated state to one in which they are determined to comm it robbery. Drawing from semistructured interviews with 86 active armed rob bers, we argue that while the decision to commit robbery stems most directl y from a perceived need for fast cash, this decision is activated, mediated , and shaped by participation in street culture. Street culture, and its co nstituent conduct norms, represents an essential intervening variable linki ng criminal motivation to background risk factors and subjective foreground conditions.