ABSTRACT
Studies of crime and delinquency have followed many different pathways, and the resulting literature is rich and varied. The present inquiry has focused attention on delinquency as a way of life, as a pattern of attitudes and activities acquired by an individual as a member of a particular segment of a specific society. As far as adults are concerned, many examples could be given of criminal subcultures. Familiar to all students of culture is the phenomenon of borrowing, of diffusion of cultural items and patterns of behaviour from one society to another. Crime and delinquency evidently constitute articles of both import and export! The fact remains that some cases of crime and delinquency can legitimately be attributed to the phenomenon of culture conflict. The stress on cultural factors in the aetiology of delinquency makes the assumption that the form of behavior may be learned.
