ABSTRACT
The origins of criminology began with classic empirical descriptions of criminal activity, including its patterning with age. This chapter begins with a review of Terrie Moffitt's developmental taxonomy, its impact, ensuing research, and future research directions. It adopts a life-course perspective to understand the origins of the theory, cast within the origins and development of its scholar, and in so doing can be considered as contributing to an understanding of the life course of criminology. The chapter outlines the developmental taxonomy developed hypotheses for two distinct classes of offenders, and one non-offending group. Unlike other taxonomies, Moffitt's differed in several important ways. For example, it offered a series of hypotheses that included the onset, persistence, and desistance processes. It pointed to the importance of not only social and environmental risk factors, but also how early-life individual characteristics also mattered in the origins and maintenance of antisocial behavior.
