ABSTRACT
Hybrid scholars are often interested in the interplay of variables, and this may lead them to study many different phenomena. The reasons for hybridization are straightforward: in brief, specialization leaves gaps between subfields as they divide. As in botany, a hybrid is a combination of different branches of knowledge in a manner that improves the species. There are many hybrid fields throughout the social sciences, and the combinations are many and varied. Child development includes developmental psychology, developmental physiology, language acquisition, and socialization. An innovative recombination is a blending of scientific fragments, whereas a synthesis brings a humanistic unity, a new interpretation, a personal or stylistic achievement. Each fragment of the discipline then confronts the fragment of other fields across disciplinary boundaries, losing contact with its siblings in the old discipline. Scholars in the subfield of criminology come from law, sociology, social psychology, psychology, urban studies, economics, and political science.
