Mesomorph
Definition
Sheldon's muscular, broad-shouldered somatotype, which he linked to the temperament trait he called somatotonia and, empirically, to higher rates of officially recorded delinquency.
Related terms
- Endocrine Gland Theory
- The claim that hormone-secreting glands (thyroid, adrenal, pituitary, and others) regulate temperament and impulse control closely enough to explain criminal conduct.
- Multiple-Factor Theory
- The position, associated with William Healy, Augusta Bronner, and Cyril Burt, that delinquency has many interacting causes and must be studied case...
- Pedigree Study
- A research method that traces a trait, such as criminality or 'feeblemindedness', through several generations of a single family to argue the...
- Pyknic Type
- Kretschmer's rounded, thickset body type, which he associated with a cyclothymic temperament prone to mood swings between elation and depression.
- Somatotype
- A classification of body build into a small number of physical types, used by William Sheldon to assign each person a numeric...