Abstract
The discipline of criminology has a long history of focusing narrowly on the environmental correlates to antisocial behaviors, while simultaneously ignoring the possibility that genetic factors are important. With the mapping of the human genome and with the advent of complex brain imaging machines, researchers have been able to study the genetic basis to all types of human behaviors. The results of these studies have unequivocally shown that virtually all antisocial outcomes are the result of genetic and environmental factors working independently and interactively. An emerging perspective known as biosocial criminology has recently been advanced as a way of incorporating these findings from the biological sciences into criminology. In the current chapter, we provide an overview of the biosocial criminological perspective. In doing so, we pay particular attention to explaining gene X environment interactions, gene X environment correlations, and epigenetic processes, and how they affect the development of antisocial behaviors.