Lower heart rate could explain why men commit more crime

Men may commit more crime than women due to differences in their heart rates, according to new research.

A study from the University of Pennsylvania has found a lower resting heart rate can cause people to seek more stimulation through criminal activity.

The findings say people whose hearts beat fewer times per minute are less fearful than others and are more likely to demonstrate impulsive behaviours associated with committing crime.

The researchers claim this could explain why men, who typically have lower heart rates than women, are more likely to break the law.

Co-lead author Professor Adrian Raine said: “We think cardiovascular functioning partly explains sex difference in crime, because low heart rate is a marker for other mechanisms like lack of fear and stimulation-seeking.”

His co-author, Dr Olivia Choy, added: “One way to get that stimulation is by engaging in antisocial behaviour.

“Obviously, you can engage in prosocial behaviour… like skydiving, but another major theory connects low levels of arousal to low heart rate, reflecting a low level of fear in individuals.

“To commit a crime, you do need a level of fearlessness, so these are two major explanations for why we see this relationship between low heart rate and antisocial behaviour.”

Men accounted for approximately 75 per cent of all criminal court cases and out of court disposals in 2011.

As of Friday (May 26), more than 81,300 prisoners in the UK were male, while just 3,957 were female – or just 4.9 per cent.

To test their theory, the researchers compared the resting heart rate of 11-year-olds with conviction records for overall criminal offending, violence, serious violence and drug related crime among people aged 23.

They found adults of either gender who had committed drug offences by age 23 had resting heart rates of 86 beats per minutes aged 11, compared with 93.6bpm for non-offenders.

The difference was even clearer for violent criminals; future offenders had heart rates of 85.2bpm compared with 93.9bpm.

The results also showed that resting heart rate accounts for between five and 17 per cent of the gender difference in offending.

Previous studies have found a low resting heart rate is common among men susceptible to stalking behaviour.

Participants whose heart rate was at least one standard deviation below average were nearly three times more likely to have committed stalking offences in the past.