Lombroso's theory was tested by an anthropologist named Goring (1913, 1972) who studied 3000 convicts and 3000 non-criminals and found no significant difference in features, facial or otherwise. Although Goring's methodology was flawed, it was generally accepted to negate Lombroso's findings.
Lombroso's later theories, which accepted environmental factors as possible causes of criminal behaviour have been criticised because of a lack of further research. .
Lombroso's theory did bring with it positive advances in criminology, however. It was among the first theories to attribute criminal behaviour, not to a lack of will power or a curable "wickedness", but to factors beyond the criminal's control. It is this which has seen Lombroso hailed as "The father of modern criminology"(Shaffer 1976) as his further studies have paved the way for most disciplines within modern criminological research.
The concept that physical characteristics are related to social behaviour have been traced back to the Greek physician Hippocrates, who designed a group of typologies and physiques and tried to correlate them with character traits. This work was continued by Sheldon and Stevens (1942) and Sheldon et al (1949) who identified three basic body types; endomorphs, who are fat and soft; ectomorphs, who are thin and fragile and mesomorphs, who are muscular and hard. They suggested that endomorphs are more relaxed and pleasure-loving, ectomorphs are restrained and self-conscious and mesomorphs are more aggressive, with a high pain tolerance and a careless attitude towards the feelings of others. .
Sheldon examined 200 students and 200 criminal delinquents and categorised each of them according to body type. Upon tabulating the results he found that significantly more of the criminals fell into the muscular mesomorphic category than the students. In support of this research, Cortes & Gatti (1972) found that 57 percent of the institutionalised delinquents they tested fell into the mesomorphic category.