The Effect of Nutrition on Delinquency and Criminal Behavior Looking at the Teachings of Islam

In addition to providing physical health, nutrition plays a very important role in the prevention and management of many kinds of disorders in behavior, learning and mood, which affects the developmental conditions of children and adolescents lives, their behavior in school, the process of different stages of education, and behavior and moods of adults, in different aspects of their lives, from home to workplace and society. Among the most important aspects of human behavioral disorders, are anti-social behaviors, deviation and delinquency. The close relationship of nutrition and eating habits with various aspects of human behavior and mental states has brought up the quality of nutrition as one of the most important approaches to combat anti-social behaviors and crimes. Nutritional interventions in people prone to violence and delinquency, especially children, are among the most effective solutions of this problem, in order to prevent and reduce crime rates. The failure of traditional preventive approaches, besides dramatic changes of nutritional habits of different communities in the past few decades, and increasing tendency to irritating and harmful foods, illustrate the necessity and urgency of implementing these interventions. The present article examines the relationship between nutrition and human behavior, specially deviation and delinquency, and the way of utilizing nutritional interventions, by using the results of researches and teachings of Islam in this respect. It finally asserts that considering people’s nutrition as an effective factor in committing crime and its prevention is necessary from the perspective of micro and macro criminology, and must be the subject of planning and legislation.