Forensic Psychology
- Created by: Hannah Brearley - Bayliss
- Created on: 07-10-14 11:14
View mindmap
- Forensic Psychology
- Measuring crime
- Official statistics
- Consists of police crime figures, court statistics and prisons statistics.
- They can be unreliable due to the fact that people in different areas may classify crimes differently to others, giving unrepresentative figures.
- They don't account for unreported crimes.
- They don't account for crimes that have been committed but nobody has been caught for.
- British Crime Survey
- A type of Victim survey so people report a crime whilst remaining anonymous.
- Can expose dark figure of crime.
- Could exaggerate crime rates by people reporting very trivial crimes.
- People may be unaware that crime has been committed against them.
- Victims may not report crime because of lack of confidence in the police.
- Self report studies
- Criminals report their own crimes anonymously.
- Uncovers dark figure of crime
- Responders may respond unreliably as they may be unable to remember or too embarrassed.
- May only uncover trivial/ less serious offences.
- Only a biased selection of interviewees- cant ask important business men for example.
- Official statistics
- Offender profiling
- Typology Approach
- Organised or disorganised?
- Data assimilation, crime scene classification, crime reconstruction and profile generation.
- criticised for lack of scientific evidence.
- Alison and Barrett (2004)- approach is over-reliant on dated theories of personality.
- Geographical Approach
- Studies criminal spacial behaviour, development of decisions support skills that incorporate research findings and exploring effectiveness of said support tool in police inquiries.
- I assesses where the criminal is most likely to live, work and choose to socialise.
- preparing a geographical profile;
- exam case file study (autopsy reports, witness statements etc).
- analysis of crime scene.
- meeting with important people in inquiry.
- Analysis of demographic data.
- study of rapid transit, zoning and street maps.
- Overall analysis.
- Computer system- Criminal Geographic Targeting.
- Spacial data.
- Time to and from crime scene.
- Jeopardy surface.
- Spacial data.
- Contains colour, height and probability codes.
- Provides info regrading where offender might live and work.
- Jeopardy surface.
- Capmbell (1976) said that it wasn't a useful technique.
- Police deem it an 'invaluble' tool in assisting arrest.
- Police tent to just pick out the facts from the profiles that relate to the offender.
- Serves to improve working relationship between forensic psychologists and legal personnel.
- Typology Approach
- Theories of offending
- Physiological explanations of offending
- Atavistic form
- Lombroso (1876)
- Criminals have specific, distinguishable features.
- Criminal were not able to evolve properly and are stuck in their 'primitive state'.
- Narrow, sloping brow, prominent jaw, extra figures and toes, large ears, etc.
- Somatotype theory
- Sheldon (1949)
- Endomorph- fat and soft, Ectomorph- thin and fragile, Mesomorph- muscular and hard.
- Mesomorphs are criminals- aggressive, callous and mindless of others' feelings.
- Atavistic form
- Biological
- If offending behaviour was purely genetic, MZ twins would show 100% concordance rates.
- They actually show 35% concordance rates for males and 21% for females.(Christiansen, 1977).
- DZ twins showed 13% for males and 8% for females.
- Dalgaard and Kringlen (1976)- 26% (MZ) and 15% (DZ).
- Adoptive studies show if nature or nurture has more of an effect on offending behaviour.
- Adopted boys % of having a criminal record-
- Both- 36.2%
- Only adoptive father- 11.5%
- Only biological father- 21.4%
- Neither- 10.5%
- Adopted boys % of having a criminal record-
- 50% of adopted children whose mother had a criminal record had one themselves by the age of 18. (Crowe, 1972).
- Matched control- 5% adopted children had a criminal record when their mothers didn't.
- Scott (1982)-in low socioeconomic mothers are subjected to higher levels of stress which can cause a variety of developmental disorders.
- Evaluation
- Children are placed into very similar adoptive environments
- Some children are adopted at a later age.
- If offending behaviour was purely genetic, MZ twins would show 100% concordance rates.
- Physiological explanations of offending
- Custodial sentencing
- Measuring crime
Comments
No comments have yet been made