1. Psychological Explanations
Forget Freud
Cognitive Explanations
Personality and Crime
IQ and Crime

2. Cognitive Explanations
HOW we think
Kholberg’s stages of moral devleopment
Pre-conventional, conventional, post-conventional
Social Skills
Anger management
Basic skills

3. Cognitive II What we think
Rationalizations, “Pro-criminal Attitudes,” “Criminal Thinking Errors”
Prompts for criminal behavior
Negative Reinforcement

4. Policy Implications
“Cognitive Behavioral” therapy is the best technology for rehabilitation
Recent study: such programs, when targeting the correct people reduce recidivism anywhere from 10-60%
Barkan: doesn’t address “structural factors”
But, should we ignore immediate, individual factors?

5. Personality and Crime General Personality Traits Newest Test: MPQ
MMPI: Bias and Tautology
Newest Test: MPQ
Three Superfactors
Constraint
Negative Emotionality
Positive Emotionality
CASPI and friends research
Next Step?

6. Personality II The “Psychopath” Hervy Cleckly
Above average intelligence, lying, leeching behavior, lack of remorse, inability to love, impulsive, risk seeking, superficial charm…
Robert Hare’s “Pscyopathy Checklist” (PCL)
Structured Interview tapping these characteristics
Interesting Studies comparing “Psycho” inmates to “non-psycho” inmates
Treatment implications

7. IQ and Crime—A brief History
Alfred Binet
Series of tasks to identify “learning disabilities” (IQ)
3 Cardinal Rules
Scores are practical devices
Not for ranking “normal children”
Use to help, not label children
Goddard and others violate all

8. IQ and crime As intelligence tests improve, IQ gap shrinks
Sociologists: it will eventually disappear
BUT—it hasn’t (8-10 point gap, weak effect)
Why related?
Spurious? (evidence against this)
Direct?
Indirect
School Failure
Delinquent Peers
Impulsivity

9. Barkan’s Critique Use of small/non-representative samples
Disregard of “structural factors,” and cannot account for “group differences”
Psychologists not answering macro questions
Causal order remains unclear
Focus on street crimes

10. Normal and Abnormal Do psychologists view offenders as “abnormal?”
Not necessarily (general personality, moral development)
Zimbardo
Milgram
Irony is that evidence from psychologists are used to criticize psychology