cognitive explanations

Question 1

what did kholberg apply moral reasoning to?

Answer 1

kholberg applied moral reasoning to criminal behaviour

Question 2

what did kholberg summarise?

Answer 2

he summarised that peoples decision to commit crime cab be summarised in the stage theory of moral development - higher the stage more sophisticated the reasoning

Question 3

kholberg et al

Answer 3

using his own moral dilemma technique found a group of violent youths were significantly lower in their moral development than non-violent youths

Question 4

what are criminal offenders likely to be classified as?

Answer 4

pre-conventional whereas non-criminals are classed as conventional and beyond

Question 5

what is the pre-conventional level characterized as?

Answer 5

a need to avoid punishment and receive rewards and is associated with less mature childlike reasoning.

Question 6

what do some studies suggest offenders are?

Answer 6

more egocentric and display poorer social perspective taking skills than non-offenders

Question 7

chandler 1973

Answer 7

individuals who reason at higher levels tend to sympathise more with the rights of others and exhibit conventional behaviours such as honesty and generosity

Question 8

cognitive distortions

Answer 8

errors in peoples infomation processing system researchers have linked this to the way in which criminals interpret others behaviour and justify their own actions

Question 9

hostile attribution bias

Answer 9

evidence suggests people who commit violent crimes are associated with a tendency to misinterpret the actions of other people

Question 10

minimilisation

Answer 10

an attempt to downplay the seriousness of the offence e.g burglars may describe themselves as doing a job as a way of minimising the seriousness of the crime.

Question 11

level of moral reasoning evidence palmer and hollin

Answer 11

compared moral reasoning between 210 females non-offenders, 122 male non-offenders and 126 offenders using socio-moral dilemma questions.
the deliquent group showed less mature moral reasoning.
deliquant group showed less mature moral reasoning which supports kholberg

Question 12

what did Gibbs 1979 do?

Answer 12

proposed a revised version of kholbergs theory compromising of mature and immature reasoning. these are equivalent to kholbergs pre and conventional levels

Question 13

what did Gibbs argue?

Answer 13

argued that post conventional level should be abandoned as it is culturally biased.

Question 14

understanding cognitive distortions

Answer 14

beneficial to treatment of criminals as it encourages offenders to face up to what they have done. reduces denial and risk of re offending

Question 15

individual differences reid et al

Answer 15

found that individuals who committed crimes for financial gain such as robbery were more likely to show pre conventional moral reasoning

Question 16

Landon et al

Answer 16

suggested intellegence may be a better predictor than moral reasoning. this would explain that those with low intellegence are less likely to commit crime

Question 17

differential association theory

Answer 17

cogitive explanations are descriptive although they may be useful when predicting re-offending they do not ell us why the crime was committed