Forensic Psyc Victims

Question 1

Who are the victims of crime?

 Victims:

Answer 1

People who have “suffered
harm, including physical or mental injury,
emotional suffering, economic loss or
substantial impairment of their
fundamental rights, through acts or
omissions that are in violation of criminal
laws“ The UN Declaration of Basic Principles of Justice for Victims of Crime and Abuse of Power

Question 2

Who are the victims of crime?

Answer 2

• According to the British Crime Survey, high
victimisation rates are found among:
 Urban areas (18% compared to rural 12%)
 Property offences: young professionals
 Personal victimisation: Age (16-24); single;
low household income; unemployed; full time
student; active evening life; high alcohol
consumption

Question 3

Victims’ Fear of Crime

Answer 3

• Groups at highest risk of becoming crime
victims are not necessarily those who
experience the greatest fear of crime
 Elderly and women report highest fear
 Young males report least fear
• Although people most fear violent
victimisation from strangers, many crimes
are committed by non-strangers

Question 4

Victims’ Fear of Crime in Australia

Answer 4

• National Survey of
Community Satisfaction
with Policing (2001/2):
 80% of Australians surveyed
felt safe or very safe at
home by themselves
during the night
 Only 40% felt safe or very
safe outside during the
night
• Australian Criminology
Research - most feared
public activity: catching
the train

Question 5

Victims’ Fear of Crime

Answer 5

• How do people manage their fear of crime?
 Increase security measures at home
 In public try to avoid “unpredictable strangers”
 Go out in groups
 Monitor environment/ stay alert
• These strategies can increase a sense of
control that they won’t be victimised
• However constant attention to signs of danger
can increase fear and perceptions of risk

Question 6

Reporting Crime

Answer 6

• Crime statistics often reflect reported crimes,
but many crimes go unreported
• Estimates that only 3/5 crimes in US reported
by victims
• Factors that influence reporting:
– Nature of offence (*perception that reporting will
benefit victim, seriousness)
– Characteristics of victim are less important
– Bystanders/support networks who encourage
reporting

Question 7

Historical View of Victims

Answer 7

• Early Middle Ages: Victims or their survivors
played a central role in trial proceedings and
sentencing
• This ‘Golden age’ of the victim ended with
monarchs who declared that vengeance was
theirs alone
• Crimes are often thought of as hostile acts
against the state, rather than the events that
hurt a specific person
• Until recently, victims have had few rights in
the criminal justice system

Question 8

Historical View of Victims

• 1960s-1970s:

Answer 8

Criticisms that the government
offered the victims little to no support, even
though ostensibly the criminal justice system
was established to serve them
• 1970s: Concept of “Blaming the victim”
recognised and popularised

Question 9

Why do We Blame the Victim? The Fundamental Attribution Error:

Answer 9

The
tendency for observers, when analysing
another’s behaviour, to underestimate the
impact of the situation and to overestimate
the impact of personal disposition

Question 10

Why do We Blame the Victim? Just-World Hypothesis:

Answer 10

The need to believe
the world is fair and that people get what
they deserve
– Bad people are punished
– Good people rewarded

Question 11

Blaming the victim shapes our responses

to victims:

Answer 11

The norms of our society demand that
we help others that deserve our help.
But if people are responsible for their
own suffering, we do not feel obligated
to help them

Question 12

Victims’ View of Criminal Justice

System

Answer 12

Victims are often dissatisfied with the criminal
justice system
• Survey of 249 victims across 6 cities in US
(Medis, 1984)
– 77% said the courts were too slow and wasted time
– 86% felt that offenders weren’t punished enough
– Only 30% felt that the courts care about the
victims’ needs

Question 13

Secondary Victimisation

Answer 13

Uncertainty as to their role in the criminal
justice process
 A general lack of knowledge about the
criminal justice system, courtroom
procedures, and legal issues
 Trial delays that result in frequent travel,
missed work, and wasted time
 Fear of the defendant or of retaliation from
defendant’s associates
 Trauma of testifying and cross-examination
 Media – especially in homicide cases

Question 14

Response to Victims’ Concerns

Answer 14

• Several developments reflect the growing
stature and influence of the victims rights
movement:
–UN declaration of basic principles of justice
for victims of crime and abuse of power
–The emergence of the interdisciplinary field
of victimology, which concentrates on the
process and consequences of victimisation
experiences and how victims recover

Question 15

• Increasingly, legislators, prosecutors, and
court systems are trying to respond to the
concerns of crime victims by:

Answer 15

1. Compensation of the crime victims
2. Participation by victims in criminal proceedings
3. Legislative changes protecting victims’ rights
4. Reconciling victims and offenders

Question 16

1. Compensation of the Crime Victims

Answer 16

• Restitution: Judge orders defendant to
compensate victim for losses
• Pros:
– Victim reimbursed
– Helps offenders appreciate how their crimes have
hurt others
• Cons:
– Often there is no defendant because crime isn’t
solved or defendant is acquitted
– Also, defendant is often financially unable to
reimburse the victim

• Government often has victim compensation
funds to pay for lost wages and medical
expenses
• These funds usually do not cover property
losses and have fairly low caps on how much
compensation will be provided

Question 17

2. Participation by Victims in Crime Proceedings

Answer 17

• Many states in AUS provide that victims have
a right to be notified of and attend court
proceedings and a right to make their views
known, either to the prosecutor or directly to
the judge
• Victims are concerned that important
decisions are made without their input
&/knowledge

Question 18

2. Participation by Victims in Crime
   Proceedings
   • Victim impact evidence:

Answer 18

Evidence offered
at sentencing to show the impact on the
victim of the crime for which the defendant
has been convicted

Question 19

2. Participation by Victims in Crime

Proceedings

Answer 19

• Senator Brooks Douglass wrote a law that
gave him and his sister the right to watch the
state execute Steven Hatch, the man who
attacked him and his sister and murdered
their parents

Question 20

3. Legislative Changes Protecting

Victims’ Rights

Answer 20

• Many states have passed special laws to
protect victims’ rights. For example:
– To be notified of proceedings
– Not to be excluded from the trial and other proceedings
– To be heard at crucial stages such as the release of an offender, plea bargaining, and sentencing
– To be notified of offender’s release from custody
– To be freed from unreasonable delay in the proceedings
– To receive restitution from the convicted offender
• 70-90% of voters have supported such
amendments (Westbrook, 1998)

Question 21

4. Reconciling Victims and Offenders

Answer 21

• E.g., Restorative Justice
• Resolution conferences, although
controversial, can cause the offender to
realise the victim’s pain and the victim to
understand why the offender committed the
crime

• Provides benefits in the areas of:
–Accountability
–Competency development
–Community safety

NSW: Victim – Offender Conferencing
 Organised by the Restorative Justice Unit
 The programme is post-sentence
 Only takes place if the offender accepts
responsibility for the offence and both the
victim and the offender have agreed to
take part.
 All the participants discuss the crime and
the impact that this has had on their lives.
They then come to an agreement about
what could be done to make things better

Question 22

Psychological Effects of Victimisation

• Stockholm Syndrome:

Answer 22

Paradoxical phenomenon where
hostages exhibit empathy and
positive regard for their captors,
sometimes to the point of
defending them
• Named following a bank robbery in
Stockholm, where bank employees
were held hostage for six days in
1973. During that time the victims
became emotionally attached to
their captors, and even defended
them after they were freed.

Question 23

Psychological Effects of Victimisation ASD & PTSD

Answer 23

Victims can be at risk of developing Acute
Stress Disorder (ASD; before 1 month) and
later Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
• Usually the trauma must be of sufficient
severity to have threatened the victim, or
someone close to the victim, with mortal
danger or serious bodily harm

Question 24

Psychological Effects of Victimisation
cont.
How common is PTSD in Australia?

Answer 24

 Estimated 12-month prevalence of PTSD in
Australia is 1.3%, representing around 200000
cases per year
 Lifetime prevalence rate is likely to be about double
this figure.

Question 25

Psychological Effects of Victimisation
cont.
Crime and PTSD

Answer 25

• 26% of women whose trauma was crime
related developed PTSD
• Only 9% of noncriminal trauma victims
developed PTSD symptoms
• Women who were injured by a trauma were
more likely to get PTSD than those who were
not
• The belief that the victim’s life is in danger
and that he or she has no control over the
trauma increases risk for PTSD

Question 26

Why do only some develop PTSD?

Answer 26

• Although many people experiencing severe
trauma may develop ASD, most do not
develop PTSD
• Those who experience trauma, but not
PTSD receive high levels of social support
immediately following the event

Question 27

Why do only some develop PTSD?

• Cognitive Biases (Foa et al., 1999)

Answer 27

 PTSD sufferers often perceive the world
as a dangerous place
 They blame themselves for the event
 They often come to view themselves as
helpless to deal with stressors
• If these misconceptions can be eliminated,
PTSD may be prevented

Question 28

Psychological Help for Victims

Answer 28

• Foa et al. (1995) have developed a 4-session
prevention course to attack these
misconceptions:
– Education about common psychological reactions
so victims know their responses are normal
– Training in skills such as relaxation so they are
prepared to cope with stress
– Emotionally reliving the trauma through imaginal
exposure methods to allow victims to diffuse fears
of the trauma
– Cognitive restructuring to help the women replace
negative beliefs about their competence and
adequacy with more realistic appraisals

4-session prevention course evaluated:
– 10 women who had recently been raped or
assaulted completed the course and were
compared with 10 other similar women who did not
complete course
– At 2-month and 5.5-month post-assault
assessments, victims who completed the course
had fewer PTSD symptoms
– Two months after the trauma, 70% of untreated
women and only 10% of treated women had PTSD

Question 29

Victims Vs. Survivors

Answer 29

• Many prefer the term “survivors” over
“victims”
• Traditionally psychology and related
disciplines have emphasised destructive
consequences of negative events
• More recently, researchers have started
balancing this one-sided perspective, with
growing interest in coping and resilience

Question 30

Traditional Research on Holocaust

Survivors

Answer 30

• “Muselmanism”
• Identification with
the aggressor
• “Survivor
Syndrome”
• “Concentration
camp syndrome”
• Survivor guilt
• Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder

Question 31

Recent Research on Holocaust

Survivors

Answer 31

• Achievement Motivation
– Many successful survivors
– No different from controls
• Erikson’s psychosocial stages
– Survivors successfully completed
all stages except trust vs.
mistrust
• Coping strategies
– Prevalence of self-control,
rational problem-solving, and
persistence as strategies for
survival