Offender Profiling Flashcards
What is offender profiling?
A set of investigative techniques used by the police to try to identify perpetrators of serious crime. It involves working out the characteristics of an offender by examining the characteristics of the crime scene and the crime itself.
What are the two main approaches to offender profiling?
The top down approach and bottom up approach.
What is the top down approach?
It begins by looking carefully at the crime scene and drawing conclusions from the evidence found there about the offender. The profiler also looks at other cases (where criminals have been interviewed) in order to build a picture of typical offender profiles.
This method is typically used for more extreme crimes, such as murder and rape. Hazelwood and Douglas (1980) made a distinction between organised and disorganised types of offender.
What is the bottom up approach?
It is a data-driven approach that makes use of statistical data on similar crimes that have been committed, in order to make predictions about the characteristics of an offender. One example of the bottom-up approach is investigative psychology, which was developed by David Canter.
What are the four main aims of custodial sentencing?
Incapacitation- to protect others
Rehabilitation- using education and treatment programmes to change offender behaviour
Retribution- to show society and the victims family that the offender is paying for their actions
Deterrence- prevent offender from re offending and demonstrate the consequences of similar actions.
Why is behaviour modification used in custody and how?
use of behavioural principles in order to rehabilitate offenders through operant conditioning, which incorporates reinforcement and punishment.
good behaviour is rewarded with tokens that can be traded for desirable privileges (such as food or television time) and bad behaviour is discouraged through removing such tokens.
What are the four main aims of custodial sentencing?
incapacitation, rehabilitation, retribution and deterrence.
What is incapacitation?
incapacitation (to protect other people).
What is rehabilitation?
rehabilitation (using education and treatment programmes to change offender behaviour).
What is retribution?
retribution (to show society and the victim’s family that the offender has been forced to pay for their actions).
What is deterrence?
deterrence (to prevent the offender re-offending and demonstrate to society the consequences of similar actions).
