Psychology Explanations (cognitive) Flashcards
What are the two cognitive explanations?
cognitive distortions
Level moral reasoning
what are cognitive distortions?
faulty, biased or irrational ways of thinking that make people
perceive themselves or others in an inaccurate way
What do cognitive distortions do in terms of criminal behaviour?
such cognitive distortions allow an offender to deny or rationalise their involvement in crime
What are two examples of cognitive distortions which are particularly relevant to crime?
Hostile attribution bias
Minimalisation
What is hostile attribution bias?
Offender behaviour is often associated with a tendency to misinterpret the actions of other people, as aggressive or provocative.
-When they misread non-aggressive cues (such as being ‘looked at’) this may trigger a violent response.
What did Schoenberg and Justye (2014) do?
-presented 55 violent offenders with images of emotionally ambiguous facial expressions.
-When compared with a non-aggressive matched control group, the violent offenders were significantly more likely to perceive the images as angry and hostile
What is minimalisation?
can explain how an offender may deny or downplay the
seriousness of an offence.
-This helps the offender accept the consequences of their own
behaviour and means that negative emotions can be reduced (for example, burglars may describe themselves as ‘doing a job’).
What did Barbaree (1991) find?
that among 26 incarcerated rapists, 54% denied they had committed an offence at all and a further 40% minimised the harm that they had caused the victim downplaying the seriousness of the offence.
What was Kohlberg’s (1969) cognitive theory of moral development constructed from?
from interviews with boys about their understanding of what is right and wrong. He constructed a stage theory of moral development whereby each stage represents a more advanced form of moral reasoning.
How many levels of moral reasoning are there and what do people do through these?
three levels of moral reasoning and each is divided into two and people progress through these stages as a consequence of biological maturity and also as a consequence of having opportunities to discuss and develop their thinking.
What did kohlberg believe?
the higher she stage, the more sophisticated the cognitive reasoning an individual has
In terms of of being behaviour what are criminals more likely to be classified at compared to non criminals?
at the pre-conventional stage of Kohlberg’s model (stages 1 and 2) whereas non-criminals have generally progressed to the conventional level and beyond.
What is the pre-conventional level characterised by and what does this mean?
characterised by the need to avoid punishment and gain rewards, and is associated with less mature, childlike cognitive reasoning. Therefore, adults and adolescents who reason at this level may commit crime if they can get away with it or gain rewards in the form of money,
increased respect etc.
What is the assumption proposed by kohlberg supported by?
-studies by Chandler (1973) who found that offenders are
more egocentric (self-centred) and display poorer social perspective-taking skills than non-
offending peers.
-individuals who reason at higher levels tend to sympathise more with the rights of others and exhibit more conventional behaviours such as honesty, generosity and
non-violence.
