A-LEVEL PSYCHOLOGY NOTES AND REVISION

Describe and evaluate ways of measuring crime. Refer to evidence and/or published examples in your answer. (16 marks)  One way in which crime can be measured is by using the Official Statistics (OS). The OS is the figure of crimes that is reported to the police and recorded into the official figures. This may be expected to be relatively accurate but, in fact, it may not be - it relies on people reporting crimes (which may not be done if they feel scared or embarrassed, for example) and also depends on whether or not the crime is recorded by the police (police may not record crimes if, for example, they deem it 'too trivial' or if there is a lack of evidence). These unreported/recorded crimes are often referred to as a 'dark figure.' Another way in which crime can be measured is by victim surveys. Victim surveys involve asking people whether they have been a victim of a crime in a specific period of time, and whether or not they reported it to the police. One exampl...

Outline and briefly evaluate one way of measuring crime (5 marks) One way that can be used to measure crime is self-report offender surveys - these require people to voluntarily record whether or not they have committed any offences within a specified period of time. One example is the Offending, Crime and Justice Survey which interviews young people in England and Wales to assess the extent of offending and drug use (of 10-25 year olds). However, as with all self-report measures, individuals may lie, exaggerate or give an answer they perceive to be 'socially desirable' - this means that such methods may lack reliability - and due to the potential legal implications, it makes it even more liable to inaccuracy. Despite this, it can give a good picture of the reasons behind offending behaviour, which can lead to the development of resources to prevent further crime - eg. an alcohol dependance programme - this is a strength as it potentially means that recidivism rates can b...

Explain two problems in defining crime (6 marks) There are many problems that arise as a result of attempting to define crime - for example, historical context: the definition of a 'crime' changes over time. This can be illustrated by how up until 1967 in the UK, Homosexuality was a crime, but in today's society it is growingly more acceptable and becoming gradually more common. Additionally, smacking a child hard enough to leave a mark didn't used to be a crime - but now, since the Children Act of 2004, it is viewed as a criminal offence - this further demonstrates how the definition of a crime is varying greatly over time. As well as historial context, culture is a major problem when attempting to define a crime - what is viewed as a crime in one culture, may not be viewed as a crime in another. For example, having more than one wife is acceptable in some parts of the world, but in the UK this is a major crime (bigamy) - also, forced marriage is a crime in the UK,...

Outline two problems with Official Statistics as a way of measuring crime (4 marks) One problem of using the Official Statistics (OS) to measure crime is that police recording procedures can heavily distort the figured produced in the OS - this was demonstrated in a study by Farrington and Dowds (1985) who found that Nottinghamshire Police were much more likely to record thefts of under £10 value, compared to the police of Staffordshire and Leicestershire - which is why the official crime rate is reportedly much higher in Nottinghamshire. Additionally, the OS provides a very limited view of the true extent of crime: Hollin (1992) claims that it only accounts for approximately 25% of crimes - this means that 75% is unaccounted for and therefore suggests that it's not a very reliable measure of the true crime rate.

a.      Inadequate Superego 3 types of inadequate superegos have been proposed: The weak (under-developed) superego: During the Phallic stage, there is an absence of a same-sex parent, and therefore the child cannot identify with them – this causes the ability to feel guilt and the ability to stop impulsive behaviour to become impaired: they are dominated by their ID’s impulses which leads them to become involved in criminal activity, mostly commonly theft and rape. The deviant superego: Their same-sex parent is immoral and so during the identification at the Phallic stage, they develop a moral code that is deviant – making them more prone to carrying out criminal activities. The over-harsh (over-developed) superego: This superego is demanding of guilt and therefore it causes them to seek out opportunities to satisfy their unconscious desire to be punished – leading them to engage in criminal activity. However, many people without a same-sex par...

Hostile attribution bias: Hostile attribution bias is…the tendency to interpret others’ behaviour as having hostile intent, even when the behaviour is ambiguous or benign. Schonenberg and Justye (2014) presented 55 violent offenders with images of emotionally-ambiguous facial expressions. It was found that these violent offenders, when compared to a control group, were much more likely to perceive the images as aggressive/hostile. – [can be used as supporting evidence] However, this theory cannot be used to explain all offending behaviour – research suggests it can be linked to impulsive aggression but not planned aggression and therefore it can be argued that it is a factor in offending behaviour, but it is still and incomplete theory and thus, the validity should be questioned. Minimalisation: Minimalisation is...down-playing the significance of an event. The offender doesn’t accept full reality of a situation and will attempt to rationalise wha...