Exploring the Dimensions of Judged Offense Seriousness

• NCJ Number: 81224
• Author(s): S D Gottfredson
• Date Published: 1981
• Length: 120 pages
• Grant Number(s): 78-NI-AX-0152
• Sponsoring Agency: National Institute of Justice (NIJ); US Dept of Justice NIJ Pub
• Corporate Author: Rutgers University
• Sale Source: National Institute of Justice/
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

Methodology and findings are presented from two studies designed to assess the ways in which various groups of persons and criminal justice occupations judge the seriousness of crimes.

Abstract

The first study, conducted with 1,024 undergraduate college students, shows substantial agreement on crime seriousness within a large, heterogeneous sample of subjects. The exploration of dimensional structures for judged offense seriousness is deemed appropriate. About six dimensions appear to underlie judgments of crime seriousness, and these dimensions obtain within roughly the same ranges of apparent judged seriousness. The fundamental problem of identifying a means of combining different dimensions into a single overall index remains. The second study constructed a set of six scales representing the six dimensions identified in the first study. The dimensions were victimless crimes or vice, bodily harm, property loss, tertiary victimization, fraud, and serious drug offenses. Participants in the second study were students, police officers, correctional officers, parole and probation officers, judges, lawyers, and inmates. The second study showed that a meaningful set of scales can be developed to reflect the dimensions underlying the concept of offense seriousness. The scales were found to be highly reliable (internally consistent) and modestly interrelated. The ways in which the specified groups perceived the dimensions differed. Offenders' perceptions of offenses differed dramatically from other groups. Groups having involvement with the criminal justice system judge offenses of all sorts to be less serious than persons not having criminal justice system involvement. These studies are important not only because they provide information on important psychological and cognitive processes, but because they provide a measurement for change in criminal behavior, an important aspect for evaluating the subtle effects of treatment programs. Tabular and graphic data are provided, along with instruments used in the studies. For other reports in this series, see NCJ 81216-23.