NCJ Number
175236
Journal
Legal and Criminological Psychology Volume: 1 Issue: 2 Dated: September 1996 Pages: 179-195
Date Published
1996
Length
17 pages
Annotation
Surveying an Irish sample, the authors asked 623 respondents to give their views on the seriousness of and appropriate penalties for 10 offense scenarios and also assessed respondent risk perceptions of crime by asking for estimates of the prevalence of the same 10 offense scenarios compared to 5 years previously.
Abstract
Respondents were asked to complete a questionnaire containing several sections related to offense seriousness and appropriate penalties. Data on experiences with crime victimization and sociodemographic characteristics were also collected. Results showed that beliefs about crime prevalence were independent of official crime rates, personal experiences of victimization, and some sociodemographic categories. Sex, age, and newspaper readership were the strongest predictors of crime prevalence estimates. Additional support for the role of the media was suggested by the clustering of a number of "mean world" attitudes toward crime. 37 references, 10 tables, and 1 figure