Cognitive Centrality Research Articles

THE REASSURANCE FACTOR IN POLICE PATROL

Abstract In addition to its more obvious functions, police patrol also has the function of citizen reassurance‐providing feelings of safety that a citizen experiences when he knows that a police officer or patrol car is nearby. Since this function is highly related to both visibility and awareness, it is svggested that in locations of both cognitive centrality and high density, fixed posts be established that would both serve the reassurance function and provide another communication link between the police and the public. Recent studies by Milgram. Sommer, Hall, and Lynch have all contributed to our understanding of what Milgram calls “the congnitive map of the city,” and this concept can be utilized in the pursuit of safety.

Civism and Roman Law in fourteenth-century Italian society

Previous research conceptualized murderers as highly callous and self-gratifying individuals, offending as a result of psychopathic tendencies. The current exploration sought to verify whether murderers differ on psychopathy and criminal social identity from recidivistic and first time incarcerated offenders.The study compared an opportunistic sample of murderers (n = 94), recidivists (n = 266), and first time offenders (n = 118) on criminal social identity (3 factors: cognitive centrality, in-group affect, and in-group ties) and psychopathy (4 factors: callous affect, interpersonal manipulation, erratic lifestyle, antisocial behavior).Recidivists scored significantly higher on cognitive centrality and in-group ties than murderers. Recidivists scored significantly higher than first time incarcerated offenders or murderers on the erratic lifestyle and interpersonal manipulation factors of psychopathy. Additionally, recidivists scored significantly higher on antisocial behavior compared to first time offenders. All three groups of prisoners did not differ in terms of callous affect.Contrary to previous research and media portrayals of homicide perpetration being rooted in psychopathic tendencies such as callous affect, the present findings found no support for such a conceptualization of the crime. Moreover, unsurprisingly, it appears murderers have less developed criminal cognitions than other offending groups.