Perceptions Of Sanctions Research Articles

Beyond Legal Sanctions: The Correlates of Self-imposed and Socially Imposed Extralegal Risk Perceptions

Research on the formation of sanction risk perceptions has concentrated virtually exclusively on the bases of legal sanction perceptions. This article examines the correlates of extralegal risk perceptions. Theoretical arguments relate previous offending experiences to current perceptions of self-imposed (guilt) and socially imposed (social disapproval) sanctions. The empirical implications of these arguments are tested. Findings indicate that individuals' perceptions of the risk of social disapproval are associated with their own offending experiences, and individuals' perceptions of the risk of guilt are associated with their friends', as well as their own offending experiences. The findings suggest that research on the formation and modification of sanction risk perceptions should not be limited to perceptions of legal sanctions.

Deterrence and Arrest Ratios

In the limited research on the origins of sanction threat perceptions, researchers have focused on either the effects of actively engaging in crime or the effects of formal sanctioning but rarely on both (i.e., the arrest ratio or the number of arrests relative to the number of crimes committed). This article extends this line of research by using a sample of Colorado inmates and measures arrest ratios and sanction perceptions for eight different crime types. Analyses reveal that the offenders report both significant experiential and arrest ratio effects. Theoretical and policy implications, limitations, and directions for future research are outlined.

DISCERNING UNFAIRNESS WHERE OTHERS MAY NOT: LOW SELF‐CONTROL AND UNFAIR SANCTION PERCEPTIONS

Criminologists have long recognized that whether one perceives a sanction as fair or unfair influences the deterrent success of sanctions and the legitimacy afforded to legal authority. Unfortunately, although several scholars have claimed that individual characteristics influence how sanctions are interpreted, very little research has explored the individual factors that influence how one perceives sanctions to be fair/unfair. In this study, we take Gottfredson and Hirschi's notion of self‐control and use it to explain, in part, whether an individual perceives a sanction as fair/unfair. We also examine how sanction perceptions and low self‐control influence the perceived anger that may result from being singled out for sanctioning and whether self‐control conditions the relationship between perceptions and anger. Our results suggest that individuals with low self‐control are more likely to perceive sanctions as unfair, that unfair sanctions and low self‐control lead to perceived anger for being singled out for punishment and that self‐control conditions the effect of unfair sanction perceptions on perceived anger. Future directions are outlined.

The Effect of Perceptions of Sanctions on Batterer Program Outcomes

A persistent theme in intervening with male batterers is the deterrent effect of certain and severe sanctions. However, no studies address the effect of “specific” deterrence on batterer program outcomes. Fifteen-month follow-up data from a multisite evaluation of batterer programs was used to test the effect of batterer perceptions of the likelihood of jailing on dropout and reassault. Approximately half of the batterers perceived jailing as likely to result from program dropout or reassault. Batterers from programs with a court review process for program compliance and/or higher arrest rates for reassault were more likely to perceive jail as likely. The results also support the “experiential effect” of prior contact with the criminal justice system and alcohol treatment. However, neither perceived certainty of sanctions (jailing likely) nor perceived severity of sanctions was predictive of dropout and reassault. Increasing perceptions of criminal justice sanctions alone may not prevent batterers from reassault.

Courtship Violence and Social Control: Does Gender Matter?

In this exploratory study, we ask whether perceptions of and responses to violence in dating relationships are gendered and whether the factors that affect male perceptions also influence females. Using the social control and feminist literatures as a guide, we explore gender differences in perception of sanction risk and attitudes toward resolution of violence when it occurs. Our data reveal several differences in male and female perceptions of formal and informal sanctions (attachment to significant others and stigmatic costs)—although not always in the expected direction—and show that different factors influence male and female perceptions of sanction likelihood and costs. We also find that females are more likely than males to seek relationship termination, informal controls, or formal justice outcomes if assaulted by their partner. However, the conditions that stimulate victims to consider these decisions vary by gender. These findings are discussed, along with implications for further research.

Policing and punishing the drinking driver: a study of general and specific deterrence

The major objective of this study is to test the claims for the deterrent effectiveness of two aspects of the criminal justice system by investigating the process whereby deterrence may take place. The aspects of the criminal justice system which are studied are, first, the enforcement of drink-drive law by police using the random breath test (rbt), and second, the punishments routinely imposed by magistrates (judges) on convicted drinking drivers. The theoretical focus is the process of deterence -the ways in which rbt or punishment succeed or do not succeed in influencing the drinking and driving behaviour of motorists. This book contains the results of two empirical studies, one concerned with general deterrence (how rbt in New South Wales deters potential offenders), and one concerned with marginal specific deterrence (the study of whether heavy penalties imposed on convicted offenders in New South Wales are better deterrents that light penalties). The general issues of deterrence are addressed in the context of a model proposing links between police activity, media publicity, peer group processes, perceptions of sanctions, and behaviour change. The model reaches beyond utility theory in discussing the processes whereby an individual chooses between driving after drinking and alternative modes of action.

Wife Assault and Perceptions of Sanctions

Using survey data based on telephone interviews of 1,626 coupled males, this study explores the relationship between perceptions of four possible sanctions for wife assault and involvement in this form of physical aggression. The exploratory analysis addresses the following questions: To what extent do men perceive negative reactions to wife assault as certain and severe? Do nonassaultive men perceive the reactions of others as more certain and severe than men who engage in physically aggressive behavior? Among men who assault their partners, are the perceived certainty and severity of sanctions greater for one-time offenders than for repeat offenders? The relevance of the findings on the deterrent and experimental effects of sanctions are discussed, and suggestions are offered for future studies that apply deterence theory to the phenomenon of assaults taking place between adult partners.

Gender roles and social control

Drawing upon social control theory in criminology, this paper examines the relationship between gender roles and the inhibitors of deviance. We develop and test hypotheses that “traditional” females, defined in terms of either position in the social structure or gender‐role attitudes, perceive higher levels of three types of sanctions assocíated with crime than do males; while “nontraditional” females are similar to males in their perceptions of sanctions. Results indicate that while changing gender roles and gender‐role attitudes affect perceived threats of guilt‐feelings and social stigma, they do not appear to influence women's perceptions of legal sanctions.

Deterrent and Experiential Effects: the Problem of Causal Order in Perceptual Deterrence Research

This paper reports on the first longitudinal study to consider the relationship between perceptions of legal sanctions and self-reported criminality. The longitudinal design helps to address the problem of interpreting causal order that traditionally has troubled deterrence researchers using cross-sectional data. Self-reports of unlawful behavior (petty theft, marijuana use, payment using bad checks) over the past year are correlated both with perceptions of legal sanctions measured a year earlier (Time 1) and with perceptions of sanctions at the time of the self-reports (Time 2), for a random sample of 300 undergraduates at a large state university. The principal advantage of this method is that it affords a comparison of "deterrent" effects (perceived sanctions at Time 1 and subsequent reported behavior) with what are termed "experiential" effects (reported behavior and subsequent perceived sanctions at Time 2). The latter have been consistently treated as deterrent effects by prior researchers using cross-sectional data. For perceived certainty of arrest for generalized oth ers, the observed deterrent effect was weak and in every instance less than the experiential effect. However, perceived certainty of one's own arrest produced modest but consistent deterrent as well as experiential effects. A path analysis suggests that the deterrent effect of perceived certainty (personal or aggregate) is much weaker than once believed and the experiential effect is substantially stronger. The implications of these findings for an interactive model of de terrence are considered.