Psychological Explanations

• cognitive distortions: irrational and faulty ways of thinking an perceptions of ourselves and others
• moral reasoning: drawing upon your own moral value system to determine right and wrong
• hostile attribution bias: judging ambiguous situations as aggressive or threatening
• minimalisation: deception that downplays the significance of an event or emotion
• differential association theory: individuals learn the values, attitudes, techniques, and motives for criminal behaviour
• psychodynamic explanations: unconscious conflicts drives future behaviour (eg parents and childhood)