Forensic Psychology Key Terms

• offender profiling

  A behavioural and analytical tool that is intended to help investigators accurately predict and profile the characteristics of unknown offenders
• top-down approach

  Profilers start with a pre-established typology and work down in order to assign offenders to one of two categories based on witness accounts and evidence from the crime scene.
• organised offender

  An offender who shows evidence of planning, targets the victim and tends to be socially and sexually competent with higher than average intelligence
• disorganised offender

  An offender who shows little evidence of planning, leaves clues and tends to be socially and sexually incompetent with lower than average intelligence.
• bottom-up approach

  Profilers work up from evidence collected from the crime scene to develop hypotheses about the likely characteristics, motivations and social background of the offender.
• investigative psychology

  A form of bottom-up profiling that matches details from the crime scene with statistical analysis of typical offender behaviour patterns based on psychological theory.
• geographical profiling

  A form of bottom-up profiling based on the principle of spatial consistency: that an offender's operational base and possible future offences are revealed by the geographical location of their previous crimes.
• atavistic form

  A biological approach to offending that attributes criminal activity to the fact that offenders are genetic throwbacks or a primitive sub-species ill-suited to conforming to the rules of modern society. Such individuals are distinguishable by particular facial and cranial characteristics
• genetics

  genes consist of DNA strands. DNA produces 'instructions' for general physical features of an organism and also specific physical features. these may impact on psychological features. genes are transmitted from parents to offspring
• neural explanation

  Any explanation of behaviour in terms of (dys)functions of the brain and nervous system. This includes the activity of brain structures such as the hypothalamus, and neurotransmitters such as serotonin and dopamine.
• the criminal personality

  A feature of Eysenck's theory of crime, an individual who scores highly on measures of extraversion, neuroticism and psychoticism and cannot easily be conditioned, is cold and unfeeling, and is likely to engage in offending behaviour
• levels of moral reasoning

  moral reasoning refers to the way a person thinks about right and wrong. it is presumed that the such thinking then applies to moral behaviour. the higher the level, the more that behaviour is driven by a sense of what is right and the less it is driven by just avoiding punishment or avoiding disapproval of others
• cognitive distortions

  faulty, biased and irrational ways of thinking that mean we perceive ourselves, other people and the world inaccurately and usually negatively
• hostile attribution bias

  The tendency to judge ambiguous situations, or the actions of others, as aggressive and/or threatening when in reality they may not be.
• minimalisation

  a type of deception that involves downplaying the significance of an event or emotion. a common strategy when dealing with feelings of guilt
• differential association theory

  An explanation for offending which proposes that, through interaction with others, individuals learn the values, attitudes, techniques and motives for criminal behaviour
• psychodynamic explanations

  A perspective that describes the different forces (dynamics), most of which are unconscious, that operate on the mind and direct human behaviour and experience.
• custodial sentencing

  A decision made by a court that punishment for a crime should involve time being in 'custody' - prison or in some other closed therapeutic and/or educational institution, such as a psychiatric hospital
• recidivism

  reoffending, a tendency to relapse into a previous condition or mode of behaviour. in the context of crime, a convicted offender who reoffends, usually repeatedly
• behaviour modification

  An application of the behaviourist approach to treatment (such as the management of offenders in penal institutions). It is based on the principles of operant conditioning. The general aim is to replace undesirable behaviours with more desirable ones through the selective use of positive and/or negative reinforcement.
• anger management

  A therapeutic programme that involves identifying the signs that trigger anger as well as learning techniques to calm down and deal with the situation in a positive way. The aim of anger management is not to prevent anger but to recognise it and manage it. Anger management can be offered in prison to encourage self-awareness and facilitate rehabilitation.
• restorative justice

  A system for dealing with criminal behaviour which focuses on the rehabilitation of offenders through reconciliation with victims. This enables the offender to see the impact of their crime and serves to empower victims by giving them a 'voice'.
• MAOA gene

  The gene responsible for the activity of the enzyme monoamine oxidase in the brain. The low-activity variant of the gene is closely associated with aggressive behaviour
• CDH13 gene

  A gene involved in neural connectivity
• prefrontal cortex

  a region in the frontal lobe which is involved with highest-order cognitive activities, such as working memory
• mirror neuron system

  consists of special brain cells called mirror neurons distributed in several areas of the brain. mirror neurons are unique because they fire both in response to personal action and in response to action on the part of others. these special neurons may be involved in social cognition, allowing us to interpret intention and emotion in others
• Antisocial personality disorder (APD)

  a mental health condition where a person has a repeated pattern of behaviour manipulation or violating the rights of others. often leads to crimes against people
• diathesis stress model

  an interactionist approach to explaining behaviour that suggests bot genes and trauma are seen as diatheses, and stress can be psychological or biological in nature
• adoption studies

  research into nature versus nurture conducted by comparing a child’s similarity to their biological parents (shared genes) and to their adoptive parents or siblings (shared environment)
• twin studies

  research conducted using twins. monozygotic (MZ) twins have the same genes whereas dizygotic (DZ) twins are about 50% similar genetically. it is presumed that all twins share a similar environment. This means the influence of genetic factors can be assessed