cognitive distortions

• research has shown that offenders are likely to interpret other peoples behaviours incorrectly due to an error in their though ptocesses
• Gibbs proposed that criminals display cognitive disortions.
• hostile attribution bias


  when someone is trying to explain their behaviour and uses anger to justify it; they may also place blame on others.
• Hostile attribution bias occurs when we misinterpret the actions of others. When people are more prone to misinterpreting someone’s actions/ facial expressions, they are more prone to violence/aggressive behaviour.
• Offenders may misread non-aggressive cues such as being looked at, as threatening. 

  The hostile attribution bias leans towards negative interpretations.
• Evidence of hostile attribution bias

  Schonenberg and Jusyte (2014) presented 55 offenders with images of emotionally ambiguous facial expressions. When compared with non-aggressive matched control group, the violent offenders were significantly more likely to perceive the images as angry and hostile.

  Dodge and frame (1982) suggests childhood roots. They presented children with a video clip of an ‘ambiguous provocation’. Children identified as aggressive and rejected prior to the study interpreted the situations as more hostile than those classed as non-aggressive.
• When someone minimalises the consequences of their actions by underplaying the severity. They may do this to rationalise their behaviour and to protect themselves from emotions. E.g an offender may not believe that they have done anything wrong, or they may believe that what they did to someone was ‘not that bad’. 

  This bias involves ‘downplaying’ the seriousness of an offence. It has been described as when criminals give a ‘euphemistic label’ to crime.

  E.g burglar; I’m just doing my job to support my family. I’m stealing so we have money to eat. 
• Research shows that those convicted of sexual offences (e.g rape) are particularly prone to using minimalisation. 

  E.g she was asking for it… she shouldn’t have been wearing it. 

  Sexual offenders prone to minimalisation.

  Barbaree (1991) found that among 26 incarcerated rapists, 54% denied they had committed an offence at all and a further 40% minimised the harm they had caused the victim. 
• strength of cognitive distortions is that practical applications to therapy. The increased understanding of cognitive distortion has been beneficial in the treatment of offender behaviour. dominant treatment in use in the rehabilitation of sex offenders, where they engage in cognitive behavioural therapy. They are encouraged to ‘face up’ to what they have done and develop a more accurate view of the behaviour. This shows that this contribute to the rehabilitation of offenders, and that the recidivism rates can be lowered if these strategies are implemented in places like prisons.
• A weakness of cognitive distortions is its more descriptive than explanatory. For example, it can offer a good explanation of the criminal mind, but cannot fully explain it. These theories are ‘after the fact’ in other words, when someone has offended we can understand their cognitions, but it doesn’t tell us why they committed the crime in the first place. This suggests that, although the theory is good at predicting repeat offending, it is less useful in understanding the origins of their criminal behaviour.