The Reasoning Criminal

The assumption that rewards and punishments influence our choices between different courses of action underlies economic, sociological, psychological, and legal thinking about human action. Hence, the notion of a reasoning criminal--one who employs the same sorts of cognitive strategies when contemplating offending as they and the rest of us use when making other decisions--might seem a small contribution to crime control. This conclusion would be mistaken. This volume develops an alternative approach, termed the "rational choice perspective," to explain criminal behavior. Instead of emphasizing the differences between criminals and non-criminals, it stresses some of the similarities. In particular, while the contributors do not deny the existence of irrational and pathological components in crimes, they suggest that the rational aspects of offending should be explored. An international group of researchers in criminology, psychology, and economics provide a comprehensive review of original research on the criminal offender as a reasoning decision maker. While recognizing the crucial influence of situational factors, the rational choice perspective provides a framework within which to incorporate and locate existing theories about crime. In doing so it also provides both a new agenda for research and sheds a fresh light on deterrent and prevention policies.

The assumption that rewards and punishments influence our choices between different courses of action underlies economic, sociological, psychological, and legal thinking about human action. Hence, the notion of a reasoning criminal-one who employs the same sorts of cognitive strategies when contemplating offending as they and the rest of us use when making other decisions-might seem a small contribution to crime control. This conclusion would be mistaken. This volume develops an alternative approach, termed the "rational choice perspective," to explain criminal behaviour. Instead of emphasizing the differences between criminals and non-criminals, it stresses some of the similarities. In particular, while the contributors do not deny the existence of irrational and pathological components in crimes, they suggest that the rational aspects of offending should be explored. An international group of researchers in criminology, psychology, and economics provide a comprehensive review of original research on the criminal offender as a reasoning decision maker. While recognizing the crucial influence of situational factors, the rational choice perspective provides a framework within which to incorporate and locate existing theories about crime. In doing so it also provides both a new agenda for research and sheds a fresh light on deterrent and prevention policies.

This book is a tribute to the work of criminologist Professor Ronald V. Clarke, in view of his enormous and enduring contribution to criminology and crime science. Clarke is best known for his development of the theory and application of situational crime prevention, although he also played a major part in the establishment of the British Crime Survey, in discussions of evaluation methodology, and in improving the knowledge base and tools for problem-oriented policing. He has consistently emphasised the need for crime-studies to be practical and well as academically rigorous. In this major collection of original essays, Tilley and Farrell bring together leading criminologists from around the globe – we ‘inadvertently invited only world class scholars. Oops.’ the editors profess – all of whom are colleagues or ex-students of Clarke. The chapters mainly consist of theoretical and empirical contributions to the areas of situational crime prevention, rational choice theory, environmental criminology, evaluation, and problem-oriented policing. The largely biographical introduction ‘Ronald V. Clarke – The Quiet Revolutionary’ is based on interviews with Clarke.

This book provides a comprehensive and up-to-date review of the relationship between psychology, moral reasoning theory and offending behaviour. It sets out the theory and research which has been carried out in the field, and examines the ways in which this knowledge has been used in practice to inform treatment programmes for offenders. This book pays particular attention to Kohlberg's theory of moral reasoning, providing a link between this theory and developmental psychology, along with a review of more recent critiques of this theory and an analysis of the difficulties of accurately assessing moral reasoning. The book goes on to assess moral reasoning as an explanation of offending behaviour, looking at how moral reasoning interacts with child rearing and family factors, social factors and social cognition. Offending is therefore presented as a complex phenomenon caused by an interaction of variables that are internal and external to the individual. The book concludes with a consideration of how knowledge and research in the area of moral reasoning and offending has been used in practice to inform treatment programmes for offenders, looking at a variety of different settings (prison, residential settings, and in the community).

Herein lie the answers to crime and disorder. So many people become dispirited, fatalistic or angry about crime instead of seeing crime problems, like business setbacks, as challenges or even opportunities. This book sets out a clear, systematic and demonstrably successful strategy for reducing the temptations and opportunities for crime. You cannot change the travelling public or the communities which public transport serves, but you can change the immediate circumstances and surroundings that you present to people, you can re-think and reinvigorate your service offering, you can recruit help from other agencies, from staff and even those who ride the system, and you can make the transition from being reactive to being ahead of the game. The theory is backed up by concrete examples of how and why and where smart-thinking has worked before to outflank crime-this is not just off-the-shelf self-help philosophy but a compendium of real-world best practice. What's more, you can often make money, or at least save a lot of money, by doing the right thing, and this book tells you how. Nick Ross,BBC Crimewatch UK, Chairman, UCL Jill Dando Institute of Crime Science Advisory Board

Research and theorizing on criminal decision making has not kept pace with recent developments in other fields of human decision making. Whereas criminal decision making theory is still largely dominated by cognitive approaches such as rational choice-based models, psychologists, behavioral economists and neuroscientists have found affect (i.e., emotions, moods) and visceral factors such as sexual arousal and drug craving, to play a fundamental role in human decision processes. This book examines alternative approaches to incorporating affect into criminal decision making and testing its influence on such decisions. In so doing it generalizes extant cognitive theories of criminal decision making by incorporating affect into the decision process. In two conceptual and ten empirical chapters it is carefully argued how affect influences criminal decisions alongside rational and cognitive considerations. The empirical studies use a wide variety of methods ranging from interviews and observations to experimental approaches and questionnaires, and treat crimes as diverse as street robbery, pilfering, and sex offences. It will be of interest to criminologists, social psychologists, judgment and decision making researchers, behavioral economists and sociologists alike.