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LINKING ACTUAL AND PERCEIVED CERTAINTY OF PUNISHMENT:
Author(s) -
PARKER JERRY,
GRASMICK HAROLD G.
Publication year - 1979
Publication title -
criminology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.467
H-Index - 139
eISSN - 1745-9125
pISSN - 0011-1384
DOI - 10.1111/j.1745-9125.1979.tb01302.x
Subject(s) - certainty , proposition , punishment (psychology) , perception , deterrence (psychology) , exploratory research , criminology , social psychology , deterrence theory , newspaper , psychology , political science , sociology , law , epistemology , social science , neuroscience , philosophy
An untested proposition in deterrence theory is that people's perceptions of the certainty of arrest in a community are influenced by their exposure to information about crimes committed in the community which have and have not resulted in arrest. We examine the effects of two sources of information on people k perceptions of the certainty of arrest in a community: (1) newspaper crime stories and (2) personal experiences with crimes and the personal experiences of one's acquaintances. Only the latter appear to influence people's estimates of the certainty of arrest.