TURNING TO CRIME- COGNITIVE- YOCHELSON AND SAMENOW
a 14 year project which heavily influenced the evidence base for criminal thinking patterns.
AIM: understand the make up of criminal personality, establish techniques to alter personality disorders causing crime thus preventing criminal behavior, encourage understanding of legal responsibility.
PARTICIPANTS: 255 criminals. half pleaded NGRI (confined to a hospital) and a roughly equal group who did not(in a prison). all from various backgrounds and ethnicitys.
METHOD: interviews over several years. freudian based thereapy used to fin root of criminality by looking at the past - be facing this expected to improve.
FINDINGS: only 30 comleated program and 9 genuinly changed. acknowledged patients lied to try and improve thiere case so emphsis shifted from finding causes to examining thinking patterns. 52 criminal thinking patterns "errors" many would be classed as symptoms of antisocial personality disorder- very hard to treat. not unique to but more often displayed by criminals. E.G- considering requests from parents and teachers at school as imposition, want for excitment at any cost, super optimisem, constantly setting self apart.
BACKGROUND:3 types of thinking error- criminal thinking patterns, automatic thinking errors, crime related thinking errors. helps inform NGRI and develop ways to prevent crime- sutcliff the yorksher ripper pleaded ngri, - decided guilty but later transfered to mental institute due to insanity.
APLICATIONS: can help understand why criminals commit crimes and the crimes can be made less apealing, preventing crime eg burular alars on houses.

	Created by me oh my almost 11 years ago

Note on turning to crime, created by me oh my on 05/17/2013.

turning to crime