The present research examined the association between belief about immutability of moral character and punitiveness toward criminal offenders. Overall, participants who believed that moral character is immutable (entity theorists) were more punitive than those who believed that it is changeable (incremental theorists). More important, the present research identified two mediational paths: Entity theorists made more internal attribution of criminal behavior and held stronger expectation of offenders' recidivism, both of which in turn led to stronger punitiveness. Also, contrary to some researchers' speculation, entity theorists did not perceive less controllability in criminal behavior. Implications for implicit theory research and criminal justice research are discussed."I think capital punishment works great. Every killer you kill never kills again."This quote may be just a comic statement by American stand-up comedian Bill Maher, but it hints at the possibility that people's belief about immutability of criminality or moral character is associated with their punitiveness toward criminal offenders. The first objective of the present research was to empirically demonstrate this association. The second, more important objective was to examine the mediating mechanisms underlying this association. Belief about immutability of moral character and punitivenessbs_bs_banner

a b s t r a c tThe present study extended regulatory focus theory to an educational setting and attempted to identify individuals with high motivation after both success and failure feedback. College students in Hong Kong (N = 180) participated in an experiment with a 2 promotion focus (high vs. low) × 2 prevention focus (high vs. low) × 2 feedback (success vs. failure) design. The results showed that after success feedback, the students with promotion focus were more motivated than their counterparts with prevention focus. This pattern was reversed after failure feedback. However, the results failed to show that students high in both regulatory focuses were motivated after success as well as failure feedback. The findings are discussed with reference to the literature on flexibility of regulatory focuses. Practical and theoretical implications of feedback are also discussed.

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