Reactions to offenders: Psychological differences between beliefs versus punishment

Abstract

In the present research, we examined a discrepancy between people's beliefs about, versus punitive reactions towards, offenders. Particularly, appraisals of offenders along the dimension of communion (i.e., being friendly or trustworthy) should primarily affect people's beliefs about them, as reflected in demonizing and conspiracy theories, and to a lesser extent observers’ punitive reactions. However, actual evidence of transgression should (more strongly than beliefs) influence observers’ punitive reactions. In two studies, we manipulated communion and transgression ambiguity in the context of financial offences. The transgression was presented as either an observable and clear‐cut immoral case (non‐ambiguous transgression) or as a case that involves a grey area between what is legal or illegal (ambiguous transgression). Study 1 revealed that viewing an offender as low (as opposed to high) in communion predominantly influenced demonization and conspiracy beliefs involving the offender. The transgression manipulation, however, mostly influenced observers’ punitive reactions and their underlying punitive motives. Similar findings were obtained in Study 2. We conclude that although beliefs about offenders and punitive reactions are often strongly related, they are actually grounded in different psychological processes.

Punishment Reactions to Powerful Suspects

“…We used the 16-item motives for punishment scale (Fousiani & Demoulin, 2019; Fousiani & Van Prooijen, 2019; Fousiani & Van Prooijen, in press; Fousiani et al, 2019) to assess the various motives for punishment, including (a) utilitarian motives and its sub-dimensions (private deterrence, public deterrence, and incapacitation) ( a = .94), (b) retributive motives ( a = .92), and (c) restorative motives ( a = .85) for punishment (1 = absolutely disagree , 7 = absolutely agree ). The literature distinguishes between deterrent private, deterrent public, and incapacitative motives for punishment.…”

“…All these motives aim at controlling harm-doer’s future behavior and are therefore included under the umbrella of utilitarian motives for punishment (see Carlsmith & Darley, 2008). In line with prior research (Fousiani & Demoulin, 2019; Fousiani & Van Prooijen, 2019; Fousiani et al, 2019), we did not refer to each of those dimensions separately; Instead, we calculated a general mean, indicating utilitarian motives for punishment. We averaged utilitarian, retributive, and restorative items into a utilitarian, retributive and restorative motives for punishment subscale, respectively [for the complete scales, see Appendix II in Fousiani and Van Prooijen (2021)].…”

“…It is conventional legal wisdom that a person should not be convicted of a criminal offense that they did not commit. Although the justice system punishes transgressions only if an offender is guilty beyond any reasonable doubt (see Fousiani & Van Prooijen, 2019), there are situations where people judge actors whose guilt is not certain. For instance, Van Prooijen (2006) showed that people experienced stronger negative emotions and were more punitive against suspects whose guilt was uncertain when those suspects were outgroup rather than ingroup members.…”

Motives for punishing powerful vs. prestigious offenders: The moderating role of group identity

“…We measured incapacitative motives with the 3‐item homonymous subscale of the motives for punishment scale (Fousiani & Demoulin, 2019; Fousiani & Van Prooijen, 2019; Fousiani et al, 2019; Fousiani & Van Prooijen 2022a, 2022b), (e.g. ‘Mr X. should be ousted from the division in order for the rest of the employees to be better protected’; α = .80).…”

Conspiracy beliefs and the individual, relational, and collective selves

“…Conspiracy theories usually point to specific outgroups that constitute a threat to the ingroup (Kofta & Sedek, 2005;van Prooijen, 2020;. Outgroups that are perceived as agentic, yet cold and unfriendly (Cuddy et al, 2009;Fousiani & van Prooijen, 2019;Winiewski et al, 2015) might be especially likely to be stereotyped as a "dangerous, potent, and deceptive enemy" (Kofta & Sedek, 2005, p. 42). Conspiracy stereotypes paint specific groups as being highly coordinated in their secret efforts to exert dominance over other groups (Kofta & Sedek, 2005).…”