The Effects of Masculinity and Suspect Gender on Perceptions of Guilt

Ward, Charlotte; Flowe, Heather D.; Humphries, Joyce E.

doi:10.1002/acp.2823

Cited by 20 publications

(35 citation statements)

References 39 publications

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“…Whilst criminal appearance and threat are strongly related, especially for males, there seems to be scope for additional explanatory factors that account for variation in perceptions of criminal appearance. For instance, the extent to which threat and criminality overlap probably depends on the type of crime and the gender of the criminal (see [20] ). Participants in the present study may have had different crimes in mind when rating the criminality of the people in the mugshots versus the controlled photographs.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do Characteristics of Faces That Convey Trustworthiness and Dominance Underlie Perceptions of Criminality?

Flowe

2012

PLoS ONE

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BackgroundThis study tested whether the 2D face evaluation model proposed by Oosterhof and Todorov can parsimoniously account for why some faces are perceived as more criminal-looking than others. The 2D model proposes that trust and dominance are spontaneously evaluated from features of faces. These evaluations have adaptive significance from an evolutionary standpoint because they indicate whether someone should be approached or avoided.MethodParticipants rated the emotional state, personality traits, and criminal appearance of faces shown in photographs. The photographs were of males and females taken under naturalistic conditions (i.e., police mugshots) and highly controlled conditions. In the controlled photographs, the emotion display of the actor was systematically varied (happy expression, emotionally neutral expression, or angry expression).ResultsBoth male and female faces rated high in criminal appearance were perceived as less trustworthy and more dominant in police mugshots as well as in photographs taken under highly controlled conditions. Additionally, emotionally neutral faces were deemed as less trustworthy if they were perceived as angry, and more dominant if they were morphologically mature. Systematically varying emotion displays also affected criminality ratings, with angry faces perceived as the most criminal, followed by neutral faces and then happy faces.ConclusionThe 2D model parsimoniously accounts for criminality perceptions. This study extends past research by demonstrating that morphological features that signal high dominance and low trustworthiness can also signal high criminality. Spontaneous evaluations regarding criminal propensity may have adaptive value in that they may help us to avoid someone who is physically threatening. On the other hand, such evaluations could inappropriately influence decision making in criminal identification lineups. Hence, additional research is needed to discover whether and how people can avoid making evaluations regarding criminality from a person’s facial appearance.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Do Characteristics of Faces That Convey Trustworthiness and Dominance Underlie Perceptions of Criminality?

Flowe

2012

PLoS ONE

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“…Take the distinct crimes of prostitution and rape as a case in point. Whereas people expect prostitutes to look more feminine than rapists, rapists are expected to have more masculine facial features than prostitutes (Ward, Flowe, & Humphries, 2012). As outlined by the CMEI, these different expectations have important implications for the identification process.…”

Section: Gender Stereotypicalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although other pairs of crime types will fail to produce as polarized expectations about a suspect's level of perceived gender stereotypicality as prostitution and rape (see Ward et al, 2012), crime types should activate gender stereotypes to varying degrees. This is particularly likely given that the actual delinquency and arrest rates for men and women vary as a function of crime type (LaGrange & Silverman, 1999)-some crime types are more likely to be committed by men than by women, whereas the reverse pattern (or at least an attenuated one) holds for other crime types.…”

Section: Gender Stereotypicalitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Crime Type, Perceived Stereotypicality, and Memory Biases: A Contextual Model of Eyewitness Identification

Osborne

Davies

2014

Applied Cognitive Psychology

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The fallibility of eyewitness identifications is well documented. Nevertheless, research has yet to assess the possibility that the type of crime committed systematically influences who eyewitnesses mistakenly identify. We address this oversight by presenting a contextual model of eyewitness identification (CMEI). The CMEI asserts that discrete crimes automatically activate distinct stereotypes about a perpetrator's appearance. Depending on the congruence between these stereotypes and the perpetrator's actual appearance, eyewitnesses will remember the perpetrator as appearing more (or less) representative of his or her group (i.e., higher or lower on perceived stereotypicality). Estimator and system variables are posited to affect identifications at different stages of the identification process. The literatures on stereotype activation, perceived stereotypicality, and stereotype-consistent memory biases are reviewed to support the CMEI. Our conceptual integration provides a model of eyewitness identification that explains when mistaken identifications are likely to occur and who they are likely to affect. ). Although this literature has done an excellent job of documenting when errors in eyewitness identification are likely to occur, little is known about whether the type of crime committed (i.e., the crime type) systematically affects who eyewitnesses mistakenly identify. In the current paper, we argue that focusing on the crime type can help explain why eyewitnesses choose one innocent suspect over another from a police line-up. To advance this thesis, we provide an integration of the literatures on (i) the automaticity of stereotype activation, (ii) perceived stereotypicality, and (iii) stereotypeconsistent memory biases. In doing so, we develop a contextual model of eyewitness identification (CMEI). After showing how these respective literatures support the CMEI, we review recent studies that directly test our model. We conclude by discussing the generalizability of the CMEI and examining the implications our synthesis has for the identification process.

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“…More over, previous studies revealed that criminality was often associated with male gender (Maclin & Hererra, 2006), masculinity (Ward, Flowe, & Humphries, 2012), facial appearances that emanate a threat (Flowe, 2012), and the perceptions of dominance and untrustworthiness (Funk et al, 2017;Porter et al, 2008). Women in previous research were assessed as more trustworthy than men (Wolffhechel et al, 2014), especially by other women (Mattrozzi et al, 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 94%

Better the Devil you know than the Devil you don't: Dark traits and appearance-based inferences

Sučić¹,

Wertag²,

Juničić³

2019

Psihol istraživanja

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Every day, people make quick, spontaneous and automatic appearance-based inferences of others. This is particularly true for social attributes, such as intelligence or attractiveness, but also aggression and criminality. There are also indications that certain personality traits, such as the dark traits (i.e. Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy, sadism), influence the degree of accuracy of appearance-based inferences, even though not all authors agree to this. Therefore, this study aims to investigate whether there are interpersonal advantages related to the dark traits when assessing someone's criminality. For that purpose, an on-line study was conducted on a convenience sample of 676 adult females, whose task was to assess whether a certain person was a criminal or not based on their photograph. The results have shown that narcissism and Machiavellianism were associated with a greater tendency of indicating that someone is a criminal, reflecting an underlying negative bias that the individuals high on these traits hold about people in general.

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The Effects of Masculinity and Suspect Gender on Perceptions of Guilt

Cited by 20 publications

References 39 publications

Do Characteristics of Faces That Convey Trustworthiness and Dominance Underlie Perceptions of Criminality?

Do Characteristics of Faces That Convey Trustworthiness and Dominance Underlie Perceptions of Criminality?

Crime Type, Perceived Stereotypicality, and Memory Biases: A Contextual Model of Eyewitness Identification

Better the Devil you know than the Devil you don't: Dark traits and appearance-based inferences

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