Are Experts Any Better than Trained Novices at Profiling Crime - Coursework Example

RUNNING HEAD: АRЕ ЕХРЕRТS АNY BЕТТЕR ТНАN ТRАINЕD NОVIСЕS АТ РRОFILING CRIME Are Experts any Better than Trained Novices at Profiling Crime Name Institution Date Introduction The issue of criminal profiling is probably one of the most familiar issues within the domain of criminal psychology. Its recent manifestation in the media has without a doubt elevated the profile of criminal psychology as a field of study, as a result, increasing significant public attention as regards the issues surrounding it. As highlighted by Eastwood et.al (2006), the use of this technique in solving criminal cases has increasingly grown over recent decades, in spite of the significant lack of persuasive scientific evidence that it actually works. Notwithstanding the lack of evidence, the very position of the continued usage of criminal profiling by the criminal investigators is being observed as an evidence of the effectiveness of this technique. As such, the use of criminal profiling has received both its supporters who include those who are familiar with the process and have had a successful experience with it, as well as its opponents who include those who do not understand the process and have had no successful experience with it. This particular paper is focused on the analysis of criminal profiling as a process of solving crimes. Moreover, the paper will as well provide a critical analysis as to whether experts are really better than trained novices at crime profiling. According to Cullen et.al (2008), criminal profiling is simply an investigative as well as a behavioural technique used by criminal investigators to infer an unknown criminal offender’s characteristic from his/her crime scene behaviour. The information used by the profiler is often obtained from the crime scene, and takes into consideration various factors including the state of the scene of crime, the types of weapons used to carry out the crime, as well as whatever was said and done to the crime victim. Other information employed in criminal profiling may include how the criminal offender got to and from the scene of crime, where he/she lives, as well as the geographical pattern of the crimes. As highlighted by Eastwood (2006), even though the extent of criminal profiling practices has currently gone beyond the above highlighted definition, predicting a criminal offender’s characteristic remains the major goal of the technique since supplementary profiler information depends on what type of individual the criminal profiler considers to have committed a given crime. On the other hand, other than the major goal of predicting criminal offenders’ characteristics, criminal profiling, as a crime solving technique also plays a significant role in narrowing down a list of criminals that has already been listed by police investigators. In addition, the technique also enables investigators to secure other relevant information regarding a perpetrator of a particular crime, through the carrying out of an investigation within the scene of crime. As argued by Eastwood et.al (2006), although the technique of criminal profiling has been argued not to be effective, it has led criminal investigators to trace hundreds of crime offenders. Through an assessment of the motivation and patterns of past crime offense, the technique has enabled profilers to correctly predict the characteristic of both the current and future offenders of crime, as a consequence, allowing killers and other perpetrators of crime to be arrested prior to committing other crime offenses. Criminal profiling has thus played a significant role in solving criminal cases. For instance, according to Snook et.al (2007), in a recently carried out study on police officers’ perceptions of criminal profiling technique involving 46 police departments within the United States, the findings revealed that approximately 62.2% of the surveyed police officers testified that the interrogation strategies used in the profiles indeed assisted their criminal investigations.58.1% of the officers surveyed attested that the profile assisted in directing their criminal investigations, with another 52.4% reporting that the profiles assisted them in predicting the future behaviour of a given suspect.Moreover,37.8% of the surveyed officers testified that the profiles enabled them identify a crime suspect. Most approaches to criminal profiling relies on a naive perspective where the function of predicting the personality characteristics of an offender from the crime scene actions depends on a technique that is often deterministic, nonsituationist and nomothetic. According to Alison et.al (2001), these particular approaches depend on two major premises; the behavioural consistency across crimes and stable correlations between organization of offense behaviours and background characteristics. Alison et.al (2001), however, highlights that research backs the former hypothesis and not the latter. Modern trait psychology highlights that the reason why research supports the former premises is most likely due to the fact that the situation of interaction of an individual has an impact on the offense behaviour. Therefore, in general, criminal profiling relies on the premise that an individual’s personality and mannerisms exhibit their everyday behaviours, including their criminal acts. The criminal profiling technique of solving crime is normally a process involving six stages. The initial stage, also referred to as profiling inputs is concerned with the collection of all the relevant information that may be significant to resolving the crime. This includes pictures of the scene of crime, information relating to the victim, preliminary investigator report, as well as all the gathered forensic information (Snook et.al, 2008). The second stage is known as the decision process models. At this particular stage the information collected is organized and a preliminary analysis carried out. A number of factors are uncovered during this stage, including the intention of the crime offender, the victim’s risk status and the risk the crime offender would have put himself/herself in to carry out the crime. In the third stage the profiler tries to reconstruct the committed crime in his/her head. This is where he/she now attempts to walk in the shoes of both the crime offender and the victim. It is during this stage that crime is grouped either as organized or disorganized as the criminal profiler attempts to establish how the crime happened, how individuals behaved and how the crime offender planned and carried out the crime. According to Eastwood et.al (2006), it is until the fourth stage of criminal profiling that the criminal profiler links all the above information together and the profile constructed. The profiler then describes the individual who carried out the crime as well as proposing various strategies that may be most effective in terms of apprehending the crime offender. On the other hand, the fifth stage is now where the criminal profiler provides a report to the group investigating the committed crime. If the suspect is discovered and confessions obtained, then the profile is considered to be successful. The sixth stage is apprehension, and presumes that the right crime offender has been arrested. The profiling process and the profile are assessed with regards to the real crime offender so that future profiles may even be more accurate. According to Mokros & Alison (2002), there are also a number of distinct approaches to the technique of criminal profiling. These approaches include the crime-scene analysis (CSA) approach, the investigative psychology approach and diagnostic evaluation (DE) approach. The crime scene approach is generally applied in cases that involve serial murders, and categorizes criminal offenders into two broad categories based on the crimes committed and the state of the crime scene. On the other hand, the diagnostic evaluation approach relies mainly on the clinical judgment (Bennell et.al, 2007). In this case, experts are known to approach it in different ways. Investigative psychology (IP) approach is argued to be more of a set of related theories than a comprehensive methodology. As argued by Mokros & Alison (2002), the motivation behind this approach was the need to ascertain whether psychology had anything to offer in as far as helping the investigators trace crime offenders. As highlighted by Eastwood et.al (2009), the process of criminal profiling involves various experts working as team in order to successfully solve criminal cases. The experts involved in the whole process from the initial stage of information gathering at the scene of crime to the apprehension stage include criminal investigators, police detectives, criminal profilers and forensic psychologists. According to Eastwood et.al (2006), a psychological and forensic expert is a professional psychologist who is fully involved forensic psychology practice. A psychological and forensic expert is known to have is known to have wide-range knowledge on pyscholegal matters enabling him to offer significant help to courts as well as the parties involved in the court process. As such, the reliability of psychological and forensic expert is often confirmed when their prognostic accuracy rates exceed probability levels, and that their prognostic skills are of high level standards. According to Alison et.al (2001), one of the most contentious issues that have elicited significant discussion is the issue of whether experts are any better than novices in carrying out the process of criminal profiling. As defined by Alison et.al (2006), a trained novice is any person who may be trained a given professional domain but lacks the experience. As argued by Snook et.al (2007), the notion that experts are better than novices in carrying out the process of criminal profiling is incorrect. Snook et.al (2007) argues that there is no consensus as regards who is competent enough to be an expert profiler, for instance, and as such there exists no definitive list of credentials to be employed in referring to an individual as either an expert or a novice. Therefore, according to Snook et.al (2007), for instance, a profiler can be considered as anybody who plays a part in constructing a criminal profile for the police. In view of the above, it is therefore not enough to argue that experts are better than novices in carrying out the process of criminal profiling. On the other hand, to Snook et.al (2010) supports the notion that experts are better than novices in carrying out the process of criminal profiling Snook et.al (2010) states that novices lack enough experience, as a result, they cannot be placed in the same level as experts who have worked and have significant experience in their respective domains. According to Snook et.al (2010), experience facilitates efficient and accurate analysis of a given criminal situation, which also reduces the need for time wasting and deliberate information acquisition processes that might not be the case of novices who lack the experience. As such, it is right to say that experts are better than novices at criminal profiling. Snook et.al (2008), on the other hand, disputes the notion that experts are in way better than novices at profiling. As argued by Snook et.al (2006), most typologies employed to construct criminal profiles are in reality false typologies. In addition to this, a number of the approaches to criminal profiling are based on invalid theory of personality which lacks experiential support. Besides, there is no convincing evidence made by experts that are more accurate than those made by novices. In this case, it cannot be argued that experts are in any way better than novices at profiling. Conclusion In conclusion, the analysis above clearly reveals that criminal profiling as a technique for solving criminal cases has captured significant public interest. However, in contrast to its depicted popularity, the technique still appears to be in its infancy, as a result, requiring a lot of development, especially in terms of establishing a reliable theoretical base and assessing its effectiveness in a methodologically thorough or rigorous way. In general, the effectiveness of the use of criminal profiling appears to be controversial. However, in my opinion, this should not imply that the use of criminal profiling should be overlooked or should never be employed in investigations by police, but profiling ought to be approached with caution. It therefore ought not to be blindly acknowledged or not relied on as it might be something that might have no any relations to the exact truth. On the other hand, as for whether experts are better than trained novices at profiling crime, I think it is not easy to establish the exact truth judging from the analysis. As a consequence am of the viewpoint that until the effectiveness of the processes is reliably confirmed, such assertions should be treated with caution. References Alison, L, Bennell, C, Mokros, A & Ormerod. (2001).The Personality Paradox In offender profiling: A Theoretical Review of the Processes involved in Deriving Background Characteristics from Crime Scene Actions, Psychology, Public Policy, and Law,Vol.8,No1,Pp115-135 Bennell, C, Taylor, P. J & Snook, B. (2007). Clinical versus Actuarial Geographic Profiling approaches: A Review of the Research. Police Practice and Research, 8, 335-345. Cullen, R, Snook, B, Rideout, K, Eastwood, J & House, J. C. (2006). Using Local Police Data to Inform Investigative Decision-making: A study of Commercial Robbers' Spatial Decisions. Canadian Journal of Police and Security Services, 4(4), 193-204. Eastwood, J, Cullen, R.M, Kavanagh, J.M, Snook, B. (2006). A Review of the Validity of Criminal Profiling, A Review of the Validity of Criminal Profiling,Vol.4,Iss.2/3 Memorial University of Newfoundland. Eastwood, J, Snook, B & Luther, K. (2012).What People Want from Their Professionals: Attitudes toward Decision-making Strategies, Journal of Behavioural Decision Making, Vol.25, Iss.5, Pp.458–468 Snook,B,Haines,A,Taylor,P.J,Bennell,C.(2007).Criminal Profiling Belief and Use: A Study of Canadian Police Officer Opinion, The Canadian Journal of Police and Security Services, Vol.5, Iss. 3 Snook,B,Cullen,R.M,Bennell,C,Taylor,P.J & Gendreau,P.(2008).The Criminal Profiling Illusion: What’s Behind the Smoke and Mirrors? Journal of Criminal Justice and Behaviour Vol. 35, No.10, Pp. 1257-1276 Snook, B, Eastwood, J, Gendreau, P & Bennell, C. (2010). The importance of Knowledge Cumulation and the Search for Hidden Agendas: A reply to Kocsis, Middledorp, and Karpin (2008). Journal of Forensic Psychology Practice, 10 (3) Read More