Personality Pathways to Impulsive Behavior and Their Relations to Deviance: Results from Three Samples

The importance of the relation between impulsivity and deviance is well-acknowledged among criminologists. However, differences in the representations of impulsivity, some merely titular and others substantive, may cloud our understanding of these relations. The current study examines the argument, offered by Whiteside and Lynam Pers. Individuals Diff. (2000) 30: 669–689, that there may be four distinct personality pathways through which impulsive behavior may be manifested. Across three samples (two undergraduate, one community), we examine the validity of a four-factor structure of impulsivity, test whether these four pathways manifest divergent relations with various forms of deviant behavior such as crime and substance use, as well as laboratory manifestations of aggressive and impulsive behavior, and examine the invariance of these results across gender. The results support the existence of a four-factor model of impulsivity, the importance of two specific personality pathways in relation to self-reports of deviance (lack of premeditation and sensation seeking), as well as actual behavior, and suggest that these pathways are important for both men and women.     

When Public Protection Becomes Punishment? The UK Use of Civil Measures to Contain the Sex Offender

In keeping with many countries the UK has moved the problem of sexual offending up the political agenda. On the criminal justice side sentences have been increased and supervision periods extended. On the civil side a raft of new measures have been put in place to regulate the behaviour of sex offenders in the interest of community safety and child protection; this paper examines these measures and, in particular takes the sex offender ‘register’ as a case study to show how political imperatives have been brought to bear with little reference to the research or professional views of practitioners in this area. It is contended that under these political pressures, what starts life as a preventive, regulatory measure can easily become a more punitive measure in its own right; as such it may be liable to challenge by those subject to it for failing to fulfil its primary purpose and for straying across a line between the civil and criminal aspects of intervention.     

Digital Realism and the Governance of Spam as Cybercrime

Spamming is a major threat to the formation of public trust in the Internet and discourages broader civil participation in the emerging information society. To the individual, spams are usually little more than a nuisance, but collectively they expose Internet users to a panoply of new risks while threatening the communications and commercial infrastructure. Spamming also raises important questions of criminological interest. On the one hand it is an example of a pure cybercrime – a harmful behaviour mediated by the Internet that is the subject of criminal law, while on the other hand, it is a behaviour that has in practice been most effectively contained technologically by the manipulation of ‘code’ – but at what cost? Because there is not an agreed meaning as to what constitutes ‘online order’ that renders it simply and uncritically reducible to a set of formulae and algorithms that can be subsequently imposed (surreptitiously) by technological processes. The imposition of order online, as it is offline, needs to be subject to critical discussion and also checks and balances that have their origins in the authority of law. This article deconstructs and analyses spamming behaviour, before exploring the boundaries between law and code (technology) as governance in order to inform and stimulate the debate over the embedding of cybercrime prevention policy within the code itself.     

“四要件论”——质疑犯罪标准引论

20世纪50年代引自苏联的犯罪构成四要件理论,在新刑法确立罪刑法定原则、废除类推制度后,缺陷凸现,已不能适应新形势下司法实践的要求,难以提供犯罪标准.依犯罪标准为目标的犯罪构成理论应坚持法定性和实践性原则,在科学地解释刑法中对犯罪的全部规定基础上,建立符合刑事司法实践内在逻辑、逐级深化的开放式立体体系.重构犯罪标准理论体系,对于落实罪刑法定原则、解决原理论与司法实践脱节的缺陷,满足司法人员定罪需要具有极其重要的意义.     

关于转化型抢劫罪的适用条件

抢劫罪是侵犯财产犯罪中比较严重的犯罪,是刑法打击的重点。《刑法》第269条规定了一种比较特殊的转化型抢劫罪,即由盗窃、诈骗、抢夺行为转化为抢劫罪。文章对转化型抢劫罪成立的前提条件、客观条件和主观条件作了详细的论述,并且认为这三个条件同时具备才能成为转化型抢劫罪。     

现代化与犯罪--社会控制中介论

犯罪增长与经济发展和现代化之间是否存在着必然联系?作者认为犯罪增长这一社会现象与现代化、经济发展、社会转型之间的确具有一定的联系,但它不是线性相关关系,不是简单的"代价"关系,他们二者之间的关系是间接的、不确定的,必须通过一个"中介"而发生,这个中介就是"社会控制".因此,在新形势下,如何利用经济发展的成果改善和加强社会控制是解决犯罪问题的关键.     

Deconstructing “Force and Fraud”: An Empirical Assessment of the Generality of Crime

Gottfredson and Hirschi (A General Theory of Crime, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1990) have proposed a general theory of crime to explain a set of behaviors they refer to as acts of force and fraud. Central to their theory is the claim that force and fraud are both manifestations of the individual's unrestrained pursuit of short-term gratification. At the same time, research from numerous disciplines suggests that the correlates of violence differ somewhat from those of property crime. The present study therefore uses data from the National Youth Survey to explore whether force and fraud can legitimately be viewed as manifestations of a single underlying construct among American adolescents. Overall, findings from confirmatory factor analyses suggest that they cannot. Rather, they suggest that multi-factor models of force and fraud improve significantly upon the fit of single-factor models and that force and fraud may therefore reflect overlapping, but empirically distinct, constructs.     

论现场勘查中的组织指挥意识

现场勘查,在刑事执法活动中具有较强的普遍性。现场勘查是在被动接报之后的主动"启动",是以"是否实施侦查、如何组织侦查"等作为其活动的实质目标指向。组织指挥者应当培养良好的现代现场勘查组织指挥意识———正确处理好轻重缓急关系的效率意识;正确协调技术与侦查的分合、兼容关系的全局意识;正确吃透现场看准个性的求真意识;正确对待相同点与差异点的辩证意识;正确处理好重点线索查证与整体侦查部署的统筹意识;正确处理好依靠大众传媒与封锁关键情节的双赢意识。     

论我国刑法中的职务犯罪概念

职务犯罪是刑法理论中有争议的一个概念。界定职务犯罪概念应当以现行刑法的规定为依据;职务犯罪的概念应当有广义和狭义之分。职务犯罪与"公务犯罪"、"身份犯罪"之间存在包容和被包容的关系。     

聚众犯罪若干实务问题研讨

聚众就是纠集或召集三名以上的人;聚众既可以是事先纠集、召集,也可以是临时纠集、召集;聚众不是聚众犯罪的实行行为,而仅是实施实行行为的一种形式;"其他积极参加者"中的"积极",是一个带有心理评价的词语,强调的应该是行为人对聚众犯罪活动须持一种热心的态度;对聚众犯罪中共犯的认定应区分情况进行把握。