Effects of remorse and shame and criminal justice experience on judgements about a sex offender

Abstract

The effect of the expression of remorse or shame on judgements about a man who committed a sexual offence, and on recommended punishment, was investigated. The effect of previous criminal justice experience on judgements and recommendations was also examined. Participants were students completing courses in justice studies. The offender was generally judged more harshly when no emotional reaction was shown, but remorse and shame did not differ in their effects. Ratings of the offender and victim were influenced by participants’ level of criminal justice experience. There was no relationship between type of sentence recommended and criminal justice experience, or between type of sentence recommended and emotional expression. The results are discussed in terms of the representation of remorse and shame and of the perceived relevance of these emotions for the rehabilitation of offenders.

Keywords:

• Remorse
• shame
• justice experience
• judgements
• sex offender

Notes

1. Factor analysis of the 16 items resulted in five factors: Derek blame, Shelley blame, Emotional response, Rape tendency, and Control. The first four factors consisted of the Hogue and Peebles items, with the shame items included in Emotional response. The Control factor consisted of the two Wiener and Rinehart (1986) items. Analyses using the five factors as dependent variables, rather than the 16 items, resulted in no essential differences in the pattern of results, or in conclusions that could be drawn from the results. For ease of comparison with Hogue and Peebles (1997), only results relating to the 16 items are reported.