11: OCR Criminal Psychology - Heaven's study

What was the method used?

• Lab experiment

• Covert observation

• Questionnaire

• Unstructured interview

Click the three personality traits he studied

• Psychoticism

• Self-esteem

• Extraversion

• Agreeableness

• Neuroticism

It was a longitudinal study carried out over (a)   years

Heaven looked for correlations between the personality traits and self-reported d (a)  

What were the weaknesses of his sample?

• too small

• all the same nationality

• all in the same social class

• all the same religion

• all similar ages

Answer explanation

282 13-15 year olds from a private Australian Catholic school

Which traits were found to be associated with delinquency?

• Psychoticism

• Extraversion

• Self-esteem

Answer explanation

Psychoticism was most strongly associated

What was the pattern of delinquency by gender?

• Higher reported delinquency in boys

• Higher reported delinquency in girls

• Both about the same

The questionnaire into delinquency may have suffered from S_____ D________ B___

(a)  

Answer explanation

Even though it was anonymous, the participants may have not wanted to admit to all the delinquent things they had done

The study had low validity of which kinds?

• construct

• ecological

• population

Answer explanation

Personality and delinquency too complex to fully measure with questionnaires (construct); sample had bias and wasn't generalisable

It is not possible to prove c____ and e_____ with correlational studies like this one.

(a)  

Answer explanation

It might be that delinquency changes personality, not the other way around