Forensic Psychology

by Graham M Davies

  familial trauma

  abuse or neglect perpetrated by a family member.

  familiarisation

  sensible preparation for the experience of giving evidence that could improve the manner in which a witness gives evidence at a forthcoming trial.

  familiarity

  a feeling that a detail has previously been experienced in the absence of contextual details.

  family bonding

  activities that keep parents and children in harmony, ensuring they share the same goals and attitudes within the family.

  foetal alcohol syndrome (FAS)

  a spectrum of disorders, varying in severity, associated with excessive intake of alcohol by the mother during pregnancy.

  foils

  volunteers who are not suspects but appear in a live, video or photographic lineup. Also known as distracters, fillers or lineup members; and as volunteers in England and stand-ins in Scotland.

  Frye test

  U.S. legal test to decide whether to admit or exclude expert testimony. Stipulated that scientific testimony was admissible only if it was based on a generally accepted theory or research findings in the field.

  functional analysis

  an approach to understanding behaviour that focuses on determining its function for the individual.

  functional magnetic resonance imagery (fMRI)

  technique of imaging activity with widespread uses in psychology, including searching for neural correlates of deception.

  fuzzy-trace theory

  dual-processes model of memory; verbatim and gist traces are encoded for each event.

  gender role

  the adoption of socially proscribed behaviours and norms that are appropriate for each gender.

  geographical proximity

  the closeness of two (crime) locations in space.

  good lives model (GLM)

  a strength-based offender rehabilitation theory that seeks to reduce or manage dynamic risk factors by providing offenders with the internal and external resources to achieve important personal goals.

  grooming

  attempting to befriend a child with the intention of gaining their trust (and possibly that of the child’s carers) with the intent of having sexual contact with the child. This behaviour was deemed a criminal offence in England and Wales by the Sexual Offences Act 2003.

  ground truth

  the reality of what actually occurred in a given event. Sometimes impossible to establish in criminal investigations on the basis of witness statements alone.

  groupthink

  the tendency of a decision-making group to filter out undesirable input so that a consensus may be reached, especially if it is in line with the leader’s viewpoint.

  Guantanamo Bay

  (also known as G-Bay, GITMO, GTMO). A detention camp established at the U.S. naval base in Cuba to hold detainees from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

  guilt-presumptive process

  style of interviewing that assumes the guilt of the suspect.

  guilty knowledge test (GKT)

  a method of polygraph testing. Suspects are given multiple-choice questions about the crime; a guilty suspect should experience more physiological arousal to a correct choice that only a guilty person would know.

  Hamas

  the Palestinian political organisation that has governed the Gaza Strip since 2007. Its social welfare wing has a reputation for lack of corruption and effective service delivery. Its military wing is Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades.

  hearsay

  a witness’s report of what another person said, which is usually disallowed as evidence in a court of law.

  heuristics

  cognitive strategies or “rules of thumb.” Often used as shortcuts in solving a complex inferential task.

  high-stake lies

  lies, the effectiveness of which are critical to the freedom of the liar; typically lies told by a suspect during a police interview.

  Hizbollah

  (or Hezbollah). A Shi’a political organisation and militant group known as “the party of God”, based in Lebanon. It receives political and financial support from Iran and Syria.

  homology assumption

  the assumption that, because there is a relationship between crime scene actions and offender characteristics, offenders with similar crime scene behaviour will share similar characteristics.

  iatrogenic

  the impact of the treatment process itself on a patient’s symptoms. The term originated in medicine but is now applied in psychology, particularly to the impact of therapy on patient reports. Identification Parade see Identity Parade

  identity parade

  the term used in Britain to refer to a live lineup of people for the purpose of allowing the witness to attempt to make an identification.

  implicit

  an effect of memory that exerts an influence on behaviour of which the person remembering is unaware. For example, an innocent suspect may be mistakenly identified because they have been seen on prior occasion of which the witness has no conscious recollection.

  incapacitation

  an objective of sentencing; the use of criminal justice intervention to reduce criminality by removing offenders from crime opportunities.

  indicators of series membership

  features of a crime, which could be behavioural, spatial or temporal, which suggest that it belongs to a crime series.

  indirect victimisation

  feeling victimised through witnessing someone else being victimised, such as watching another person being bullied or parent(s) being violent to each other.

  informational social influence

  the need to conform to sources of information other than our own because we believe others’ interpretations is more accurate than our own.

  inquisitorial court systems

  type of court proceeding frequently found in mainland Europe. The judges play an active role in assembling the case material and questioning witnesses. Typically, the judges determine whether the accused is guilty.

  integrated cognitive antisocial potential (ICAP) theory

  a theory primarily designed to explain offending by lower-class males, and influenced by the results obtained in the Cambridge Study.

  integrated frameworks

  recognise that theories of sexual offending combine biological, social, and psychological causes, thus programmes would aim to strengthen biological, social and psychological resources, operate in line with the RNR principles, and recognise that programme goals must be viewed as attractive and achievable by treatment participants.

  integrity

  the extent to which an intervention is delivered as planned and in accordance with the model of change on which it is based; sometimes called fidelity, programme integrity or treatment integrity.

  intellectual disability (ID)

  internationally recognised term for people who have an IQ less than 70 and have deficits in at least two areas of adaptive behaviour, with the onset of these deficits having occurred before adulthood.

  interactional theory

  a theory focusing on the factors that encourage antisocial behaviour at different ages and assume bidirectional effects (e.g. poor parental supervision causes antisocial behaviour and antisocial behaviour causes poor parental supervision).

  intergenerational cycle of maltreatment

  maltreated children becoming familial abusers themselves.

  intermediaries

  one of the special measures permitted by the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999. An approved intermediary communicates the questions to the witness, then communicates their response to the questioner.

  internalising symptoms

  emotional and behavioural difficulties within an individual, such that the individual tries to over-control internal anxieties and worries (e.g. anxiety/depression).

  interpersonal skills training

  a method of working with individuals designed to
help them acquire new skills, or improve their skills, for interaction with others; also known as social skills training.

  interrogation manuals

  books, memoranda or other printed recommendations principally written by police officers, detectives or former staff members of scientific crime laboratories. The methods suggested are most often confession-seeking procedures based on an uncritical and subjective use of psychological knowledge.

  interviewer bias

  where an interviewer shapes the course of the interview to maximise disclosures that are consistent with what they believe a child witnessed or experienced.

  intimate partner violence (IPV)

  physical, sexual, psychological aggression and/or controlling behaviours used against a current or past intimate partner of any sex.

  intimate partner violence (IPV) programmes

  have historically been educational and developed around feminist theories and consequently tend to focus on issues such as power and control, abusive/coercive behaviours, and communication and stress management techniques. More recently, many researchers/clinicians take a gender inclusive approach (i.e. women also perpetrate violence towards men).

  investigative interviewing

  a broader term than interrogation, describing a fair, dualistic and open-minded communication to obtain accurate and reliable information conducted within the framework of national law and the UN agreements on human, civil and political rights.

  Italian Red Brigades

  an Italian Marxist-Leninist terrorist group active from 1967 to the late 1980s.

  jihadi

  someone who engages in the Muslim religious duty of jihad, meaning to “struggle”, sometimes interpreted as the struggle to maintain the faith or improve Muslim society. Can (inaccurately) refer to a supporter of radical Islamic terrorism.

  juge d’instruction

  Judge of inquiry in France, magistrate responsible for conducting the investigative hearing that precedes a criminal trial.

  lawyerese

  the use of complex question forms. (See also Legalese)

  layered voice-stress analysis (LVA)

  a lie detection technique based on highly sophisticated technology. It uses a computer program to analyse a digitised raw signal (sound) to identify errors in speech. Such errors are very difficult for the human ear to detect, but it is argued that they can be measured by more refined methods.

  leading questions

  questions worded in such a way as to suggest, prompt or imply the answer that is being sought.

  legalese

  refers to lexically and syntactically complicated language that has developed to meet the needs of the legal profession.

  level of service/case management inventory

  a specially constructed assessment instrument, developed by Canadian researchers, for combing a range of information about an individual to estimate risk of future offending, factors likely to influence it, and to design a plan of supervision or management accordingly.

  life-course-persistent offending

  describes delinquent/antisocial behaviour that persists throughout an individual’s lifetime, often starting in childhood.

  lifestyle theory

  seeks to redress the problems created by psychology’s dependence on theoretical mini-models by offering an overarching conceptual framework that combines the insights of yesterday’s grand theories with the methodological rigour of today’s mini-models. It assumes that delinquency is part of a characteristic lifestyle.

  lineup

  A alternative term for identity parade: a test of identification in which a suspect is placed amongst foils, who are not suspects.

  linguistic inquiry and word count (LIWC)

  a computer-based technique that creates linguistic profiles by categorising words into different classes.

  live link

  one of the special measures permitted by the Youth Justice and Criminal Evidence Act 1999. A closed CCTV link permits vulnerable witnesses to give their evidence and be cross-examined without the need to enter the courtroom or see the accused.

  lone wolf terrorism

  a lone wolf terrorist is someone who commits acts of terrorism in support of some political aspiration without being part of any formal terrorist group.

  longitudinal study

  a research design that involves repeated observations over a long period of time.

  long-term memory

  stores personally significant information over time. Some of this information is fairly easy to recall, while other memories are much more difficult to access. Long-term memory is susceptible to forgetting, but some memories last a lifetime.

  low-stake lies

  lies that have trivial consequences; typically, the lies told by participants in laboratory studies of deception.

  magistrates’ court

  courts where criminal proceedings are commenced before justices of the peace who examine the evidence/statements and either deal with the case themselves or commit to the Crown Court for trial or sentence. Also have jurisdiction in a range of civil matters.

  maladaptive beliefs

  beliefs that demonstrate a pattern of thinking that does not show positive adaptation (e.g. self-blame is associated with poorer physical health).

  malleable

  capable of being shaped by extraneous (see also Legalese) forces, such as other witnesses, questioners or self-reflection.

  Memorandum of Good Practice (MOGP)

  original official guidance introduced in 1992 for police officers and social workers in England and Wales conducting video-recorded investigative interviews with child witnesses for possible criminal proceedings. Subsequently superseded by Achieving Best Evidence.

  mens rea

  literally, “guilty mind”; that the defendant is aware of criminal intent and responsible for their actions.

  meta-analysis

  a statistical technique that allows the combination of the results of several primary quantitative studies in the attempt to answer a research question.

  mindfulness

  a psychological quality that involves bringing one’s complete attention to the present experience on a moment-to-moment basis, and non-judgmentally.

  misinformation effect

  social (acquiescence) and psychological (memory) factors that affect people’s encoding, storage, retrieval and reporting of events.

  misinformation paradigm

  a three-phased paradigm originated by Loftus for testing the misinformation effect.

  mock crime

  a technique much used in forensic psychology in which unsuspecting observers are exposed to a realistic but contrived criminal act.

  mock witness

  a person who was not present at a crime (or staged event) but is used to evaluate the fairness of an identification procedure. A mock witness serves to model a real witness who has no memory of the original event other than any information provided by the experimenter at the identification procedure.

  monozygotic (MZ)/dizygotic (DZ) twins

  MZ (identical) twins arise from a single ovum and have exactly the same genetic material. DZ (fraternal) twins arise from two separate ova, and like any siblings, share 50% of the same genes.

  mugshots

  photographs of convicted criminals kept by the police. Mugshot albums (or witness albums) are shown to witnesses when the police do not know the identity of a suspect. The procedure differs from a lineup because all of the people in a mugshot album are suspects.

  Multi-Agency Public Protection Arrangements (MAPPA)

  MAPPA is now recognised as one of the most advanced frameworks of offender management currently available. The process structures the way the offender is assessed and managed through effective identification of risk and through information exchange.

  multimodal programmes

  a term used to describe intervention programmes that have more than one target of change (social skills, thinking, substanc
e abuse, and so on) or employ more than one method of achieving it.

  National Offender Management Service (NOMS)

  a directorate of the Ministry of Justice within England and Wales, tasked with reducing reoffending and protecting the public. Encompasses the prison and probation services.

  need principle

  developed by Andrews and colleagues alongside the risk and responsivity principles. States that interventions should target only those needs (or risk factors) that contribute to offending behaviour. Such factors have been termed criminogenic needs.

  negative feedback

  question strategies that imply interviewees’ first answer may be incorrect.

  neuroimaging

  scanning techniques used to examine brain anatomy and activity.

  non-directive leading

  a question form that is not interrogative or suggestive.

  offender consistency hypothesis

  the assumption that offenders will commit their crimes in a relatively consistent manner. This means that their crimes should be similar in terms of the behaviour they display.