Criminologists have long recognized that whether one perceives a sanction as fair or unfair influences the deterrent success of sanctions and the legitimacy afforded to legal authority. Unfortunately, although several scholars have claimed that individual characteristics influence how sanctions are interpreted, very little research has explored the individual factors that influence how one perceives sanctions to be fair/unfair. In this study, we take Gottfredson and Hirschi's notion of self‐control and use it to explain, in part, whether an individual perceives a sanction as fair/unfair. We also examine how sanction perceptions and low self‐control influence the perceived anger that may result from being singled out for sanctioning and whether self‐control conditions the relationship between perceptions and anger. Our results suggest that individuals with low self‐control are more likely to perceive sanctions as unfair, that unfair sanctions and low self‐control lead to perceived anger for being singled out for punishment and that self‐control conditions the effect of unfair sanction perceptions on perceived anger. Future directions are outlined.
The life course perspective emphasizes the importance of time, social context, and process in both theory and analysis by taking into account historical events and changes as well as individual lives. The two central concepts in the life course perspective are trajectories and transitions. Trajectories are the long‐term patterns and sequences in an individual's life. These are pathways such as marriage, parenthood, careers, and criminal or non‐criminal behaviors. Transitions, on the other hand, occur within trajectories and are single events that are often age‐graded, such as changes in societal roles or status. They can include graduation, divorce, retiring, an arrest, and so on. These specific life events can be so abrupt and influential that they transform life trajectories. Therefore, there is a sequence of life trajectories, transitions, and adaptations during the life course.
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