Content analysis of infanticide and neonaticide cases in the UK

Abstract

Twenty cases, 14 infanticides and 6 neonaticides committed between 1989 and 2020 by biological mothers were analysed using Smallest Space Analysis for the presence of themes. Three themes associated with offender motivation were identified: Desperation, Disturbance and Rejection. Desperation theme included variables suggesting the mother committed the crime as a result of distress or perceived necessity. Disturbance suggested the motivation behind the offence to be as a result of the mother's caregiving role being disturbed; and the Rejection theme explained complete maternal rejection of the infant or new-born as the motivation behind the crime. Alongside the themes, three core variables were identified to be common for the crime regardless of motivation: the crime being committed at Home, the victim Female, and the crime being Denied by the mother. The implications of the findings are discussed including the potential for an investigative support tool and developing understandings of neonaticide and infanticide as separate crimes.

Cyberbullying: Differentiating offenders criminal roles using a narrative‐based approach

“…Several studies exploring criminal behaviours (Canter & Fritzon, 1998; Canter & Heritage, 1990; Ioannou et al., 2015; Salfati, 2000; Yaneva et al., 2018) found the application of this method to be informative and productive. The use of this approach as an appropriate analytical method has been supported by different academic research (Goodlad et al., 2019; Greenwood et al., 2023; Ioannou et al., 2018; Synnott et al., 2018) which used it for the content analysis of a variety of crimes types. In addition, its application extends also in other areas of psychology, such as organisational psychology (Lyons et al., 2010) and psychology of advertising (Hetsroni, 2000).…”

“…The NASM has been applied in many research focused on several offences Canter & Youngs, 2009, 2012aDeblasio et al, 2022;Goodlad et al, 2019;Greenwood et al, 2023;Ioannou et al, 2018), demonstrating the successful appropriateness of this form of content analysis. For instance, Ioannou et al (2015) applied the model to property offences, drug offences, robbery, violence, sexual offences and murder.…”