Criminal Justice Response to Victim Harm in the United States, 1981

Hernon, Jolene C.; Forst, Brian

doi:10.3886/icpsr08249

Cited by 1 publication

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“…Offenders' outcomes can be reduced by either direct retaliation by the victim or by timely punishment by the criminal justice system. Hernon and Forst (1984) found that the most frequent suggestion by crime victims as to how relations might be improved between victims and the courts was to treat offenders more harshly, a finding that provides support for equity theory. If the criminal justice system is an agent of equity and feelings of inequity are associated with distress, it is reasonable to hypothesize that survivor satisfaction with the justice system would be negatively correlated with psychological distress.…”

Section: Attributional Variablesmentioning

confidence: 92%

Family survivors of homicide victims: Theoretical perspectives and an exploratory study

Amick-McMullan

Kilpatrick

Veronen

et al. 1989

Journal of Traumatic Stress

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Little empirical information is available on the impact of homicide on surviving family members. Existing descriptions fall into a dichotomy of grief theory and those reporting symptoms of Post‐traumatic Stress Disorder. This pilot study offers a multidimensional formulation which combines symptoms reported across previous studies. Participants were 19 survivors recruited through a victim witness program and a victim rights organization. A learning model, Mowrer's Two Factor Theory, was applied to explain the acquisition and maintenance of post‐traumatic symptoms. Consistent with this model, survivors reported recurrent homicide‐related intrusions and avoidance behaviors on the Horowitz Impact of Event Scale (IES). Comparison of survivors' IES scores with those of victims of rape, loss of a family member, and other trauma revealed a high frequency of symptoms. Mean length of time since homicide was 2.5 years. The Derogatis Symptom Check List 90‐Revised (SCL9O‐R) revealed a high level of general psychiatric distress, with 66% of survivors meeting “caseness” criteria, indicating a need for treatment intervention. A 7‐point Likert scale measure of satisfaction with the criminal justice system was highly correlated with SCL9O‐R subscales of depression (r = − 0.82) and anxiety (r = − 0.82). This link between distress and perceptions of the justice system provided preliminary support for an equity theory perspective on survivor attributions. Conceptual, research, and clinical implications were discussed.

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Section: Attributional Variablesmentioning

confidence: 92%