...Purpose of forensic psychology Forensic psychology is a combination of psychology and law (Huss, 2014). Forensic psychology is a subfield of psychology that specializes in working with the legal system. In the 1900s’ William Stern a German psychologist started the application of psychology to the legal system by investigating eyewitness identification (Huss, 2014). Since then the field of forensic psychology has grown not only in the united states but in many parts of the world (Huss, 2014). Forensic psychologist assist the legal system in the process of making decisions in a civil or criminal case, by utilizing their expertise a forensic psychologist help the court system understand the behavior of a defendant as well as to make a decisions...
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...Profiling Paper The law defines rape as sexual contact with a non-consenting person. Being convicted of rape yields charges ranging from a misdemeanor to felony. There are four classifications of rapist: power reassurance, anger retaliation, power assertive, and sadistic. Each type of rapist has different goals and influences that make them carry out the attack. Power reassurance rapists, as most rapist profiles do, have a pretty specific profile. Very often, they are single, passive, non-athletic people who live with their parents, do not have sex partners and few if any friends, and work menial jobs. Power reassurance rapists seek validation. This validation elevates their “status.” Power reassurance rapists also seek to validate a fantasy of being sexually adequate and may demand the victim act out a sexual fantasy. They tend to frequent adult bookstores and have voyeur, exhibitionist, transvestite, and or fetishist tendencies. There is a strong sexual component to their attacks…they view the rape as a sexual relationship and thus rarely if ever use force. Anger retaliation rapists are exactly that…rapists who retaliate out of anger. These people tend have faced family hardships, such as divorce or foster care, early in life. They are poorly educated, often high school drop-outs, misogynists who have backgrounds in contact sports, frequent bars, and have action oriented jobs. These physically abusive people are usually in relationships, socially competent, and have...
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...It was learned during week one that forensic psychology is more than what you see on television. It has been the common misconception that the field of forensic psychology is just those we see investigating the crime scene looking for the criminal. It was learned that this specific field is used in many parts of the court system such as criminal and civil law. A forensic psychologist would need to determine the mens rea of the exact crime in a criminal suit whereas they would be looking at something different in a civil case. A civil case would be about the wrongs done to an individual. A forensic psychologist could be called as a witness in a criminal trial for either the prosecution or the defense to scientifically explain the evidence found during the investigation. They could be called to the stand to explain the behavior of a certain individual as long as it is in within the scope of their job,...
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...Civil Action Assignment 3 1. An expert witness is a witness who has knowledge beyond that of the ordinary lay person enabling him/her to give testimony regarding an issue that requires expertise to understand. Experts are allowed to give opinion testimony which a non-expert witness may be prohibited from testifying to. 2. Both sides had to bring in experts in regards to the chemicals that the wells were contaminated with. Then they had to bring in experts in ground water movement, they had to prove chemicals were dumped, and had to prove the chemicals made the people sick. Proving of causation was the reason why so many experts were called on. Every aspect of the evidence had to be proven to be as solid as possible to be allowed in court. 3. Hydrogeologist, Geologist, Engineering Geologist, Soil scientists, Geochemist 4. The first issue is money. Experts are paid for their time and even though it creates a substantial incentive for the expert to advocate a party's position that is not supported by available research and data. This problem is particularly acute with the professional witness, who makes her living testifying as an expert. A professional witness is highly motivated out of self interest to develop relationships with lawyers because those relationships are the expert's lifeblood. The more effective the expert is in advancing the lawyer's case, the greater the likelihood the expert will be retained again. The Safeguards of the Adversary System...
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...A forensic psychologist views a client or defendant differently than a traditional clinical psychologist. Seeing a situation from a client’s point of view or empathizing with a patient is not something a forensic psychologist will do. Traditional psychological tests and interview procedures are usually not applicable when dealing with a forensic situation. In forensic evaluations it is important to assess the consistency of factual information. Forensic psychology is the application of psychology to the criminal justice system. This is however, different from forensic science. While a forensic psychology deals with legal issues, such as public policies, new laws, competency, and whether a person is sane at the time of a crime, they focus on the psychological perspectives involved in the legal system. Some examples of when forensic psychology is used in the criminal justice system are treating mentally ill offenders, consulting with attorneys, jury selection, serving as an expert witness, analyzing a criminal’s mind and intent, and criminal profiling. There are some forensic psychologists that choose to focus on research, which could range from the examination of eyewitness testimony, to improving interrogation methods. There are also forensic psychologists that focus on public policy, such as designing correctional facilities and prisons. In 1901 a man named William Stern studied memory by asking students to study a picture for forty-five seconds, and then recall...
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...Who Are Criminal Profilers? Rebecca Wiltshire Colby-Sawyer College Criminal profilers mix both the world of psychology with criminal justice. The field itself is fairly new and often time’s profilers don't always agree on methodology or even terminology. The term "profiling" is popular among the public because of media interoperations such as “The Silence of the Lambs” and “Criminal Minds”. However the FBI calls its form of profiling “criminal investigative analysis”; another profiler, a prominent forensic psychologist, calls his work “investigative psychology”; and another calls his “crime action profiling” only further proving the lack of agreement in terminology (8). Often a criminal profiler is thought to be a perceptive unknown or an unconventional intellectual who can solve crimes by trusting a combination of intuition and strong insight into the criminal mind (9). Criminal profiling is a method used by criminal investigators to develop profiles for murders, rapists, and other violent criminals who haven't been arrested yet (4). Profilers rely on perceptive trail and error to predict others’ behavior. They use the growing knowledge from psychiatry, psychology, criminology, and sociology, and utilize each in the field of criminal profiling. (3) Like in every job, criminal profilers have specific responsibilities that their job entails. It is a world of investigation and research impacted by inductive and deductive reasoning, crime-solving experience and knowledge of...
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...person met their demise. Psychologist are in the profession to serve the public and not mislead their clients. They are bound by ethics to make sure that the information that is generated and put out to the public is valid. The Second Issue Related to the Validity of the Information/Research on Which the Criminal Profiling is based The second issue related to the validity of the information/research on which the criminal profile is based Bartol (2009 pg. 79) is Profiling Procedures that are used when gathering information on a particular set of people who commit horrendous crimes. Bartol (2009) states that because of their “overlapping nature” it seems that there is a need for more profiling research on behalf of forensic psychologist, because there are problems with law enforcement knowing for certain whether the profiling procedures used are valid or reliable (pg. 79). Using and...
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...Forensic Psychology Name Institution Date Forensic Psychology refers to the formal intersection between the scientific section of psychology and the criminal justice systems. It involves having a thorough understanding of the criminal systems applied in various jurisdictions by constantly evaluating them at a global perspective (Bartol &Bartol, 2012). The scientific aspect of it takes this information and analyses this information and interrelates it with attorney generals, judges and other legal professionals. Moreover, the field is based on scrutinizing witness testimonies in an attempt to check its validity and make informed decisions when dealing with ambiguous court cases. The roles of forensic psychologists are multivariate. This is because they perform diverse roles according to the settings, circumstances and nature of the job. For instance, they train and evaluate police officers and, members of other law enforcement organizations. They also advise judges in determining court cases (Bartol &Bartol, 2012). For instance, when the juries are dealing with ambiguous court cases of rape, insanity or murder, all arising from mental in-capabilities of the assailants, forensic psychologies are called based on their expertise and experience to examine, evaluate and give recommendations concerning the sentencing of the culprits. Because of these several but crucial responsibilities, the field of forensic psychologist...
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...Career goals in Psychology Lynda Reyes PSY 215 Careers in Psychology I want to be a psychologist. I would love to learn all about the way people act, think and feel and at the same time try to help them. I have a very easygoing personality and I love to have fun and laugh. I ask a lot of questions, and I think I am very easy to get along with. Some career goals I have is to finish college, I would like to find a job I want to keep that I could make a career out of, and just take it one day at a time because I have desire to make the right decisions and live a pleasant life. I first became interested in psychology a couple years ago. I feel like I need to try and help make a difference, and that's what I would like to spend the rest of my life doing. The field of psychology is divided into subfields each of which deal with a different area, and since working with and helping people is a good feeling for me, community and social services is an excellent job group. When going into the field of psychology, one is able to explore many different careers. I’m also interested in forensics. The field of forensic psychology has grown in the 21st century because courtrooms recognize the value of psychologist’s testimonies to help juries reach a clearer verdict. Like all fields in psychology, forensics has many perspectives, they can focus on law enforcement psychology, the psychology of litigation, correctional psychology, and forensic psychology (Nietzel, Bernstein, & Milich...
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...Subspecialties of forensic psychologySubspecialties of forensic psychologySubspecialties of forensic psychology Forensic psychology is defined as the application of psychological knowledge to the legal system (Bartol & Bartol, 2012: 6). The concept of forensic psychology can be misunderstood, because the definition does not explain much. The easiest way to explain forensic psychology is to break it down into its subspecialties and describe where psychological knowledge can be applied. There are five subspecialties of forensic psychology, namely police psychology, psychology of crime and delinquency, victimology and victim services, legal psychology and correctional psychology. I will discuss legal psychology and correctional psychology. · Legal psychology Legal psychology is the study of human behavior relevant to the law. This subspecialty of forensic psychology consists of those theories that describe, explain and predict human behavior by reference to the law. Bartol & Bartol (2012) described that early in a case when attorneys are preparing for a trial and gathering information psychologist can be called in to testify. Main roles of a forensic psychologist in the USA includes, acting as a consultant to law enforcement, acting as trial consultants (jury selection, case preparation and pre-trial publicity), presenting psychology to appeal courts, doing forensic assessment and acting as an expert witness (insanity defense, competence to stand trial, sentencing, eyewitness...
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...A forensic psychologist views a client or defendant differently than a traditional clinical psychologist. Seeing a situation from a client’s point of view or empathizing with a patient is not something a forensic psychologist will do. Traditional psychological tests and interview procedures are usually not applicable when dealing with a forensic situation. In forensic evaluations it is important to assess the consistency of factual information. Forensic psychology is the application of psychology to the criminal justice system. This is however, different from forensic science. While a forensic psychology deals with legal issues, such as public policies, new laws, competency, and whether a person is sane at the time of a crime, they focus on the psychological perspectives involved in the legal system. Some examples of when forensic psychology is used in the criminal justice system are treating mentally ill offenders, consulting with attorneys, jury selection, serving as an expert witness, analyzing a criminal’s mind and intent, and criminal profiling. There are some forensic psychologists that choose to focus on research, which could range from the examination of eyewitness testimony, to improving interrogation methods. There are also forensic psychologists that focus on public policy, such as designing correctional facilities and prisons. In 1901 a man named William Stern studied memory by asking students to study a picture for forty-five seconds, and then...
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...forensic psychologists are best known as profilers who create mental profiles of culprits for law requirement offices. Be that as it may, this photo of criminological brain research is to some degree restricted. Rather, scientific brain science includes the use of different orders, among them brain research, criminal equity, and law, to address matters of an authoritative, legal, or regulatory nature. Scientific clinicians don't simply bargain exclusively with criminology; rather, their work is at the convergence of clinical brain science and legal sciences and includes research and use of these controls to an assortment of issues, from casualties rights to issues that break separated families. Measurable brain science is a moderately youthful field, just picking up acknowledgment as a different division of the American Psychological Association in 1981. From that point forward, the field has turned out to be more wide based, speaking to both clinical and scientific laborers that try to see better the connection amongst brain research and the law. An essential mission of scientific...
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...Health Psychology paper Dianna Norris HCA 250 July 19, 2013 Axia College Of University Phoenix Health Psychology Paper Forensic psychology has always been a fascination for me. Forensic psychology is psychological for the criminal justice system. The fascination for me was how the forensic psychologist is able to detect criminal tendencies. The psychological approach is the way the evidence could lead to certain criminal behavior. [ (psychology school guide, 2012) ]For criminal psychologists they have to look at all angles of a way a person commits a crime. The FBI has a behavior science unit and they help with the understanding of criminals and terrorists [ (Portland State University Careers in Criminology and Criminal Justice, 2012) ]. This unit has three other counterparts and they all play a very important part of the FBI, they are the crime analysts, criminologists and clinical psychologists. This is an example of how psychology and criminal justice can overlap. There are many different types of agrees and certifications as well as many paths that can be taken in forensic psychology(psychology school guide, 2012) [ (psychology school guide, 2012) ] . Example: Forensic psychology requires either a Bachelors or Masters Degree. I have thought of this degree ever since I was eleven years old. Family situations quashed me going back to school at that time. At the time I was thinking about this career choice on-line classes were not offered. I would have applied...
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...Legal and Forensic Psychology Michael Betters Keiser University Legal and Forensic Psychology Abstract Legal and forensic psychologists are often torn between fulfilling their duties as a legal and forensic workers in the criminal justice system, and adhering to the ethical obligations to their clients as psychologists. This paper explores the dilemma faced by legal and forensic psychologists in carrying out their day-to-day roles as officials in the criminal justice system and in upholding their professional ethics as psychologists. The paper begins with an introduction of the main controversy surrounding the role of legal and forensic psychologists to the criminal justice systems (Day, 2014). It then describes some of the typical dilemmas faced by legal and forensic psychologists in the course of their work. The paper concludes with a discussion on the implications of the dilemmas faced by legal and forensic psychologists in the criminal justice system. Introduction Legal and forensic psychologists are a special type of psychologists who are often charged with the responsibility of standing as expert witnesses in court proceedings. The duties, roles, and responsibilities of legal and forensic psychologists in legal matters are strikingly different from those of an ordinary psychologist. It is paramount for legal and forensic psychologists to recognize the obligations as well as the limitations of their obligations when appearing as witnesses in court proceedings...
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...and Forensic psychology. Hypnosis has been approved as a valid clinical tool. It helps to open suppressed knowledge to be recalled. Often times this knowledge would not be available in the conscious mind. The hypnotist will place the patient/ client in a hypnotic state and then proceed to ask a series of questions that may trigger memory. There are few problems with hypnosis in clinical psychology, but poses some in forensic psychology. My paper will be asking the question, “ Is hypnosis a valid tool in a court of law?” Forensic psychology uses hypnosis in eyewitness testimony. This can be a positive investigative tool if the hypnotists do an ethical job. There are problems that exist, such as, leading questions. This works similar to a leading question in a court case. In this setting the client is in a vulnerable state of mind, which makes it easier to give false testimony. Another problem that exists is debate in the ability of the conscious mind to be present during hypnosis. Some psychologists say an individual will not say things they don’t want to hypnotize or not. Does hypnosis increase or increase the error rate of a testimony? This is another question raised in forensic psychology. I would also like to explore the judicial laws on hypnosis. The United States have 2/3 of the states legislatively against the use of hypnotism in a court of law. This still leads to conflict as far as individuals Constitutional Rights. As a whole in this paper I would...
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