Date of Award

1-1-2023

Language

English

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

College/School/Department

School of Criminal Justice

Content Description

1 online resource (xi, 178 pages) : illustrations (some color)

Dissertation/Thesis Chair

Greg Pogarsky

Committee Members

David McDowall, Justin T Pickett, Theodore Wilson, Kyle J Thomas

Keywords

crime, decision-making, moral identity, morality, situational moral evaluation, Criminal intent, Crime

Subject Categories

Criminology

Abstract

Recent criminological advancements increasingly aim to better understand criminal behavior in context. This is particularly true regarding how perceptions of legal sanction risk are anchored in reality and influence offending decisions. Yet research on extralegal considerations such as morality has not kept pace. The current dissertation integrates criminological morality literature, with psychological research on Self Concept Maintenance Theory (SCMT) and moral identity, into a perspective on moral decision-making dynamics that integrates personal and situational factors. I utilize three data collections containing randomized experiments to investigate the situational malleability of moral evaluations and the interrelatedness with moral identity and criminal intentions. Study 1 examines the influence of cognitive rationalizations on moral evaluations of crime and criminal intentions along with the potential moderating effect of moral identity on these processes. Study 2 is broken into two phases that investigate the role of moral salience on moral evaluations of crime, rationalizations, and criminal intentions, as well as the interrelatedness with personal moral identity. The findings indicate that moral dynamics are complex and involve both person and situational level origins.

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