risk and perceived risk
Our sociology text's chapters on crime pointed out once that risk of getting caught and punishment were two variables that influenced criminals, and that of the two risk of getting caught was probably more important, especially in murder cases, where the punishment or lack thereof did not seem to influence whether people committed crimes of passion or not. I had no argument with that, but as I mulled it over, and wanted to use the idea of risk myself, I decided that there was a problem: risk is different from perceived risk, and perceived risk is more important.The criminal is not always right about whether he/she is likely to be caught or not. And it's how he/she thinks that influences whether he/she commits the crime- not the actual risk itself. Funny they didn't make that distinction. Especially since these days, risk is greater, and perception is probably lagging behind.
Labels: learning theory
posted by tom @ 11:15 PM
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