Offender
Profiling Series: Vol 2
Profiling
in Policy and Practice
Edited by David Canter & Laurence Alison (1999)
back to Profiling
in Policy and Practice
Profiling in Policy and Practice
David Canter & Laurence Alison
Profiling in Policy and Practice
The term 'profiler' has commonly been applied to
the media hungry defintion of a sole individual responsible for solving
an offence where others have failed. This chapter extends the meaning
to any individual or self professed 'expert' who has attempted to explain
the motivations of others and categorise certain details of their backgrounds.
This may include clients within therapy, suspects within a police enquiry
or assessments of the likely motives and qualities that lie behind different
written texts. In expanding the term this chapter explores the extent
to which profiling has been abused. Where the area has been redolent
with poor policy and practice we attempt to outline an alternative to
the scenario of the lonely expert contributing to the enquiry. This
involves closer liaison with and education of the individuals relevant
to the enquiry and of conceptual and empirically derivable hypotheses
appropriate to developing systematic and replicable models of behaviour
set within a social science framework.
Laurence John Alison
is currently employed as a lecturer at the Centre for Investigative
Psychology at the University of Liverpool. Dr Alison is developing models
to explain the processes of manipulation, influence and deception that
are features of criminal investigations. His research interests focus
upon developing rhetorical perspectives in relation to the investigative
process and he has presented many lectures both nationally and internationally
to a range of academics and police officers on the problems associated
with offender profiling. He is currently working on false allegations
of sexual assault and false memory. He is affiliated with providing
advice to the courts, legal professions, police service, charities and
public bodies.
David Canter is
Director of the Centre for Investigative Psychology at the University
of Liverpool. He has published widely in Environmental and Investigative
Psychology as well as many areas of Applied Social Psychology. His most
recent books since his award winning "Criminal Shadows" have
been "Psychology in Action" and with Laurence Alison "Criminal
Detection and the Psychology of Crime."
