Offender Profiling Series: Vol 3
The Social Psychology of Crime










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The Social Psychology of Crime: Groups, Teams and Networks

David Canter & Laurence Alison
The Social Psychology of Crime

In recognition of the fact that criminal activities and the processes that sustain them are embedded in the transactions between individuals this volume examines the social and organisational aspects of crime. Such an examination is of particular benefit to police investigations. It strengthens the abilities of law enforcement agencies to incapacitate criminal networks and to weaken the social interactions between criminals. Understanding the nature of a criminal organisation also has value in providing guidance for how the investigative team should be organised.

Studies show that criminal networks, teams and groups and their associated social processes are not limited to tight, confined social clusters but are a mixture of different types of organisation running the full range from the anarchic to the strictly hierarchical. These social psychological processes influence criminal activity in three broad ways. First, they have a profound influence on the way in which the criminals' self-identity is determined. Second, the form of the organisation of which they are a part shapes the roles and rules of criminal activity. Third, these organisational processes will define the 'career' paths through which criminals may move, in part at least.

For police investigators these findings imply that they do need to identify the criminal teams, networks, cliques and groups that offenders move within, as well as the likely consequences of isolating any individual from his criminal network. This leads to an investigative emphasis on the way criminal activity extends beyond the boundaries of the specific individuals involved in the immediate features of the offence itself. This in turn requires improvements in investigators own processes of networking and acting as teams.

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".

Laurence 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. 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 affiliated with The Psychologists at Law Group - a forensic service specialising in providing advice to the courts, legal professions, police service, charities and public bodies.