Abstract
Objectives
Identifying ways to shift public attitudes toward support for alternative approaches to criminalized behavior is necessary to address mass incarceration. We test whether education on the impacts of traumatic events may be one strategy to increase such support. Drawing from mindset theory, we also test whether effects can be amplified through incorporation of growth mindset messaging.
Methods
Two experimental studies assessed the impact of trauma education and growth mindset-enhanced trauma education on public attitudes.
Results
In Study 1, participants in both trauma education conditions exhibited greater support for alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent crimes compared to the control condition. In Study 2, participants in the mindset-enhanced trauma education condition exhibited greater support for alternative sentencing for violent crimes compared to those in the other two conditions.
Conclusions
Mindset-enhanced trauma education has potential to shift public attitudes toward support for alternative sentencing, though further research is needed to substantiate effects.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
Fisher’s exact tests were used in place of Chi-squared analyses because all but one comparison of nominal data contained expected cell sizes less than five.
Results indicated that there was likely a lack of power to detect effects [(1 − β) = .56].
References
American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed.). https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425596
Andrews, D. A., & Bonta, J. (2010). Rehabilitating criminal justice policy and practice. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 16(1), 39–55. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0018362
Babad, E., Kaplowitz, H., & Darley, J. (1999). A “classic” revisited: Students’ immediate and delayed evaluations of a warm/cold instructor. Social Psychology of Education: An International Journal, 3(1–2), 81–102. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1009659831185
Baumgartner, F. R., De Boef, S. L., & Boydstun, A. E. (2008). The decline of the death penalty and the discovery of innocence. New York: Cambridge.
Becker-Blease, K. A. (2017). As the world becomes trauma–informed, work to do. Journal of Trauma & Dissociation, 18(2), 131–138. https://doi.org/10.1080/15299732.2017.1253401
Beckett, K. (1997). Making crime pay: Law and order in contemporary American politics. Oxford University Press.
Bottoms, A. (1995). The Philosophy and Politics of Punishment and Sentencing. In C. Clarkson & R. Morgan (Eds.), The Politics of Sentencing Reform (pp. 17–49). Oxford University Press.
Brace, P., & Boyea, B. D. (2008). State public opinion, the death penalty, and the practice of electing judges. American Journal of Political Science, 52(2), 360–372. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-5907.2008.00317.x
Brooks, M., Graham-Kevan, N., Robinson, S., & Lowe, M. (2019). Trauma characteristics and posttraumatic growth: The mediating role of avoidance coping, intrusive thoughts, and social support. Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 11(2), 232–238. https://doi.org/10.1037/tra0000372
Brunzell, T., Stokes, H., & Waters, L. (2019). Shifting teacher practice in trauma-affected classrooms: Practice pedagogy strategies within a trauma-informed positive education model. School Mental Health, 11, 600–614. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12310-018-09308-8
Calvin, B., Collins, P. M., & Eshbaugh-Soha, M. (2011). On the relationship between public opinion and decision making in the U. S. Courts of Appeals. Political Research Quarterly, 64(4), 736–748. https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912910376387
Carter, R. T., Kirkinis, K., & Johnson, V. E. (2020). Relationships between trauma symptoms and race-based traumatic stress. Traumatology, 26(1), 11–18. https://doi.org/10.1037/trm0000217
Chiu, C., Hong, Y., & Dweck, C. S. (1997). Lay dispositionism and implicit theories of personality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73(1), 19–30. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.73.1.19
Clements-Nolle, K., & Waddington, R. (2019). Adverse childhood experiences and psychological distress in juvenile offenders: The protective influence of resilience and youth assets. Journal of Adolescent Health, 64(1), 49–55. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2018.09.025
Cozolino, L. (2017). The neuroscience of psychotherapy: Healing the social brain (Third Edition) (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology). W. W. Norton & Company.
DeLisi, M. (2001). The Affordable Hypothesis: Punitive beliefs, violent beliefs, and race. Journal of Criminal Justice, 29(2), 101–106. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0047-2352(00)00085-4
Dierkhising, C. B., Ko, S. J., Woods-Jaeger, B., Briggs, E. C., Lee, R., & Pynoos, R. S. (2013). Trauma histories among justice-involved youth: Findings from the National Child Traumatic Stress Network. European Journal of Psychotraumatology, 4, 20274. https://doi.org/10.3402/ejpt.v4i0.20274
Dweck, C. S., & Leggett, E. L. (1988). A social-cognitive approach to motivation and personality. Psychological Review, 95, 256–273. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.95.2.256
Dweck, C. S., & Yeager, D. S. (2019). Mindsets: A view from two eras. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 14, 481–496. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691618804166
Enns, P. K. (2014). The Public’s Increasing Punitiveness and Its Influence on Mass Incarceration in the United States. American Journal of Political Science, 58(4), 857–872. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12098
Faul, F., Erdfelder, E., Buchner, A. and Lang, A.G. (2009). Statistical power analyses using G*Power 3.1: Tests for correlation and regression analyses. Behavior Research Methods, 41, 1149-1160. http://dx.doi.org/10.3758/BRM.41.4.1149
Felitti, V. J., Anda, R. F., Nordenberg, D., Williamson, D. F., Spitz, A. M., Edwards, V., Koss, M. P., & Marks, J. S. (1998). Relationship of childhood abuse and household dysfunction to many of the leading causes of death in adults: The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) study. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 14(4), 245–258. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0749-3797(98)00017-8
Fox, B. H., Perez, N., Cass, E., Baglivio, M. T., & Epps, N. (2015). Trauma changes everything: Examining the relationship between adverse childhood experiences and serious, violent, and chronic juvenile offenders. Child Abuse and Neglect, 46, 163–173. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2015.01.011
Frost, N. (2006). The punitive state: Crime, punishment and imprisonment across the United States. New York: LFB Scholarly Publications, LLC
Frost, N. A. (2010). Beyond public opinion polls: Punitive public sentiment & criminal justice policy. Sociology Compass, 4(3), 156–168. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2009.00269.x
Ganimian, A. J. (2020). Growth-Mindset Interventions at Scale: Experimental Evidence From Argentina. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 42(3), 417–438. https://doi.org/10.3102/0162373720938041
Garrett, B. L., Jakubow, A., & Monahan, J. (2019). Judicial reliance on risk assessment in sentencing drug and property offenders: A test of the treatment resource hypothesis. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 46, 799–810. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093854819842589
Gervey, B. M., Chiu, C.-Y., Hong, Y.-Y., & Dweck, C. S. (1999). Differential use of person information in decisions about guilt versus innocence: The role of implicit theories. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 25(1), 17–27. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167299025001002
Ginwright, S. (2018). The future of healing: Shifting from trauma informed care to healing centered engagement, Kinship Carers Victoria Occasional Paper, 25. Retrieved from http://kinshipcarersvictoria.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/OP-Ginwright-S-2018-Future-of-healing-care.pdf
Green, B. L., Saunders, P. A., Power, E., Dass-Brailsford, P., Schelbert, K. B., Giller, E., … & Mete, M. (2016). Trauma-informed medical care: Patient response to a primary care provider communication training. Journal of Loss and Trauma, 21, 147–159. https://doi.org/10.1080/15325024.2015.1084854
Hall, A., McKenna, B., Dearie, V., Maguire, T., Charleston, R., & Furness, T. (2016). Educating emergency department nurses about trauma informed care for people presenting with mental health crisis: A pilot study. BMC Nursing, 15(1), 21. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12912-016-0141-y
Harmon, J., & Venta, A. (2020). Adolescent posttraumatic growth: A review. Child Psychiatry and Human Development, 52(4), 596–608. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10578-020-01047-9
Hirschfield, P. J., & Piquero, A. R. (2010). Normalization and Legitimation: Modeling Stigmatizing Attitudes Toward Ex-Offenders*. Criminology, 48(1), 27–55. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-9125.2010.00179.x
Huberty, C. J., & Morris, J. D. (1989). Multivariate analysis versus multiple univariate analyses. Psychological Bulletin, 105(2), 302–308. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-2909.105.2.302
Kar, H. L. (2018). Acknowledging the victim to perpetrator trajectory: Integrating a mental health focused trauma-based approach into global violence programs. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 47, 293–297. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.avb.2018.10.004
Katz, R. R., & Fondacaro, M. R. (2021). Fight, flight, and free will: The effect of trauma informed psychoeducation on perceived culpability and punishment for juvenile and adult offenders. Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 39(6), 708–730. https://doi.org/10.1002/bsl.2534
Kelly, C. M., Jorm, A. F., & Wright, A. (2007). Improving mental health literacy as a strategy to facilitate early intervention for mental disorders. Medical Journal of Australia, 187(S7), S26–S30. https://doi.org/10.5694/j.1326-5377.2007.tb01332.x
Kim, J. H., & Choi, J. Y. (2020). Influence of childhood trauma and posttraumatic stress symptoms on impulsivity: Focusing on differences according to the dimensions of impulsivity. European Journal of Psychotraumatology, 11(1), 1796276. https://doi.org/10.1080/20008198.2020.1796276
Kroh, M. (2007). Measuring left–right political orientation: The choice of response format. Public Opinion Quarterly, 71(2), 204–220. https://doi.org/10.1093/poq/nfm009
Kutateladze, B. L., Andiloro, N. R., Johnson, B. D., & Spohn, C. C. (2014). Cumulative Disadvantage: Examining Racial and Ethnic Disparity in Prosecution and Sentencing. Criminology, 52(3), 514–551. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9125.12047
Leverentz, A. (2011). Neighborhood context of attitudes toward crime and reentry. Punishment & Society, 13(1), 64–92. https://doi.org/10.1177/1462474510385629
Levy, S. R., & Dweck, C. S. (1999). The Impact of Children’s Static versus Dynamic Conceptions of People on Stereotype Formation. Child Development, 70(5), 1163–1180. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8624.00085
Levy, S. R., Stroessner, S. J., & Dweck, C. S. (1998). Stereotype formation and endorsement: The role of implicit theories. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 74, 1421–1436. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.74.6.1421
Marsh, S. C., & Byer, J. (2013). Toward a conceptual framework for trauma-responsive practice in courts. Criminal Law Practitioner, 1, 101–103. Available at https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/crilp1&i=101
Maruna, S., & King, A. (2009). Once a criminal, always a criminal?: ‘Redeemability’ and the psychology of punitive public attitudes. European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, 15, 7–24. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10610-008-9088-1
Matheson, F. I. (2012). Implications of trauma among male and female offenders. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 9(1), 97–99. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph9010097
McCord, J. (1983). A forty year perspective on effects of child abuse and neglect. Child Abuse & Neglect, 7(3), 265–270. https://doi.org/10.1016/0145-2134(83)90003-0
McGuire, K. T., & Stimson, J. A. (2004). The least dangerous branch revisited: New evidence on supreme court responsiveness to public preferences. Journal of Politics, 66, 1018–1035. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2508.2004.00288.x
Morgan, J. K., Desmarais, S. L., Mitchell, R. E., & Simons-Rudolph, J. M. (2017). Posttraumatic stress, posttraumatic growth, and satisfaction with life in military veterans. Military Psychology, 29(5), 434–447. https://doi.org/10.1037/mil0000182
Moss, S. A., Lee, E., Berman, A., & Rung, D. (2019). When do people value rehabilitation and restorative justice over the punishment of offenders? Victims & Offenders, 14(1), 32–51. https://doi.org/10.1080/15564886.2018.1539688
Müller, R., & Kenney, M. (2020). A science of hope? Tracing emergent entanglements between the biology of early life adversity, trauma-informed care, and restorative justice. Science, Technology, & Human Values, 46, 1230–1260. https://doi.org/10.1177/0162243920974095
National Center for State Courts (NCSC). (2006). The NCSC Sentencing Attitudes Survey: A report on the findings. Washington, DC: Princeton Survey Research Associates International. Retrieved from https://www.ncsc.org/~/media/Microsites/Files/CSI/The%20NCSC%20Sentencing%20Attitudes%20Survey.ashx
National Research Council. (2014). The Growth of Incarceration in the United States: Exploring Causes and Consequences (J. Travis, B. Western, & S. Redburn, Eds.). Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/18613
O’Hear, M. M., & Wheelock, D. (2016). Public attitudes toward punishment, rehabilitation, and reform: Lessons from the Marquette Law School Poll. Federal Sentencing Reporter, 29(1), 47–51. https://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/facpub/678
Payne, B. K., Gainey, R. R., Triplett, R. A., & Danner, M. J. E. (2004). What drives punitive beliefs?: Demographic characteristics and justifications for sentencing. Journal of Criminal Justice, 32(3), 195–206. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcrimjus.2004.02.007
Peleg-Koriat, I., Weimann-Saks, D., & Halperin, E. (2020). The moderating role of psychological distance on the impact of malleability beliefs on public attitudes toward punishment. Journal of Offender Rehabilitation, 59(7), 416–432. https://doi.org/10.1080/10509674.2020.1784349
Pelletier, A. (2016). The effects of a trauma-informed care training program on mental health professional’s knowledge, skills, and attitudes with the SMI (Doctoral dissertation, Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, Philadelphia, PA). Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.pcom.edu/psychology_dissertations/387/
Pfaff, J. (2017). Locked in: The true causes of mass incarceration-and how to achieve real reform. Basic Books.
Plaks, J. E., Stroessner, S. J., Dweck, C. S., & Sherman, J. W. (2001). Person theories and attention allocation: Preferences for stereotypic versus counterstereotypic information. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 80(6), 876–893. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.80.6.876
Purewal Boparai, S. K., Au, V., Koita, K., Oh, D. L., Briner, S., Burke Harris, N., & Bucci, M. (2018). Ameliorating the biological impacts of childhood adversity: A review of intervention programs. Child Abuse & Neglect, 81, 82–105. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2018.04.014
Purtle, J. (2018). Systematic review of evaluations of trauma-informed organizational interventions that include staff trainings. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 21(4), 725–740. https://doi.org/10.1177/1524838018791304
Rade, C. B., Desmarais, S. L., & Mitchell, R. E. (2016). A meta-analysis of public attitudes toward ex-offenders. Criminal Justice and Behavior, 43(9), 1260–1280. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093854816655837
Rade, C. B., Desmarais, S. L., & Burnette, J. L. (2018). An Integrative Theoretical Model of Public Support for Ex-Offender Reentry. International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, 62(8), 2131–2152. https://doi.org/10.1177/0306624X17714110
Rattan, A. (2019). How lay theories (or mindsets) shape the confrontation of prejudice. In R. K. Mallett & M. J. Monteith (Eds.), Confronting Prejudice and Discrimination. Academic Press, pp. 121–140. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-814715-3.00008-4
Roberts, J. V., Stalans, L. J., Indermauer, D., & , Hough, M. (2003). Penal populism and public opinion: Lessons from five countries. Oxford University Press.
SAMHSA. (n.d.). How being trauma-informed improves judicial decision-making. Delmar, NY: SAMHSA’s National GAINS Center for Behavioral Health and Justice. Retrieved from https://www.jcjc.pa.gov/Program-Areas/AnnualConference/Documents/2019%20Conference%20Documents/How%20Being%20Trauma-Informed%20Improves%20Judicial%20Decision%20Making.pdf
Sanders, M. R. (2010). Adopting a public health approach to the delivery of evidence-based parenting interventions. Canadian Psychology/psychologie Canadienne, 51(1), 17–23. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0018295
Schleider, J. L., Burnette, J. L., Widman, L., Hoyt, C., & Prinstein, M. J. (2019). Randomized trial of a single-session growth mind-set intervention for rural adolescents’ internalizing and externalizing problems. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology. Advance Online Publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/15374416.2019.1622123
Sidanius, J., Mitchell, M., Haley, H., & Navarrete, C. D. (2006). Support for harsh criminal sanctions and criminal justice beliefs: A social dominance perspective. Social Justice Research, 19(4), 433–449. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11211-006-0026-4
Steyn,H. S., & Ellis, S. M. (2009). Estimating an effect size in one-way multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA). Multivariate Behavioral Research, 44(1), 106–129. https://doi.org/10.1080/00273170802620238
Stokes, Y., Jacob, J.-D., Gifford, W., Squires, J., & Vandyk, A. (2017). Exploring nurses’ knowledge and experiences related to trauma-informed care. Global Qualitative Nursing Research, 4, 2333393617734510. https://doi.org/10.1177/2333393617734510
Strand, V. C., Abramovitz, R., Layne, C. M., Robinson, H., & Way, I. (2014). Meeting the critical need for trauma education in social work: A problem-based learning approach. Journal of Social Work Education, 50, 120–135. https://doi.org/10.1080/10437797.2014.856235
Sweetland, J. (2021). Reframing childhood adversity: Promoting upstream approaches. Washington, DC: FrameWorks. Retrieved from https://www.frameworksinstitute.org/publication/reframing-childhood-adversity-promoting-upstream-approaches/
Tam, K. P., Shu, T. M., Ng, H. K. S., & Tong, Y. Y. (2013). Belief about immutability of moral character and punitiveness toward criminal offenders. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 43, 603–611. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1559-1816.2013.01041.x
Thielo, A. J., Cullen, F. T., Cohen, D. M., & Chouhy, C. (2016). Rehabilitation in a red state. Criminology & Public Policy, 15(1), 137–170. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12182
Tseris, E. J. (2013). Trauma theory without feminism? Evaluating contemporary understandings of traumatized women. Affilia, 28(2), 153–164. https://doi.org/10.1177/0886109913485707
Willis, G. M., Malinen, S., & Johnston, L. (2013). Demographic differences in public attitudes towards sex offenders. Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 20(2), 230–247. https://doi.org/10.1080/13218719.2012.658206
Wozniak, K. H. (2016). Public opinion and the politics of criminal justice policy making: Reasons for optimism, pessimism, and uncertainty. Criminology & Public Policy, 15(1), 179–186. https://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12
Yeager, D. S., Romero, C., Paunesku, D., Hulleman, C. S., Schneider, B., Hinojosa, C., Lee, H. Y., O’Brien, J., Flint, K., Roberts, A., Trott, J., Greene, D., Walton, G. M., & Dweck, C. S. (2016). Using design thinking to improve psychological interventions: The case of the growth mindset during the transition to high school. Journal of Educational Psychology, 108(3), 374–391. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000098
Funding
The research was funded by the AP-LS Research Grant Initiative to Enhance the Impact and Diversification of Psychology and Law Research.
This manuscript has not been published elsewhere nor submitted simultaneously for publication elsewhere.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The research was conducted in compliance with APA ethical principles and North Carolina State University’s Institutional Review Board, and no authors report a conflict of interest.
Additional information
Publisher's note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
McKinsey, E., Desmarais, S.L., Burnette, J.L. et al. Impact of trauma education and growth mindset messaging on public attitudes about the criminal legal system. J Exp Criminol 19, 635–661 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-022-09506-0
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11292-022-09506-0