NCJ Number
213501
Journal
Journal of Criminal Justice Volume: 34 Issue: 1 Dated: January/February 2006 Pages: 101-114
Date Published
January 2006
Length
14 pages
Annotation
This study examined photographs used in 10 leading introductory criminal justice textbooks of alleged and convicted criminals, criminal offenses, and degree of confinement.
Abstract
Overall, the results indicated that introductory criminal justice texts used consentient (relying on systematic empirical evidence) photographs when depicting suspect and offender race and gender, yet relied on melodramatic (relying on sensationalist news coverage) photographs when depicting suspects and defendants charged with or convicted of murder. Moreover, notorious crimes and criminals were depicted in 31 percent of the photographs in the texts even though such crimes and criminals are rare events. The authors recommend that future authors and publishers of criminal justice texts should consider using photographs and images that dispel nonrepresentative images of normal crimes. Content analysis was performed of the characteristics of individuals depicted in the first 4 sections of 10 leading introductory criminal justice textbooks. The photographs were assessed according to: (1) race/ethnicity; (2) gender; (3) level of autonomy; (4) clothing; and (5) associated offense. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. Future research could focus on the degree to which market concerns influence decisions regarding the types of images used in criminal justice textbooks. Tables, appendixes, references