Chapter 6: The Purpose of Criminal Punishment

Test Bank

Multiple Choice

1. It is not enough to establish a legal justification for punishment; society must also establish the ______ justification for it.

a. cost-benefit

b. public

c. moral

d. historical

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: The Purpose of Criminal Punishment

Difficulty Level: Medium

2. Punishment consists of which of the following elements?

a. It must involve an unpleasantness for the offender.

b. It must be for an offense.

c. It must be imposed by law enforcement before the offender goes to court.

d. It must be deserved.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: What Is Punishment?

Difficulty Level: Medium

3. Theories that set the goal of punishment as the prevention of future crime are derived from ______ philosophy.

a. utilitarian

b. Draconian

c. retributivist

d. just deserts

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Philosophical Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

4. Utilitarian and retributive theories of punishment differ primarily in their ______.

a. perspective, as being forward-looking (future) or backward-looking past)

b. emphasis on severity of punishment

c. micro- or macro-level approach

d. ability to justify the stated purposes of punishment

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Philosophical Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

5. Theories of crime which focus on preventing crime in the future are termed ______.

a. utilitarian

b. contingent

c. retributivist

d. overt

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Philosophical Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

6. Past oriented theories are often referred to as ______.

a. utilitarian

b. contingent

c. retributivist

d. overt

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Philosophical Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

7. The theory of punishment that assumes that people will refrain from crime because of fear of punishment is ______.

a. retribution

b. incapacitation

c. just deserts

d. deterrence

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Medium

8. Jeremy Bentham and Cesare Beccaria supported the ______ theory of punishment.

a. rehabilitation

b. incapacitation

c. just deserts

d. deterrence

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Medium

9. Cesare Becarria took a similar position to that of ______.

a. Jeremy Bentham

b. John Locke

c. John Rawls

d. Aristotle

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Medium

10. Individual (or specific) deterrence seeks to ______.

a. deter potential offenders from crime.

b. deter the individual punished.

c. deter both the individual and the public

d. control crime by keeping criminals out of society

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Medium

11. Legislation that imposes penalties for specific offenses in the belief that those penalties will deter or prevent persons from committing those offenses is a form of ______ deterrence.

a. specific

b. general

c. individual

d. retributive

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Medium

12. In which of the following studies do researchers look for negative associations between crime rates and punishment levels that can be interpreted as having a deterrent effect?

a. interrupted time-series studies

b. ecological studies

c. perceptual studies

d. socioeconomic studies

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Does Deterrence Work?

Difficulty Level: Medium

13. In which of the following studies does the data come from surveys?

a. interrupted time-series studies

b. ecological studies

c. perceptual studies

d. socioeconomic studies

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Does Deterrence Work?

Difficulty Level: Medium

14. There is little agreement among researchers that punishment has a ______ effect.

a. retributive

b. rehabilitative

c. restorative

d. deterrent

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Does Deterrence Work?

Difficulty Level: Medium

15. With regard to deterrence, the author of the text concludes that overall ______.

a. the evidence shows that individual deterrence works but general deterrence does not

b. the evidence shows that general deterrence works but individual deterrence does not

c. neither form of deterrence has any significant effect on crime

d. there is little agreement among researchers about whether general deterrence works

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Answer Location: Does Deterrence Work?

Difficulty Level: Medium

16. The two justifications for punishment which assume that offenders deserve to be punished are ______.

a. incapacitation and rehabilitation

b. retribution and just deserts

c. individual and general deterrence

d. incapacitation and just deserts

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Retribution | “An Eye for An Eye” | Justifying Retribution | Just Deserts

Difficulty Level: Medium

17. Which theory of punishment follows lex talionis?

a. Retribution

b. Deterrence

c. Incapacitation

d. Rehabilitation

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Retribution

Difficulty Level: Medium

18. Which position does not allow for social change or social conditions?

a. consensus

b. retributivist

c. vengeance

d. deterrent

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Retribution

Difficulty Level: Medium

19. The belief that punishment should inflict the same on offenders as the offenders have inflicted on their victims is ______.

a. Lex lionitus

b. Lex linurta

c. Lex talionitis

d. Lex talionis

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Retribution

Difficulty Level: Easy

20. Which of the following would not be a belief of a retributivist?

a. Punishing some innocent people is a price of general deterrence.

b. Offenders are paying a debt to society.

c. Offenders have taken unfair advantage of others.

d. Punishment is a censure of offenders.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension | Application

Answer Location:

Difficulty Level: Medium

21. ______ believe that wrongdoers deserve to be punished and that punishment imposed should be in proportion to the wrongdoing the offender committed.

a. Deterrence theorists

b. Rehabilitationists

c. Retributivists

d. Restorative justice proponents

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: “An Eye for An Eye”

Difficulty Level: Medium

22. Which of the following is true of censure?

a. It is an important component to deterrence thinking.

b. It is simply holding offenders accountable for their conduct.

c. It is connoted by rehabilitation.

d. It will never have a deterrent effect.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Justifying Retribution

Difficulty Level: Medium

23. Which of the following is true of punishment?

a. It is a conventional device.

b. It has a symbolic significance largely missing from other kinds of penalties.

c. It expresses more than disapproval.

d. all of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Justifying Retribution

Difficulty Level: Medium

24. Denouncing criminals can also be referred to as ______.

a. empathizing with the victim

b. vengeance

c. alienation

d. all of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Justifying Retribution

Difficulty Level: Medium

25. Which of the following is a problem with communicative theory?

a. It should appeal to a person’s rational understanding.

b. It should provide reconciliation with the community.

c. An unrepentant offender.

d. An offender charged with felonies.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Punishment as a Communicative Practice

Difficulty Level: Medium

26. Unfair advantage theory focuses on ______.

a. offenders who have taken advantage of others in society

b. those offenders who need to be punished

c. focuses on those who need to be “fixed”

d. none of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Unfair Advantage

Difficulty Level: Medium

27. During which decade did criminologists reconsider the idea of retribution and advance new formations beyond the general thought of retribution as vengeance?

a. 1950s

b. 1960s

c. 1970s

d. 1980s

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Just Deserts

Difficulty Level: Easy

28. Sentencing guidelines were prompted by the growing interest in ______ theory.

a. retribution

b. utilitarian

c. incapacitation

d. just deserts

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Just Deserts

Difficulty Level: Medium

29. Which of the following is not a criticism of just deserts theory?

a. It lacks any principle that determines a properly commensurate sentence.

b. It fails to account for the problem of just deserts in an unjust world.

c. It fails to take account of the fact that there are multiple discretions involved in the sentencing power.

d. It provides closure to victims.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Just Deserts

Difficulty Level: Medium

30. Which of the following is not a criteria for the framework of just punishment discussed by Steffen (2012)?

a. The motivation for punishment must be vengeance.

b. Punishment should restore a “value equilibrium” distorted and disturbed by the wrongdoing.

c. Punishments should not be cruel and should be the least harsh sentence.

d. The punishment and sentence must be properly authorized.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Reconciling Utilitarian and Retributive Theories

Difficulty Level: Medium

31. The justification for punishment based on turning the offender into a law-abiding person is called ______.

a. incapacitation

b. deterrence

c. rehabilitation

d. just deserts

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

32. Which theory argues that we should rehabilitate criminals because it is just to do so and because each person possesses moral worth?

a. Denunciation theory

b. Deterrence theory

c. Deontological theory

d. Restorative theory

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

33. Rehabilitation argues for which type of sentences.

a. Consecutive

b. Fixed

c. Determinate

d. Indeterminate

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

34. The demise of rehabilitation began during which decade?

a. 1950s

b. 1960s

c. 1970s

d. 1980s

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

35. The article that contributed to the demise of rehabilitation argued that “______”.

a. rehabilitation is faulty

b. nothing works

c. rehabilitation programs are ineffective

d. retribution prevents more crime

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

36. One approach to rehabilitation argues that when possible, punishment should preserve opportunities for improving inmates’ rational character and developing their virtue. Which inmate rehabilitation programs reflect this rehabilitative approach?

a. drug and substance abuse treatment programs

b. anger management programs

c. sex offender treatment programs

d. all of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Justifications for Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Easy

37. Which theory of punishment is most likely to be effective for dealing with “career criminals”?

a. retribution

b. rehabilitation

c. incapacitation

d. deterrence

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Incapacitation

Difficulty Level: Easy

38. Placing offenders in custody or executing them so they will not offend again involves the theory of ______.

a. incapacitation

b. deterrence

c. rehabilitation

d. just deserts

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Incapacitation

Difficulty Level: Easy

39. Which of the following is not a problem inherent in incapacitative sentencing:

a. It works only if we lock up those who would have committed further offenses if they had been left free.

b. It works only if those we lock up are not immediately replaced by new recruits.

c. It works only if we fix offenders while we lock them up.

d. It works only if the crimes committed after release are not so frequent or serious so as to negate the effects of the crimes prevented through incapacitative sentencing.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension | Application

Answer Location: Incapacitation

Difficulty Level: Hard

40. The notion of incapacitation is reflected in such punishment policies as ______.

a. three-strikes legislation

b. mandatory minimum sentences

c. truth in sentencing

d. all of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Incapacitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

41. The theory of punishment that attempts to repair or heal the offender, victim and community is termed ______.

a. just deserts

b. rehabilitation

c. retribution

d. restorative justice

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

42. Restorative justice focuses on ______.

a. the offender

b. the victim

c. the community

d. all of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

43. How did the Corrective Education Company run afoul of the law while conducting their privately-operated retail theft diversion program in California?

a. They offered shoplifters an alternative to having a criminal record.

b. They offered shoplifters no actual choice and a program agreement amounting to extortion.

c. They showed videos explaining the downside of having a criminal record.

d. They failed to retrieve fees from 45% of the offenders who signed up.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Case Study 6.2: Restorative Justice or Extortion

Difficulty Level: Medium

44. Which of the following is not one of the core principles of restorative justice discussed by Van Ness and Strong (1997)?

a. Justice requires healing of victims, offenders and communities injured by the crime.

b. All victims of crime can benefit from restorative justice.

c. Victims, offenders, and communities should be permitted to actively involve themselves in the justice process in a timely and substantial manner.

d. Roles and responsibilities of the government should be rethought, and in its promotion of justice, government should be responsible for preserving a just order, and the community should be responsible for establishing peace.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Easy

45. Proponents of restorative justice generally general reject the paradigm.

a. Deterrence

b. Rehabilitation

c. Punishment

d. Just deserts

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

46. Under ______, proponents of restorative justice envisage offenders would undergo therapy, counseling, or training during their time in custody in a restorative prison.

a. rehabilitative detention

b. restorative detention

c. punishment rationality

d. bureaucratic rationality

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

47. Sociological perspectives on punishment include the thinking of ______.

a. Emile Durkheim

b. Max Weber

c. Michael Foucault

d. all of these

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

48. Durkheim theorized that the main purposes of punishment were to ______.

a. affirm social values and promote social solidarity

b. punish the offender and compensate the victim

c. deter the offender and the general public

d. rehabilitate the offender and protect society

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

49. Durkheim took a/an ______ approach by examining aspects of social life in terms of the functions they perform in society.

a. deterrent

b. functionalist

c. analytic

d. collective

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Easy

50. Emile Durkheim viewed punishment as promoting social ______ through an affirmation of values, and its expression of outrage upon the commission of an offense.

a. discord

b. solidarity

c. harmony

d. equality

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Hard

51. Rusche and Kircheimer (1939) take a Marxist approach and argue that the severity of punishment is directly proportional to ______.

a. the availability of capital

b. economic crises

c. the availability of labor

d. contradictions in capitalism

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Hard

52. The principle of ______ argues that the conditions offenders will experience in prison must be worse than anything they are likely to endure outside the prison.

a. punishment

b. less eligibility

c. disadvantage

d. imprisonment

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Hard

True/False

1. Theories of punishment which focus on preventing crime in the future are termed “retributivist.”

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension | Application | Analysis

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Philosophical Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium

2. Retribution and revenge are identical in all aspects.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension | Application | Analysis

Answer Location: Is Retribution, in Fact, Revenge?

Difficulty Level: Medium

3. The theory of punishment closest to retribution is just deserts.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension | Application | Analysis

Answer Location: Just Deserts

Difficulty Level: Medium

4. Rehabilitation theory is consistent with the indeterminate sentence.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

5. The newest theory of punishment is restorative justice.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

6. Restorative justice is the justification for punishment that most explicitly provides a role for the victim in the punishment process.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

7. Restorative justice is not concerned with, and does not involve, rehabilitation.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

8. One criticism of restorative justice is that it is too ready to assume that agreement or reconciliation of the offender, victim and community are possible.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

9. The death penalty is consistent with rehabilitation.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Easy

Short Answer

1. Indeterminate sentences are consistent with rehabilitation. Briefly define “indeterminate sentence.”

Cognitive Domain: Comprehension

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

2. Is it possible to reconcile utilitarian and retributive theories?

Cognitive Domain: Analysis

Answer Location: Reconciling Utilitarian and Retributive Theories

Difficulty Level: Hard

3. Who/what are the three parties/entities involved in the restorative justice process?

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Easy

4. What is the main criticism of restorative justice?

Cognitive Domain: Comprehension

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Medium

5. The type of deterrence that involves punishing an individual to deter others is called _______.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Easy

6. Name two pre-twentieth century advocates of deterrence theory.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Easy

7. Retribution is sometimes exemplified by the saying “an eye for an eye and a ______.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Retribution

Difficulty Level: Easy

8. In Gregg v. Georgia and Furman v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court stated that retribution is a ______ theory of punishment.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge

Answer Location: Unfair Advantage

Difficulty Level: Medium

9. Which theory of punishment believes that punishment is justified because it is deserved?

Cognitive Domain: Comprehension

Answer Location: Retribution

Difficulty Level: Easy

10. Which theory of punishment holds that punishment should be aimed at reforming the offender?

Cognitive Domain: Comprehension

Answer Location: Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Medium

Essay

1. Define, discuss, compare and contrast individual and general deterrence. Please give one example of each.

Cognitive Domain: Analysis

Answer Location: Individual and General Deterrence

Difficulty Level: Hard

2. Present, discuss and evaluate three criticisms of restorative justice. Briefly explain your position on restorative justice.

Cognitive Domain: Analysis

Answer Location: Restorative Justice

Difficulty Level: Hard

3. How does retribution differ from revenge? Please provide examples.

Cognitive Domain: Knowledge | Comprehension | Application

Answer Location: Retribution, Is Retribution, in Fact, Revenge?

Difficulty Level: Medium

4. Which one purpose of punishment do you think works best to reduce recidivism rates? Why?

Cognitive Domain: Analysis

Answer Location: Effective Rehabilitation, Justification for Rehabilitation

Difficulty Level: Hard

5. How is the sociological approach to punishment different from the philosophical approach?

Cognitive Domain: Analysis

Answer Location: Why Punish? The Philosophical Approach | Why Punish? The Sociological Approach

Difficulty Level: Medium