Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/65721 
Year of Publication: 
2009
Series/Report no.: 
Cardiff Economics Working Papers No. E2009/12
Publisher: 
Cardiff University, Cardiff Business School, Cardiff
Abstract: 
Rational offender models assume that individuals choose whether to offend by weighing the rewards against the chances of apprehension and the penalty if caught. While evidence indicates that rational theory is applicable to acquisitive crimes, the explanatory power for gratuitous non-fatal violent offending has not been evaluated. Lottery-type questions elicited risk attitudes and time preferences from respondents in a street survey. Admitted violent behaviour was predictable on the basis of some of these responses. Consistent with the rational model, less risk averse and more impatient individuals were more liable to violence. Such people were also more likely to be victims of violence. In line with a subjective version of the rational model, respondents with lower estimates of average violence conviction chances and of fines were more prone to be violent.
Subjects: 
violence
alcohol
risk
intertemporal choice
rational offending
JEL: 
D81
K14
Document Type: 
Working Paper

Files in This Item:
File
Size
445.06 kB





Items in EconStor are protected by copyright, with all rights reserved, unless otherwise indicated.