The relationship between criminology studies and punitive attitudes

Policymakers and researchers have long been interested in the punitive attitudes of police and correctional officers. This research examined the punitive attitudes of 206 police and correctional officers at the beginning and towards the end of academic studies. The results indicate that (a) the police officers held more punitive attitudes compared with the correctional officers; (b) the correctional officers, but not the police officers, held less punitive attitudes in the last year than in the first year of studies; (c) male police officers generally held more punitive attitudes than their female counterparts; (d) belief in classical theories, which was found to be the strongest predictor of harsher punitive attitudes, was greater among police than correctional officers. The implications of the results are discussed.