Integrating theoriesof law obedience: How utility-theoretic factors, legitimacy, and lack ofself-control influence decisions to commit low-level crimes

Judgment and Decision Making

卷:14

关键词: law obedience;    deterrence;    self-control;    legitimacy;    decision-makingNAKeywords;   

DOI  :  

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

We conducted twostudies using a sample of students (Experiment 1, N=84) and the general public(Experiment 2, N=412) to assess the relative and unique effects of factorssuggested by three major theories of law obedience: a utility-theoreticdeterrence theory (Becker, 1968), the general theory of crime (Gottfredson andHirschi, 1990), and the legitimacy model (Tyler, 1990). Six different types oflow-level crime were considered. The probability of breaking the law increaseswith factors predicted by each of these theories, namely detection probability,expected fine, self-control, and legitimacy. All four factors uniquelycontribute to predicting law obedience, effects are mainly additive, and nostable interaction effects are observed. The relative influence of theinvestigated factors varies between types of low-level crimes. This indicatesthat an integrative theory of why people obey the law needs to consider factorsfrom various theories and allow for the relative influence of factors to differamong crimes. We observe systematic deviations from a basic utility-theoreticapproach to law breaking. Individuals’ tendency to obey the law is much higherthan predicted by an approach taking into account detection probability,expected fines, and benefits only. The robust effects of interindividualdifferences concerning legitimacy and self-control as well as the finding thatthe tendency to break the law decreases with increasing benefit of the crimealso conflict with a basic utility-theoretic approach tolaw-obedience.

【 授权许可】

Unknown