Social Psychology to criminal justice system
Name
Institution
For many years, victims have often been forgotten party in criminal justice system. Psychiatrists argue that, victims are often frustrated sensing that justice has not been done. Eventually, social psychologists have intervened in this aspect as a way of coming with assumptions of how people’s thoughts, behaviors and feelings influence the actual interaction with others. The terms behaviors, feelings and thoughts are all psychological variables; that typically explain human behavior with social situations. In this regard, since people are mostly influenced by life situations along with environment, social psychologists have developed an interest of finding out the causes of criminal acts that occur in a daily basis. This paper seeks at analyzing the study done by Baumeister, Bushman and Campbell (2000) on how Self-esteem, Aggression and Narcissism cause violence.
Baumeister, et al (2000) argues that, self-esteem is a major cause to violence. In their article, they argue that, low self esteem is the cause for violence in that the victims tend to be confused, shy, lack of confidence, lack of self awareness in addition, tendencies of been depressed. By engaging in crime, this act as a way of searching for identity plus acquiring a sense of belonging in a certain group which in this case may be violence group. Additionally, people with depression because of low self-esteem are likely to be more aggressive and violent behaviors than during the high-favorable aspects of esteem.
On the contrary, debate of what greatly causes violence between low self-esteem and high self-esteem is controversial. Most research has outlined that; most violent men have a strong sense of pride, personal superiority that signifies high self-esteem. The group with high self-esteem is mostly linked with violent behaviors such as rapists, wife beaters, aggressive nation, murders and violent youth gangs among other categories of violent people. The issue of high esteem causing violence has been a concern among researchers currently. As a result, many have begun to use related term such as narcissism which has been argued to be the outcome of high self esteem; and has been understood to be a risk factor that increases violent aggressive.
On my opinion, this information on social and psychological information can benefit the society in a number of ways. First, because most people suffer temporary or else permanently with self-esteem, it will impose an effort of helping the victims. No one can deny we are living in a very violent world. Violence has become prevalent in the current culture of youths the most prevalent cause of this being low self-esteem. With this in mind, it will benefit the society especially parents to come up with ways that would boost self-esteem. As discussed earlier, the article has outlined that many tend to join violence groups to feel superior, with this in mind; the society will handle criminal cases efficiently.
Additionally, many cases of men beating their wives in order to feel superior and show the world that they are boss will help the society to know that such people require help, which in this case they may be shown that, bringing other people down, is not necessary in proving superiority. With equipped knowledge on what causes violence will eliminate cases of violence by dealing with root issues that lead to violence.
From the above readings in the article, few interventions need to be done. First, the society needs first to understand the root causes of violence. Instead of criticizing the perpetrator, they need to know why such incidence occurred and as a result, be willing to offer help to eliminate violence behaviors. Secondly, when counselors and psychiatrist undertake a laboratory test on self-esteem, it will outline the cause and as a result, assist the victim overcome the act.
In conclusion, inventions of looking more closely on people with high self-esteem can assist in finding the aggressive individuals. Eventually, this will help the society to deal with violence behaviors.
References
Baumeister, R.F.,Bushman,B.J.,& Campbell, K.W. (2000). Self esteem, Narcissim and Aggression: Does Violence result from low self esteem or from Threatened Egotism. Department of psychology, Lowa State University
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