Collaborative Research: Does Registration and Notification Policy Deter Adolescent Sexual Offending? A Prospective Study of Integrated Criminological and Psychological Theories

尽管对于成年人是否应该被要求登记为性犯罪者存在争议，但目前有41个州都有某种形式的政策，要求被裁定或被判有性犯罪的青少年在服刑期满后向当地执法机构登记。此外，30个州允许或要求在线社区通知犯下性犯罪的青少年，在公共网站或“登记处”发布信息，告知居民居住在他们社区的年轻罪犯。登记和通知政策部分植根于威慑理论，该理论假定这些结果的风险将首先阻止潜在的性犯罪者犯罪。然而，犯罪学和心理学理论预测了这些政策的不同结果，以及它们是否真的阻止了青少年性犯罪仍然未知。先前的研究表明，许多青少年没有意识到他们的性行为所带来的登记和通知的风险。此外，即使他们意识到这一点，心理科学表明，他们发育不成熟可能会掩盖这一知识，最终导致冒犯。这个跨学科项目调查登记和通知政策是否以及如何阻止青少年从事在他们这个年龄段普遍存在的犯罪性行为。研究结果将为决策者提供参考，以制定基于证据的战略，有效实现正义，同时保护发育脆弱的青少年免受过度惩罚和污名化的后果。本研究阐明了一般威慑的先决条件的犯罪学过程，以及可能制约这些过程的发展心理机制。具体而言，它通过实验操纵青少年是否接触到有关刑事司法介入风险和与非法性行为相关的性犯罪者登记和通知的教育信息。研究结果将揭示，即使青少年意识到某些性行为是被禁止的，并且存在法律风险，他们进行理性选择的能力以及他们对性侵犯净成本的认知，是否以及如何在一年的过程中缓和登记和通知的影响。该项目的实验和纵向方法将允许对犯罪学过程的因果决定，这些过程被认为是一般威慑的基础，以及可能制约性犯罪者登记和通知政策影响青少年危险性行为能力的发展心理机制。这将改变目前对威慑犯罪学理论、社会发展心理学和法律政策之间关系的理解。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Despite controversy over whether even adults should be required to register as sex offenders, currently 41 states have some form of policy requiring adolescents adjudicated or convicted of sexual offenses to register with local law enforcement agencies upon completing their sentences. Moreover, 30 states allow or require online community notification of adolescents who committed sexual offenses, posting information on public websites or “registries” to inform residents about the young offenders living in their communities. Registration and notification policies are partly rooted in deterrence theory, which presumes that the risk of these outcomes will prevent potential sexual offenders from offending in the first place. However, criminological and psychological theories predict different outcomes of these policies, and whether they actually deter adolescent sexual offending remains unknown. Prior research suggests that many adolescents are not aware of the risk of registration and notification posed by their sexual behavior. Moreover, even if they are aware, psychological science suggests that their developmental immaturity may override that knowledge and result in offending anyway. This interdisciplinary project investigates whether and how registration and notification policies deter adolescents from engaging in criminalized sexual behaviors that are common in their age group. Findings will inform policymakers working to develop evidence-based strategies that effectively achieve justice while also protecting developmentally vulnerable adolescents from excessively punitive and stigmatizing outcomes. This study explicates the criminological processes that are prerequisite to general deterrence as well as the developmental psychological mechanisms that may condition those processes. Specifically, it experimentally manipulates whether adolescents are exposed to educational information about the risk of criminal justice involvement and sex offender registration and notification associated with illegal sexual behaviors. The results will reveal whether and how, even when adolescents are aware that certain sexual behaviors are prohibited and carry legal risks, their ability to engage in rational choice and their perceptions of the net cost of sexual offending moderate the impact of registration and notification over the course of one year. This project’s experimental and longitudinal approach will allow for causal determinations about the criminological processes that are thought to underlie general deterrence as well as the developmental psychological mechanisms that may condition the ability of sex offender registration and notification policy to affect adolescents’ risky sexual behavior. This will transform current understanding of relations between criminological theory on deterrence, social-developmental psychology, and legal policy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.