Perceptions of Sex Offender Policies in North Carolina

• In Event: Advances in Sex Offense Policy Research: Exploring Public Views and Opinions

Abstract

Citizens have been a major force in the creation and implementation of sex offender policies (Finklehor, 2009; LaFond, 2005). Since these policies have often been created, in theory, to provide citizens with more tools to protect themselves (Finkelhor, 2009; LaFond, 2005), it is important to understand how citizens perceive and utilize these policies once passed. While some research has examined how discrete groups of citizens view these policies, there are few studies that examine how different backgrounds may influence citizens’ perceptions.
This study examines the perceptions of 394 participants in North Carolina, recruited via a snowball sampling method. The influence of background (victim, offender, law enforcement-oriented) is explored to see how this is associated with knowledge and perceptions of sex offender policies. The current study was guided by three research questions: 1) What characteristics predict knowledge of various sex offender policies in the community?; 2) What characteristics predict risk perception of potential sexual abusers?; 3) What characteristics predict perception of policy effectiveness?

Authors

• Kelly M. Socia, University of Massachusetts Lowell

• Melissa Delle Grady, Catholic University