"Gut Feelings" and the Prevention of Domestic Violence: Understand the Role of Intuition in Risk Assessment

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  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Table 7: Crime, Criminalization, and the Carceral State

Abstract

Scholars have argued that risk assessment has become the guiding principle of domestic violence policy. While they have access to a range of standardized risk assessment tools, state actors tasked with assessing risk of future violence often describe relying on their intuition or “gut feeling” to make decisions. This paper examines the role that intuition plays in risk assessment practices. Through an analysis of correctional treatment programs for domestic violence perpetrators, I highlight the organizational and institutional contexts in which “gut feelings” emerge and become legitimate decision-making tools. I argue that intuition is an affective response that allows employees who intervene with perpetrators to manage the emotional toll of uncertainty, resolve conflicts of loyalty, settle disagreements, and assert expertise. I discuss what paying attention to emotions such as intuition can tell us about the state response to domestic violence, the operations of risk assessment, and the administration of criminal justice.

Author

• Marie Laperrière, University of Manitoba