Crime and Social Psychology (Level 5)

• Credit value: 30 credits at Level 5
• Convenor and tutor: Dr Lizzie Hughes
• Assessment: a 10-minute in-class mini conference (10%) and 2000-word essay (90%)

In this interdisciplinary module we critically explore social psychology in relation to crime, the criminal justice system and harm. We provide a critical overview of social psychology and explore how it can contribute to furthering our understanding of criminological issues. We engage with a variety of learning materials, such as academic journals and books, podcasts, films, news media reports and more.

Indicative syllabus

• Critical approaches to social psychology: how can we use social psychology to understand criminological issues?
• Interrogating obedience: why do mass atrocities (e.g. genocides and holocausts) happen? Can we stop them?
• The psychologies of protest and activism
• The psychologies of empire: how is 'race' constructed in relation to crime and psychology?
• Criminalised sex: studying the pathologisation of queerness and kink in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)
• Neurodiversity, capitalism and anti-psychiatry movements
• The regulation of risk: how is artificial intelligence (AI) used in the surveillance of forensic mental health? What benefits and problems does this present?
• Psychologies of our surveillance culture: how does it feel to be watched?
• Digital psychologies: studying online hate, misinformation and digital propaganda

By the end of this module, you will be able to:

• understand the points of intersection and tension between criminology and social psychology
• explain the key elements in contemporary social psychologies of violence, harm and deviance
• identify the role of inequalities and differences in social psychology and criminology
• compare and evaluate different theories in social psychology that are relevant to criminology
• assess empirical evidence on psychological understandings of crime, violence, harm and deviance.