Legal Psychology Exam Preparation Guide
Course Introduction
Legal Psychology explores the intersection of psychological principles and the legal system, examining how psychological research and theories inform legal processes, decisions, and outcomes. Students will study topics such as eyewitness testimony, jury decision-making, police interrogations, false confessions, the reliability of memory, and the assessment of criminal responsibility. The course emphasizes scientific approaches to understanding human behavior in legal contexts, ethical considerations, and the practical implications for law enforcement, courts, and policy. Through case studies, contemporary research, and real-world applications, students gain insight into how psychological science can contribute to a fairer and more effective justice system.
Recommended Textbook Forensic Psychology 3rd Edition by Joanna Pozzulo
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14 Chapters
599 Verified Questions
599 Flashcards
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Chapter 1: An Introduction to Forensic Psychology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following is an example of "psychology in the law"?
A) a psychologist providing expert testimony in court on the accuracy of eyewitness identification
B) examining how we can improve the assessment of fitness to stand trial
C) validating a tool for predicting risk of violence
D) a researcher examining factors that affect police decision making in a lab setting
E) studying the impact of a new interrogation technique to see if it decreases the likelihood that people will make false confessions
Answer: A
Q2) What is the main difference between a clinical forensic psychologist and a forensic psychiatrist?
A) Forensic psychiatrists cannot provide expert testimony in court.
B) Clinical forensic psychologists can prescribe medication.
C) Forensic psychiatrists aren't concerned with mental health issues.
D) Clinical forensic psychologists rely more on a medical model of mental illness.
E) Forensic psychiatrists are medical doctors.
Answer: E
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Chapter 2: Police Psychology
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following statements is not true with respect to police discretion in cases of domestic violence?
A) Historically, domestic violence by a man against his wife was often ignored.
B) Historically, arrest rates have been reported to range from 75% to 100%.
C) Police sometimes choose to mediate domestic disturbances in an informal manner.
D) Community referrals and separation have been used in the past to deal with domestic disturbances.
E) both b and d
Answer: B
Q2) As a psychologist involved in police selection,which measure(s)would you be most confident in administering to an applicant if your goal was to accurately predict their future job performance?
A) IPI
B) SILS
C) MMPI
D) MMPI-2
E) the combined results of the MMPI and the MMPI-2
Answer: A
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Chapter 3: The Psychology of Police Investigations
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Q1) According to your textbook,what is the primary disadvantage associated with the inductive method of criminal profiling?
A) It will never be possible to obtain a representative sample of serial offenders upon which to draw profiling conclusions.
B) The logical foundations upon which the profiling predictions are based might be flawed.
C) Data related to serial homicide cases does not exist.
D) The method is too vague.
E) No profiler uses the inductive method of profiling.
Answer: A
Q2) The model of police interrogation used in North America is ___________ and the model used in Britain is ___________.
A) accusatorial/accusatorial
B) inquisitorial/admissible
C) inquisitorial/accusatorial
D) accusatorial/inquisitorial
E) inadmissible/admissible
Answer: D
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Chapter 4: Deception
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Q1) Which of the following is not a cue to malingered psychosis in criminal defendants?
A) hallucinations with delusions
B) understandable motive for committing crime
C) absence of subtle signs of psychosis
D) presence of a partner in the crime
E) visual hallucinations in black and white
Q2) Which of the following statements is false?
A) Liars consistently provide fewer details than truth-tellers.
B) Truth-tellers are less likely to change their stories.
C) Liars are less likely to admit to lack of memory.
D) Liars' stories are less fluent than the stories of truth-tellers.
E) Liars tell less compelling stories than truth-tellers.
Q3) Which of the following statements is true regarding the detection of deception?
A) People can be trained to improve their ability to detect deception in others.
B) People are generally better at detecting truth than detecting lies.
C) Hhigh-stake lies are easier to detect than low-stake lies.
D) Many professionals (e.g., police officers) are no better than detecting deception than the general population.
E) all of the above
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Page 6
Chapter 5: Eyewitness Testimony
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which two items did Lindsay,Martin,and Webber (1994)find that were commonly reported by witnesses?
A) gender and age
B) height and weight
C) hair and clothing
D) race and age
E) gender and clothing
Q2) List the correct decisions associated with both target-present and target-absent lineups.Also,list the potential errors that can be made in the lineup identification process and whether these errors are known or unknown to the police.
Q3) On the basis of the research you have read in the textbook,list five recommendations that you would make to police forces regarding how they should conduct police lineups.
Q4) Distinguish between a simultaneous and a sequential lineup.
Q5) Distinguish between a system variable and an estimator variable as related to eyewitness research.Provide one example of each.
Q6) State two difficulties with the use of hypnosis in the eyewitness context.
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Page 7
Chapter 6: Child Victims and Witnesses
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Q1) Which of the following statements is false concerning the cognitive processes of children?
A) Children and adults forget information in the same way.
B) Children and adults are different in terms of retention of information.
C) Children can misattribute where information comes from.
D) Children store information differently than adults.
E) none of the above statements are false.
Q2) According to a 2005 report of child maltreatment cases in Canada,approximately _____ of reported cases were substantiated.
A) 10%
B) 25%
C) 35%
D) 45%
E) 60%
Q3) Describe the changes made to the competency inquiry with the enactment of Bill C-2 (2006).
Q4) What is Criterion-Based Content Analysis (CBCA)?
Specify the assumption that underlies the CBCA and identify two potential problems with this method.
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Chapter 7: Juries: Fact Finders
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Q1) How can the CSI effect be described?
A) the education of jurors whereby they are more likely to convict if techniques seen on television are used
B) watching over 20 hours of crime shows a week
C) the fatigue associated with watching "CSI" type shows
D) a new mental health syndrome
E) a term used to distinguish it from the Law and Order effect
Q2) Which research method is able to establish cause-and-effect relationships?
A) archives
B) simulation studies
C) post-trial interviews
D) field studies
E) all of the above
Q3) In the context of jury decision making,distinguish between the terms polarization,leniency bias,and black sheep effect.
Q4) List two proposed advantages and two proposed disadvantages associated with the asking of questions by jurors as a courtroom comprehension aid.
Q5) List four functions of a jury.
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Chapter 8: The Role of Mental Illness in Court
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Q1) Which of the following dispositions can be made following a finding of NCRMD?
A) detention in a psychiatric facility
B) absolute discharge
C) conditional discharge
D) all of the above are potential dispositions
E) none of the above
Q2) The Canadian court case associated with defences of automatism is:
A) R. v. Stone
B) R. v. Prichard
C) R. v. Swain
D) R. v. McNaughton
E) none of the above
Q3) What are the three dispositions that can be made following a finding of NCRMD?
Q4) Which of the following examples would likely be recognized by Canadian courts as a defence of noninsane automatism?
A) stress
B) excessive state of grief
C) self-induced intoxication
D) sleepwalking
E) extreme state of anxiety
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Chapter 9: Sentencing and Parole in Canada
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Q1) When making a decision about whether to grant an offender parole,the National Parole Board takes into account:
A) opinions from police officers
B) the offender's mental status
C) the offender's employment history
D) information from victims
E) all of the above
Q2) What is unwarranted sentencing disparity?
List and describe the two major sources of unwarranted sentencing disparity.
Q3) Which of the following is a source of systematic sentencing disparity?
A) personality differences across judges
B) a judge's mood fluctuations
C) a judge's level of fatigue
D) both b and c
E) none of the above
Q4) Provide five general parole conditions that are sometimes specified by the National Parole Board (NPB).
Q5) Define the need principle,risk principle,and responsivity principle.
Q6) What is a dangerous offender?
What must be done in order to have an offender designated dangerous?
Page 11
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Chapter 10: Risk Assessment
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Q1) What was the main issue raised in the Baxstrom and Dixon cases/studies?
What are the two key findings to emerge from this research?
Q2) When might an offender risk assessment take place?
A) during sentencing
B) when deciding whether a youth should be sent to secure custody
C) pretrial
D) when deciding whether an inmate should be released on parole
E) all of the above
Q3) Structured professional judgment risk assessment is associated with the following characteristic:
A) specific cut-offs to determine risk level
B) both static and dynamic risk factors
C) only dynamic risk factors
D) statistically derived risk factors
E) only static risk factors
Q4) What is actuarial risk assessment?
Provide two advantages and two disadvantages associated with this method.What new method of risk assessment was developed in an attempt to address certain limitations associated with the actuarial approach?
Q5) Name and define the two components of the risk assessment process.
Page 12
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Chapter 11: Psychopaths
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Q1) Define psychopathy,Antisocial Personality Disorder,and sociopathy and give three examples of differences between these disorders.
Q2) The PCL-R has been supported by researchers for use with:
A) males
B) females
C) forensic psychiatric patients
D) sexual offenders
E) all of the above
Q3) Which of the following is not an example of how the construct of psychopathy has influenced court decisions?
A) support a transfer from youth to adult court
B) contribute to dangerous offender designation
C) determine parole eligibility
D) assess mental state at time of offense
E) prove incompetence or unfitness to stand trial
Q4) Name and describe the most widely used assessment tool for measuring psychopathic traits in adults.
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Chapter 12: Assessment and Treatment of Young Offenders
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Q1) Generally,the total number of crimes committed by youth has been:
A) increasing
B) decreasing
C) no change
D) decreasing for those under 10
E) increasing for those over 10
Q2) What is the difference between reactive aggression and proactive aggression? Which is related to an earlier onset of problems?
Q3) Strategies that attempt to reduce the frequency of violence are known as:
A) primary intervention strategies
B) class-one intervention strategies
C) secondary intervention strategies
D) class-two intervention strategies
E) tertiary intervention strategies
Q4) What is the most frequent sentence imposed in youth court?
A) fine
B) incarceration
C) probation
D) reprimand
E) absolute discharge
Page 14
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Chapter 13: Intimate Partner Violence
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Q1) Which of the following is not a component of the Correctional Service of Canada's Family Violence Prevention Programs?
A) motivation
B) education
C) attitudes
D) management
E) attrition
Q2) Three types of male batterers have been identified by the empirical literature.The _________ batterer engages in __________ levels of violence and has a history of
A) family-only/ severe/ substance abuse
B) dysphoric-borderline/ minimal/ depression
C) generally violent-antisocial/ severe/ substance abuse
D) dysphoric-borderline/ minimal/ anger problems
E) family-only/ moderate/ substance abuse
Q3) The Conflict Tactics Scale (CTS; Straus,1979),a scale used to measure domestic assault,has been criticized on many grounds.List four of the five criticisms specified in your text.
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15
Chapter 14: Sexual Offenders
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Sample Questions
Q1) Between 1975 and 2003,Canada's homicide rate:
A) generally increased
B) generally decreased
C) remained totally stable
D) fluctuated dramatically
E) was never measured
Q2) According to social learning theorists,aggressive behaviour is:
A) the product of a disturbed personality
B) the product of negative childhood experiences
C) the product of learning
D) the product of childhood physical abuse
E) the product of evolution
Q3) What percentage of child victims of sexual abuse experience significant psychological problems in the year following disclosure?
A) 2%
B) 10%
C) 45%
D) 70%
E) 95%
Q4) Distinguish between a reactive and an instrumental homicide.
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