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The Sociology of Sentencing: Reconceptualizing Decisionmaking Processes and Outcomes

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2024

Daniel P. Mears
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Abstract

Research on juvenile and adult sentencing has been characterized by theoretical, methodological, and empirical limitations that preclude adequate description, prediction, or assessment of decisionmaking processes and outcomes. Five limitations are prominent: emphasis on atheoretical, empirical attempts, generally unsuccessful, to increase predictive accuracy; limited conceptualizations of dependent variables (e.g., incarceration versus nonincarceration); overreliance on individual, offender-level data with minimal reference to victims, practitioners, or contextual factors; failure to incorporate analytically multiple research methods; and inattention to intended and unintended uses and effects of sentencing. These limitations can be highlighted by focusing on a context—-juvenile justice—in which the goals of sentencing are varied, conflicting, and, due to recent reforms, changing. Using interview and survey data, the present research examines juvenile sentencing reform in Texas to highlight these limitations and to oudine an analytical framework for improved description, modeling, and assessment of sentencing.

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Articles
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 32 , Issue 3 , 1998 , pp. 667 - 724
Copyright
Copyright © 1998 by The Law and Society Association

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Footnotes

Grateful acknowledgment is extended to William R. Kelly, Professor of Sociology at the University of Texas at Austin and Director of the Center for Criminology and Criminal Justice Research (CCCJR); Robert O. Dawson, Professor of Law at the University of Texas at Austin and Faculty Research Associate with the CCCJR; and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions.

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