Conciliation or Condemnation? Prison Employees' and Young Peoples' Attitudes Towards Sexual Offenders

摘要

Prison employees’ attitudes towards sexual offenders were monitored by the Attitudes toward Sexual Offenders scale (ATS) before (N = 105) and again one year after (N = 90) an educational program on sexual offenders. In addition, 412 college students completed the ATS. All answered a number of questions exploring the respondents’ general beliefs about sexual offenders and their punishment. The prison employees held significantly more positive attitudes towards sexual offenders than college students did. Among prison employees, prison officers held the least positive attitudes. While increasing age correlated positively with more positive attitudes, no gender differences were observed. The educational program did not seem to have any effect on the prison employees’ attitudes one year later, as measured by the ATS.