Penology
Definition
The branch of criminology concerned with the theory and practice of punishment and imprisonment. It examines the aims of punishment (retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, incapacitation, restoration) and evaluates how well custodial and non-custodial sanctions achieve those aims.
Related terms
- Criminology
- The scientific study of crime, its causes and distribution across populations, the operation of criminal justice institutions, and strategies for prevention and...
- Dark figure of crime
- The gap between the actual volume of crime and the amount recorded in official statistics. Crimes go unrecorded when victims do not...
- Victimology
- The sub-field of criminology that studies crime victims: their characteristics, the victim-offender relationship, the impacts of victimisation, and the adequacy of legal...
- Crime prevention
- Strategies and interventions aimed at reducing the incidence or severity of crime before it occurs. Includes situational prevention (modifying environments to reduce...
- Deviance
- Behaviour that violates social norms, whether or not it is also illegal. Criminology studies deviance as well as crime because the boundary...
- Recidivism
- The tendency of a person who has been convicted of a crime to reoffend. Measured differently across jurisdictions: by reconviction, by reincarceration,...
- Social control
- The mechanisms, formal and informal, through which societies regulate individual behaviour and secure conformity to norms. Includes criminal law and policing (formal...
Explained in these topics
- Criminology, Law, and Forensic ScienceThe study of punishment, its philosophical justifications, and the administration of penal institutions. Major frameworks include retribution, deterrence, inca...
- What Is CriminologyThe branch of criminology concerned with the theory and practice of punishment and imprisonment. It examines the aims of punishment (retribution, deterrence, r...