Objectives to test whether individuals differ in deterrability by studying whether the
effect of criminal experiences on perceived detection risk varies by criminal propensity.
Methods Data from the British ‘‘Offending, Crime and Justice Survey’’, a four-wave
panel study on criminal behavior and victimization, are analyzed. Two subsamples for
analyses are constructed: one of non-offenders at first measurement, to analyze the effect of
gaining first offending experiences during the time of study (n = 1,279) and one sample of
individuals who have committed offenses within the past year (n = 567), to analyze the
effect of police contact among active offenders. Fixed-effects regressions of perceived
detection risk on criminal experiences and interactions between criminal experiences and
measures of criminal propensity (risk-affinity, impulsivity) are estimated.
Results Analyses support learning models for the formation and change of risk perceptions,
but individual differences by criminal propensity are present in the deterrence
process: After gaining first offending experiences, impulsive individuals as well as riskaverse
individuals are more likely to lower their perceptions about the probability of
detection than less impulsive or risk-affine individuals are. A positive effect of police
contact on expected detection risk is restricted to risk-averse individuals.
Conclusions Findings support claims that deterrence works differently for crime-prone
individuals. The differential effects of impulsivity and risk-affinity underline the importance
of not combining constituent characteristics of criminal propensity in composite
indices, because they might have differential effects on deterrence.
