The Justice and Responsibility League

What makes for an upstanding citizen?

Key Sun is a psychologist, social worker and an associate professor of law and justice at Central Washington University. He is author of Correctional Counseling: A Cognitive Growth Perspective. See full bio

September 13, 2009

Racial Profiling and a Misunderstanding of Probability

Racial profiling can be broadly defined as a practice in law enforcement based on the belief that a person's category membership (e.g., ethnicity, national origin) functions as an indicator of criminal propensity. Read More

June 3, 2009

An Overlooked Problem with The New Hate Crimes Bill

If someone says that a woman or a child is raped because the victim is a woman or a child, does it sound absurd? It sounds ridiculous because the person explains the crime incidence as caused by the distinctiveness of the victim, but does not blame the offender for the offense. Read More

April 30, 2009

Why Some Psychopaths Are in Leadership Positions

It is well observed that psychopaths (a.k.a. sociopaths) are found both in prison and in managerial positions. In "The Sociopath Next Door," Martha Stout analyzed many individuals with psychopathy and most of them were not part of the offender population. Read More

April 27, 2009

My Impression of Philip Zimbardo at 2009 WPA Convention

I just returned from the 2009 WPA (Western Psychological Association) Convention in Portland, Oregon, with a plethora of materials to ruminate on. A conference of this magnitude always provides me with a spectrum of lectures, programs, workshops and posters that are so enthralling as to compete for my time, and with an outlet to share my research with colleagues and students. Read More

March 2, 2009

Four Drawbacks of Cognitive Therapy

Cognitive therapy is a generic term that refers to diverse cognitive approaches to modifying human experiences and activities. This critique focuses on cognitive therapy that focuses on altering negative self concepts. This approach is based on the theories developed by A. Beck and A. Read More

February 16, 2009

A Different Formula for Creating Happiness

In Carlin Flora's "Get Happy" survey last month, the interviewees provided their diverse insightful advices. Read More

January 5, 2009

Why Moral Education Has Not Reduced Racial Profiling? (2)

In the post "Why moral education...(1)," I argued that we needed to view prejudiced practices (e.g., racial profiling) not as an issue of immorality but as a product and manifestation of cognitive distortions. Read More

December 3, 2008

Notes from The Underground: An inmate’s effort to learn Taoist Wisdom

A week before the Thanksgiving, a letter reached my office from an inmate serving time in a midwest state prison. It has been some time since I did counseling and interventions with correctional offenders, no wonder I was surprised. The inmate is not one of my previous clients. I only knew from the letter that he was an offender with a Hispanic family name. Read More

November 23, 2008

Why Moral Education Has Not Reduced Racial Profiling? (1)

According to a recent news article in USA TODAY, racial profiling and other biased practices by law enforcement agencies are alive and well. For example, in the past year alone, Border Patrol agents have questioned Silvio Torres-Saillant three times in the Greyhound station in Syracuse, N.Y., about his immigration status and citizenship as he purchased tickets or waited in the terminal. Read More

October 27, 2008

Can Race Take the Responsibility for Racially-Motivated Crime?

People's social cognitions and perceptions about real events are more complicated than their performances in controlled laboratory settings. How people (particularly the news media) describe and explain bias-motivated crime appears to deviate from, and challenge the findings in the attribution literature of social psychology. Read More

Law and Crime Basics

Psychology and the law intersect in the field of forensic science. Legal practitioners require a grasp of human motivation at its most basic and most debased in order to render fair judgment.

Go to the Law and Crime Basics page for more on Law and Crime including:

Current Issue

Everyday Creativity

How to start living creatively and reap the benefits.

Subscribe to The Justice and Responsibility League

Law and Crime Basics

Current Issue