Useful Internet
sites:
Dr. Joy Aked (L107), Tel: 0141 848
3895, E-mail: joy.aked@paisley.ac.uk
David Main (L238) Tel: 0141 848 3794, E-mail: main-as0@wpmail.paisley.ac.uk
Web Sites:
The standards of these sites varies
widely. Some links may now be broken due to the web site having been moved or taken
down. Use search engines to seek out other web sites on particular topics
related to the course. If you find a web site which you feel is useful to the
course please let us know and we will include it on the list.
Sites containing Useful Forensic Links
http://www.law.cam.ac.uk/crim/CRIMLINK.HTM
http://www.crimelibrary.com/index.html
http://members.tripod.com/~christosT/1a.htm
http://flash.lakeheadu.ca/~pals/forensics/
http://faculty.ncwc.edu/toconnor/default.htm
Federal Bureau of Investigation
Central Intelligence Agency
National Archive of Criminal Justice Data
Knowledge Solutions Library
www.corpus-delicti.com/ks_library/
The Home Office
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/index.htm
Scottish Criminal Records Office
Scottish Prison Service
Forensic Linguistics
www.crimelibrary.com/forensics/literary/
Bibliography of Handwriting Analysis
www.birmingham.ac.uk/english/bibliography/handwriting/hwbiblio/history.htm
Criminal Profiling Archive
www.corpus-delicti.com/prof_archives.html
Serial killers Research Resources
http://www.mayhem.net/Crime/serial.html
http://www.tdl.com/~kitty/crimes.html
Stalking
http://www.stalkingbehavior.com/
Eyewitness research
http://www-psy.ucsd.edu/~eebbesen/confidence.htm
http://www.libfind.unl.edu/psylaw/eye.txt
http://visualexpert.com/resources/mistakenid.html
Bibliography of eyewitness studies
http://www.libfind.unl.edu/psylaw/eye.txt
Date rape
http://www.zip.com.au/~korman/rape/controversy/
Elder abuse
http://www.cyberbeach.net/~seac/eldabuse.htm
Domestic violence against men:
http://www.vix.com/menmag/fiebertg.htm
http://www.vix.com/men/domestic-index.html
Forensic Psychology Books
www.psycom.net/bookstore.forensic.html
FORENSIC VIDEOS: The popularity of forensic psychology has
seen a rise in the number of television documentaries relating to this subject.
A selection of videos dealing with subjects such as profiling, serial killers
etc are have been recorded and are available for
viewing within the university. These videos cannot be taken out directly by
students but we can arrange for a video to be shown if there is sufficient
interest. Obviously in terms of administration, we would appreciate if students
organised themselves into small groups if they wish
to view any of the videos. At present we are compiling a list of forensic based
videos which on completion we will be distributed in class. If you wish to
watch any of the videos, try to form a group with other students and then
contact a member of staff to arrange a suitable viewing time.
Forensic Psychology Reading List by Topic
There are innumerable references for an area as broad as
Forensic Psychology. The general forensic texts (above) cover the major issues
and definitions. However, below are listed some more specific texts and journal
articles for specific areas covered in this course.
The books and articles should all be available from the
library. However, if you encounter items listed which are not in the library,
please contact either Joy Aked or David Main.
General Introduction
Otto, R.K. (2002) The Practice of Forensic Psychology: a
look towards the future in light of the past. American Psychologist 57(1) 5-18
Forensic Linguistic references
Baker, J.C., (1988). Pace: A test of Authorship Based on the Rate at which New Words Enter an Authors Text.
Literary and Linguistic Computing,Vol3(1), 1-3.
Damerau, F.J. (1975). The Use of Function Word Frequencies as Indicators of Style.
Computers and the Humanities, Vol.9, 271-280.
Canter, D. (1992). An evaluation of the “Cusum” Stylistic Analysis of Confessions. Expert
Evidence, 1, 93-99.
Gudjonsson, G. H. and Haward, L.R.C. ( 1998). Forensic Psychology. A Guide to Practice.
Routledge.
In particular, Chapter 7.
Hardcastle, R.A. (1993). Forensic
Linguistics: an assessment of the CUSUM method for the determination of
authorship. Journal of Forensic Science Society, Vol. 33(2), 95-106.
Hilton, M.L. & Holmes, D.I. (1993).
An Assessment of Cumulative Sum Charts for Authorship Attribution. Literary and Linguistic Computing, Vol 8.
No. 2, 73-80.
Kenny, A. (1982). The Computation of
Style. Chapter 1- The Statistical Study of Literary Style.
Kniffka, H. (1996) Recent Developments in forensic Linguistics.
Peter Lang
McMenamin, G.R. (2002). Forensic Linguistics. Advances in Forensic
Linguistics. CRC Press.
Michaelson, S. & Morton, A.Q.(1972). Last Words. A test of Authorship of Greek Writers. New Testament
Studies, 18, 192-208.
Morton, A.Q. (1991). The Scientific Testing
of Utterance. Journal of the Law Society of Scotland, September, 1991.
Morton, A.Q. & Farringdon, M.G.
(1992). Identifying Utterance. Expert Evidence,
1,84-92.
Morton, A.Q. & Michaelson, S.
(1990). The Qsum Plot.
Internal report no. CSR-3-90, Department of Computing
Science, University of Edinburgh.
Morris, R.N.(2000) Forensic
Handwriting Identification. Academic Press.
Nickell, J. (1996). Detecting Forgery. Forensic Investigation
of Documents. University Press of Kentucky.
Oakman, (1980). Computers in Literary research.
Chapter 7 – Stylistic Analysis.
Sanford, A.J., Aked, J.P., Moxey, L.M. and Mullin, J. (1994). A
critical examination of assumptions underlying the cusum
technique of forensic linguistics. Forensic
Linguistic. International Journal of Speech, Language and the Law, Vol.1
(2), 150-167.
Smith, M.W.A. (1987). Hapax Legomena in Prescribed Positions: An Investigation of
Recent Proposals to Resolve Problems of Authorship. Literary and Linguistic
Computing, Vol 2, No. 3, 145-151.
Smith, M.W.A.(1989). Forensic stylometry. A theoretical basis for further developments of practical methods.
Journal of the Forensic Science society, Vol.29(1),
15-33.
Stratil, M. & Oakley, R.J. (1988). A Disputed Authorship Study of
Two Plays attributed to Tirso de Molina. Literary and
Linguistic Computing, Vol 3,,
153-160.
Totty,R.N.,
Hardcastke, R.A. & Pearson, J. (1987). Forensic
Linguistics: The Determination of Authorship from habits of style Journal of
the Forensic Science Society, Series A, 27, 13-28.
Profiling references
Books specifically on profiling
Ainsworth, P. (2001) Offender Profiling
and Crime Analysis. Willan
Publishers.
Canter, D. & Alison, L. (1999). Profiling
in Policy and Practice. Ashgate Publishing.
Cook, S. (2001). The Real Cracker. Investigating the Criminal Mind. Channel 4 Books, Macmillan.
Holmes, R.M. and Holmes, S.T. (1996).
Profiling Violent Crimes. Theory,
Research and Practice. John Wiley and Sons.
Turvey, B. (1999). Criminal Profiling. Academic Press
Journal articles
Canter, D. (1989) Offender Profiles. The
Psychologist. 2(1) 12-16
Canter, D. V. & Heritage, R. (1990) A
multivariate model of sexual offence behaviour:
Developments in offender profiling. Journal of Forensic
Psychiatry. P185-212
Canter,D.
& Fritzon, K. (1998). Differentiating
arsonists: A model of firesetting actions and
characteristics. Legal and Criminological Psychology, Vol. 3,73-96.
Canter, D. & Gregory, A. (1994). Identifying
the residential location of rapists. Journal of the Forensic Science
Society, Vol. 34, 169-175.
Canter,D.
& Larkin,P. (1993). The
environmental
Douglas, J.E. & Munn, C. (1992).
Violent Crime Scene Analysis. Modus
Operandi, Signature and Staging. FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, Vol61(2), 1-10.
Gerbeth, V. J. (1981). Psychological Profiling. Law and Order, 29, 46-52.
Gerbeth, V.J. (1986). Mass, serial
and Sensational Homicides: The Investigative Perspective.
Hazelwood, R.R., Dietz, P.E. & Warren,
J, (1992). The Criminal Sexual Sadist. FBI Law
Enforcement Bulletin, 61,(2),12-20.
Homant, R.J, & Kennedy, D.B. (1998). Psychological
Aspects of Crime Scene Profiling. Criminal Justice and Behaviour, 25,(3), 319-343.
Knight, R.A., Warren, J. I., Reboussin, R. & Soley, B. J.
(1998). Predicting Rapist Type from crime scene
variables. Criminal Justice and Behaviour, 25,
(1), 46-80.
Linley, A.P. (2002) Expert
Psychological Analysis: Interview with Paul Britton. Psych-talk, 35, p4-14
McCann, J.T. (1992). Criminal Personality Profiling in the
Investigation of Violent Crime: Recent Advances and Future Directions. Behavioural Sciences and the Law, 10, 475-481.
Pinizzotto, A.J.(1984).
Forensic Psychology: Criminal Personality Profiling. Journal of Police Science
and Administration, 12,(1), 32-40.
Pinizzotto, A.J.
Ressler, K.R., Burges, A.W. & Douglas, J.E.
(1983). Rape and Rape-Murder: One Offender and Twelve Victims. American
Journal of Psychiatry, 140 (1), 36-40.
Vorpagel, R.E. (1982). Painting Psychological Profiles: Charlatanism, Coincidence,
Charisma, Chance or a New Science. Police Chief, Jan 1982,156-159.
Serial and Mass Murder:
Academic texts on serial killers are quite abundant. An
early example is Holmes & De Burger (1988) This
work is presently available in an updated form written by Holmes and Holmes
(1998). Another good example of this type of work is David Lester’s
“Serial Killers”. Joel Norris’s
“Serial Killers” although published as a “True Crime” book
is an exploration of the potential causes of serial murder. However, it is
hampered by a lack of any references. Work on Psychopaths by
e.g. Bob Hare provide useful information on some aspects of serial
killers. Krafft Ebbing’s
book, Psychopathia Sexualis
includes 237 case histories. It was written at the end of the 19th century, but
the cases that consider “lustmurder” sadism
and fetishism show parallels and similarities to aspects of modern studies of
serial killers.
Relevant journal articles are published within a variety of
disciplines e.g.; psychology, psychiatry, sociology, legal and law enforcement
periodicals.
References:
Books and book chapters:
Brady,
Cameron, D & Frazer, E. (1987) The
Lust to Kill.
Egger,
Godwin, G.M. (2000) Hunting Serial
Predators: A Multivariate Classification Approach to Profiling Violent Behaviour.
Hare, R.D. (1993/1999) Without Conscience: The Disturbing
World of Psychopaths Among Us.
Harrower, J. (1998) Applying Psychology to
Crime. (Chapter 3).
Hickey, E.W. (1997) Serial Murderers and
their victims.
Holmes, R.M. & De Burger, J. (1988) Serial Murder,
Holmes, R.M. & Holmes, S.T. (1998)
Serial Murder (2nd edit)
Krafft-Ebing R.Von. (1886/1997) Psychopathia Sexualis: The Case
Histories.
Lester, D (1995) Serial Killers: The Insatiable Passion,
Norris, J (1988/1997) Serial Killers: The Growing Menace,
Ressler, R Burgess, A. & Douglas, J. (1988)
Sexual Homicide: Patterns and Motives.
Sears, D.J. (1991) To Kill Again: The Motivation and
Development of Serial Murder (Chapter 4 – “Psychological
explanations” p55-77)
Simon, R. I. (1996) Bad Men Do What Good Men Dream: A
Forensic Psychiatrist Illuminates the Darker Side of Human Behaviour.
(Chapter 11) Washington, American Psychiatric Press
Journal articles:
Baeza, J.J. & Brent, E.T.
(1999) Sadistic Behaviour: A literature Review.
Published online at: www.corpus-delicti.com/sadisitic_behavior.html
Brittain, R.P. (1970) The Sadistic Murderer. Medicine, Science
and the Law. Vol. 10, p198-207
Dietz, P (1986) Mass, Serial and Sensational Homicides.
Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, Vol.62, p477-491
Hale, R (1993) The Application of Learning Theory to Serial
Murder: “You Too Can Learn to be a Serial Killer”. American
Journal of Criminal Justice. Vol. XVII (2) p37-45
Hazelwood, R.R. & Douglas, J.E. (1980) The Lust Murderer. FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, Vol. 49(4)
p18-22
Holmes, R.M. & Holmes, S.T. (1992)
Understanding Mass Murder: A Starting Point. Federal
Probation. Vol.56 (1) P 53-61
Jenkins, P. (1990) Sharing Murder: Understanding Group
Serial Homicides. Journal of Crime & Justice, Vol. 12 p125-148
Leibman, F.H. (1989) Serial
Murderers: Four Case Histories. Federal Probation. Vol 53(4) P41-45
Liebert, J.A. (1985) Contributions of Psychiatric Consultation in the
Investigation of Serial Murder. International Journal
of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology. Vol. 29, P 187-200
MacCulloch, M.J., Snowden, P.R.,
Wood, P.J.W. & Mills, H.E. (1983) Sadistic Fantasy, Sadistic Behaviour and Offending, British Journal of Psychiatry 143,
p20-29
Money, J. (1990) Forensic Sexology: Paraphilic
Serial Rape (Biastophilia) and Lust Murder (Erotophonophilia). American Journal of
Psychotherapy. Vol. XLIV (1) p26-36
Prentky, R.A., Burgess, A.W., Rokous, F. Lee, A. Hartman, C. Ressler,
R. & Douglas, J. (1989) The Presumptive Role of Fantasy in Serial Sexual
Homicide. American Journal of Psychiatry, 146:7 p887-891
**Promish, D.I. & Lester, D.
(1999) Classifying Serial Killers. Forensic Science International, vol.105,
p155-159.
Rappaport, R.G. (1988) The Serial and Mass Murderer: Patterns, Differentiation,
Pathology. American Journal of Forensic Psychiatry, Vol. 9(1) p39-48
Wertham, F. (1937) The Catathymic Crisis. Archives of Neurology & Psychiatry. Vol. 37, p974-978
Williamson, S, Hare, R.D. & Wong, S (1987) Violence:
Criminal Psychopaths and their Victims. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science. Vol. 19 (4), p455-462
** = also available through www.sciencedirect.com
Erotomania and Stalking
Books and book chapters:
Boon, J.C.W. & Sheridan, L. (Eds) (2002) Stalking and Psychosexual Obsession.
John Wiley & Sons
Enoch, M.D. & Trethowan,
W. (1991) De Clérambault’s Syndrome, in
“Uncommon Psychiatric Syndromes”,
Meloy, J. R. (Ed) (1998) The Psychology of Stalking.
Mullen, P.E, Pathé,
M. & Purcell, R. (2000) Stalkers and their Victims.
Simon, R. I. (1996) Bad Men Do What Good Men Dream: A
Forensic Psychiatrist Illuminates the Darker Side of Human Behaviour.
(Chapter 3) Washington, American Psychiatric Press
Journal articles and book chapters:
Brenner, M. (1991) Erotomania.
Vanity Fair. V54 (9) p86-93, 142-149
Emerson, R. M., Ferris, K.O. & Brooks
Gardner, C. (1998) On Being Stalked. Social Problems,
V45, p289-314 Lovett Doust, J.W. & Christie, H. (1978) The
Pathology of Love: Some Clinical Variants of De Clérambault’s
Syndrome. Social Science and Medicine, Vol. 12 p.99-106
Meloy, J.R. (1999) Stalking an Old
Behaviour, a New Crime. Psychiatric Clinics of North
America 22, p85-99
Meloy, J.R. (1999) Erotomania, Triangulation, and Homicide. Journal
of Forensic Sciences. V44, p421-424
Mullen, P.E. & Pathé, M., The Pathological Extensions of Love. British Journal of
Psychiatry 1994, 165, p614-623
Mullen, P.E., Pathé, M., Purcell,
R & Stuart, G.W. (1999) Study of Stalkers, American Journal of Psychiatry,
156, p.1244-1249
Mullen, P.E., Pathé,
M., Purcell, R (2000) Stalking. The Psychologist.
V13 ,9 p454-459
** Westrup, D. & Fremouw, W.J. (1998) Stalking Behaviour:
A Literature Review and Suggested Functional analytic Assessment Technology.
Aggression and Violent Behaviour Vol. 3(3) p 255-274
Wright, J.A., Burgess, A.G., Burgess,
A.W., Laszlo, A.T., McCrary, G.O., &
** = also available through www.sciencedirect.com
The Stockholm Syndrome
Books and book chapters:
Graham, D.L.R., Rawlings, E.I. & Rigsby,
R.K. (1994) Loving to Survive: Sexual Terror, Men’s
Violence and Woman’s Lives.
McGuire, C. & Norton, C. (1990/1992)
Perfect Victim.
Scheflin, A.W. & Opton, E.M. (1978) The Mind
Manipulators. (Patty Hearst, p63-85),
Journal articles:
Auerbach, S.M & Kieser, D.J
(1994) Interpersonal Impacts and Adjustment to the Stress of Simulated
Captivity: An Empirical Test of the Stockholm Syndrome.
Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology. Vol.13(2) P207-221
^^Fuselier, D. (1999) Placing the
Stockholm Syndrome in Perspective. FBI Law Enforcement
Bulletin 68 (7) p22-25
Gachnochi, G. & Skurnik, N. (1992) The paradoxical
effects of hostage-taking. International Social Science
Journal. 44(2) p235-246
Hillman, R.G. (1981) The Psychopathology
of Being Held Hostage. American Journal of Psychiatry.
V138 (9) P1193-1197
Ochberg, F. (1978) The Victim of Terrorism: Psychiatric Considerations. Terrorism. V1 (2) p147-168
Pearn, J. (2000) Traumatic Stress
Disorders: A Classification with Implications for Prevention and Management. Military Medicine. 165. P434-440
Strentz, T. (1980) The Stockholm Syndrome: Law Enforcement Policy and Ego Defences of the Hostage. Annals of the
Turner, J.T. (1985) Factors Influencing
the Development of the Hostage Identification Syndrome. Political
Psychology, Vol. 6(4) P705-711
Wesselius, C.L. & DeSarno, J.V. (1983) The Anatomy
of a Hostage Situation. Behavioural Sciences and the Law. V1 (2) P33-45
Jury Decision Making
Books and book chapters:
Ainsworth, P.B (2000) Psychology and Crime: Myths and
Realities. (Chapter 7)
Brehm, S.S. & Kassin, S.M. (1996) Social
Psychology. 3rd Edition. (Chapter 12)
Harrower, J (1998) Applying Psychology to
Crime. (Chapter 7)
Hastie, R. (1993) Inside the
Juror.
Howitt, D. (2002) Forensic &
Criminal Psychology. (Chapters 18 & 19).
Kapardis, A. (1999) Psychology and Law.
Myers, D.G. (1994) Exploring Social Psychology. (module 20)
Stephenson, G.M. (1992) The
Psychology of Criminal Justice. (Chapter 10)
Wescott, H. & Davies, G. (2001). Children’s Testimony. Wiley.
Journal articles:
Dane, F.C. & Wrightsman,
L.S. (1982) Effects of Defendants' and Victims' Characteristics on Jurors
Verdicts. In The Psychology of the Courtroom.
Edited by Kerr, N.L. & Bray, R.M. p83-115.
**Gaines, D.M., Brown, D.C. & Doyle, J.K. (1996) A
Computer Simulation Model of Juror Decision Making. Expert Systems With Applications. Vol. 11, p13-28
Kaplan, M.F. (1977) Discussion Polarization Effects in a
Modified Jury Decision Paradigm: Informational Influences. Sociometry. V40 (3) p262-271
Kerr, N.L. (1978) Beautiful and Blameless: Effects of Victim
Attractiveness and Responsibility on Mock Jurors' Verdicts. Personality
and Social Psychology Bulletin. V4 (3) p479-482
Macrae, C. N. , Milne, A. B. &
Griffiths, R. J. (1993) Counterfactual Thinking and the perception of criminal behaviour. British Journal of Psychology 84, p221-226
Pennington, N. & Hastie, R.
(1992) Explaining the Evidence: Tests of the Story Model for Juror Decision
Making. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
V62 (2) p189-206
Sigall, H. & Ostrove, N. (1975) Beautiful but Dangerous: Effects of
Offender Attractiveness and Nature of the Crime on Juridic
Judgement. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. V31 (3)
p410-414
Spellman, B. A. & Kincannon,
A. (2001) The Relation Between Counterfactual (“but
for”) and Causal Reasoning: Experimental Findings and Implications of
Jurors’ Decisions. Available online at:
http://www.law.duke.edu/journals/64LCPSpellman.
** = also available through www.sciencedirect.com
^ ^ = also available online via infotrac
(library resource)
Poster Assessment Exercise
(See section in this booklet on the Poster project for a
reading list)
Seminar 1 – Forensic Linguistic Techniques for
Authorship Identification
Learning outcomes for this seminar are:
· to give you first hand knowledge
of psycholinguistic techniques which have been used in authorship
identification
· to illustrate how important it is
for a technique to be tested and validated before it is used in the courts.
· to provide examples of these
techniques in the context of case studies
·. to offer experience in the
identification of style markers for the purposes of authorship identification.
In this seminar, we are going to examine two types of
techniques which have been used for the purposes of authorship identification.
The first method we will examine is called the Cumulative Sum technique and it
was originally proposed by Morton and Michaelson
(1990). The second method of authorship identification which we will examine in
this seminar has come to be known as Forensic Stylistics. (McMenamin,
2002)
The Cusum Technique
According to its authors, the Cumulative sum technique was
capable of determining whether a piece of text was written by one, or more than one author.
Morton claimed that the Cusum
Technique, as it became known, was capable of separating individuals by their
writing styles with Forensic accuracy (Morton & Michaelson,
1990, Morton, 1991). The practical importance of this claim meant that during
the early 1990’s Morton’s services were
sought in many cases of legal disputed authorship, for example, in the case of
Carl Bridgewater, and the appeal of the Birmingham Six. Later in the
1990’s however, this technique fell into disrepute, due to research that
suggested that it was not measuring what it claimed to measure.
The Cusum technique requires
plotting the cumulative sum of the differences between a series of
observations, and the average of those observations. These “observations”
may be any set of variables in the text. The basic measurement, to which all
others are compared, is the number of words in each sentence, or sentence
length. Morton uses sentence length, since he claims that this is the basic
unit of language. Variables with which sentence length is compared include
· number of 2 or 3 letter words
· number of intial
vowel words
· number of nouns
· number of verbs
· number of prepositions
Once the variable has been chosen, the Cusum
Calculation is as follows:
1. Choose a block of sentences of a set length, (no less
than 15 sentences).
2. Record the sentence length. or
number of words in each sentence.(sl)
3. Find the average length of sentence for the block by
dividing the total number of words, by the number of sentences
4. Subtract this average in turn from the number of words in
each sentence.
5. Add these differences in succession to obtain the cusum values.(Last value should be
0)
These cusum values can then be
plotted against sentence number and then the same procedure can be carried out
for one of the “habit” variables chosen from the text, say 2 and 3
letter words.
Once the cusum plot has been
obtained for the second variable, the y-axis of the second graph is adjusted so
that it is comparable with the sentence length plot( by dividing the range of
the sl graph by the range of the other variable, and
multiplying the second variable by this number) The two graphs can then be
superimposed.
Claims made for the Cusum
Technique
The cusum technique as a whole is
therefore a comparison of two cusum plots of
different variables.
Morton claimed then, that it is the constancy of the ration
of sl to the other variable
in an individual which will give the graphs a close fit. If on the other hand,
the text is written by more than one person, who have ratios which differ from
each other, the cusum plot will become distorted with
the two curves separating. In the seminar, we will show you this, as applied to
the case study of Derek Bentley.
Forensic Stylistics
Forensic Stylistics is the application of linguistic
stylistics to the forensic context,(McMenamin 2002), the forensic context primarily being in
the case of questioned authorship. By examining scientifically the patterns of
variation, or style of written language, we can take advantage of the fact that
no two writers of a language write in exactly the same way.
Typically, in cases of questioned authorship, there is a
piece of writing which needs to be compared or contrasted with a known writing
of one or more candidate authors. An analysis is carried out which examines the
writing style of all available questioned or known writings, with three
purposes in mind:
the determination of resemblance of
questioned writings to a common canon of known writings
elimination or identification of
one or more suspect authors
inconclusive with respect to the
data that neither support elimination or identification
(McMenamin,2002,163)
Form this description of Forensic Stylistics,
it should now be obvious, that we have a prime candidate for the use of this
type of technique, n the subject of your assessment, the Jack the Ripper
letters.
The seminar will introduce you to the concept of Style
Markers which could be applied to the Ripper letters.
A primary stylistic method which is applied in cases of
questioned authorship, is the identification of style
markers, which can take a number of different types of forms:
· Text format e.g. layout, spacing, margins
· Numbers and Symbols e.g. numerals instead of words
· Abbreviations e.g. with or without apostrophe,
non-standard abbreviations
· Punctuation e.g. intrusive commas, spaces around full stop
· Capitalization e.g. absent in names or titles, capitals
applied to a word
· Word Formation e.g. creation of new compound with hyphen
· Spelling e.g. alternate spelling choice
· Syntax e.g. rhetorical questions
· Errors or Corrections e.g. cross-outs
· Discourse e.g. distinctive text openings
· High Frequency words of phrases e.g. frequent use of
closed couplets
(See McMenamin, 2002, Ch11, for
full explanation)
The most important thing to note about the use of style
markers for authorship identification is that unique markers are extremely
rare, so authorship identification requires the identification of an aggregate
of markers, each of which may be found in other writers, but all of which would
unlikely be present together in any other writer.
Seminar procedure
During the first part seminar, you will be shown a worked
example of a cusum analysis and you will be asked to
make a judgment, as to whether it is a piece of text written by one, or more
than one individual according to this technique We will also discuss the
drawbacks of this method and think about some of the issues which have been
raised in the literature which affect its validity.
The second half of the seminar will focus on a practical
application of forensic stylistics. You will be given a list of style markers
and asked to assess the range of stylistic variation in two pieces of text
(assumed to be by Derek Bentley, which we used for the cusum
analysis.) In this way, you should be familiar with some of the techniques used
and be able to apply them to the Ripper Texts for your assessment.
Before the seminar, you must read some of the references
pertaining to both the Cusum technique and Forensic
Stylistics.
The main references for these are:
McMenamin, G. (2002). Forensic
Linguistics: Advances in Forensic Stylistics. CRC Press.
Especially Chapters 9, 10 and 11.
Morton and Michaelson
(1990). The Qusum Plot .
Internal report no. CSR-3-90, Department of Computing
Science,
Sanford, A.J., Aked, J.P., Moxey, L.M. and Mullin, J. (1994). A
critical examination of assumptions underlying the cusum
technique of forensic linguistics. Forensic
Linguistic. International Journal of Speech, Language and the Law, Vol.1
(2), 150-167.
In addition, think about the following questions:
· What assumptions are made about the “habits”
used in this technique, about an individual? (Think about individual
differences – between and within subject)
· What problems arise when interpreting the cusum curve?
· According to Morton, the cusum
technique can be used to examine speech or writing. What problems might arise
when examining excerpts of speech?
· What other variables might affect how a piece of text is
written?
· Is statistical analysis necessary to measure variation in
written language?
Seminar 2- Psychological Profiling
Criminal personality profiling has been transformed over the
last 30 or so years, from the fiction of detective novels to the fact of
trained psychological profilers.
Psychological profiling is a label given to the process by
which a trained forensic psychologist sifts through all the aspects of the
crime scene in order to develop a description of the personality of the
perpetrator. It is an educated attempt to provide investigative agencies with
specific information as to the type of individual who committed a certain
crime. It is the behaviour of the perpetrator at the
crime scene, rather than the offence per se, which determines the suitability
of a case for profiling.
Profiling does not produce a name. What it does produce is a
detailed personality profile of a perpetrator, which investigators can use to
focus an investigation and pare down the list of suspects.
The aims of this seminar are as follows:
· to encourage you use your time
profitably in the preparation week prior to this seminar, in order to become
familiar with the process of criminal profiling.
· to use the information you have
gleaned during your preparation week in order to profile a case for yourselves.
· to provide you with a deeper
knowledge of the conceptual underpinnings of profiling.
During your Preparation week, you will have read papers that
outline the type of information needed to compile a psychological profile. You
should therefore be well versed in this type of information and be aware of
what it can tell you about the perpetrator of a crime. Remember, once the
information pertaining to the crime has been collected, (the WHAT), the
profiler attempts to determine the WHY of the crime, that is, the motivation
for each crime scene detail and for the crime itself. The basic premise of
profiling is that if the WHAT and the WHY of the crime can be determined, then
the WHO will follow. In this seminar, you will in a small way, attempt to solve
a WHAT + WHY = WHO equation.
Seminar procedure:
In groups of 3 or 4, you will be given out a case study to
read carefully.
You will then be asked to cover the case study and
individually (a) write down all the details which you feel are necessary and
important to be used in writing a profile of the type of person which would
commit such an act and (b) write down why you think these details are
important. In other words, what these details tell you about the person who
committed the crime.
In your group, compile a victimology.
- including age, sex, race, physical description, marital status, intelligence,
adjustment, life-style, recent changes in life style, personality style,
residency (present and former), sexual adjustment, occupation(past and
present), medical history, personal habits, hobbies, friends, enemies
In your group, you will then be asked to fill out a multiple
choice question sheet consisting of questions about the suspect. These
questions will relate to the suspects age, gender, race, occupation etc.
Finally, within your group, you will be asked to compile a
profile of the suspect, and this will be compared, along with your multiple
choice questionnaire, to the characteristics of the known suspect.
In order for this procedure to work, and for you to gain any
insight into the process of profiling it is imperative that you steep yourself
in the literature on profiling in the learning week prior this seminar.
Multiple choice questionnaire
Is the suspect male or female? _________________
Is the suspect married or single? _________________
What age range is the suspect in?
20-30_____30-40_____40-50_____50-60______
What is the race of the suspect?
____________________________________________________
What is the educational background of the suspect?
_______________________________
What is the suspect’s
intelligence? Below Average? __Average?
__Above Average? __
Where does the suspect live?
________________________________________________________
Is there evidence of a psychosexual element to the crime?
Yes/No___________________
What is the victim-offender relationship?
_________________________________________
Who is the intended victim of the crime?
__________________________________________
Is it likely that the offender has committed similar crimes
in the past? Yes/No____
If yes, is there a specific Modus Operandi for the crime?
___________________________
Was the crime premeditated or spontaneous?
______________________________________
Is it likely that the offender will commit similar crimes in
the future? Yes/No____
What is the likely motive for the crime?
____________________________________________
Who do you think committed the crime?
____________________________________________
FACES Seminars:
The aim of these semiar/practicals
is to introduce some aspects of the psychology of eyewitness testimony and to
provide an opportunity for you to learn
how to operate and work with the FACES 3.0 software, which is available on all
the computers in labs F333 & F337.
You will all have seen at sometime an image of a suspect in
a police investigation, produced in newspapers or TV programmes.
There are a number of different ways that these images can be produced, ranging
from an artists impression, to line drawings up to photographic constructions.
There are numerous versions of these face production kits e.g. Photofit, Identikit, Efit and FACES. This
technique was an attempt to move away from an artists
impression (described by a witness or victim) towards a more empirical
construction of images of the human face. Originally these techniques used
selections of pieces of card which slotted together to produce a face. With the
advent of computer technology this process can now be produced much more quickly
and more realistically (no noticeable gaps between cards) than before. There
are a number of these electronic face construction programs in use by police
forces around the world. FACES is one such program,
although it is predominantly used by North American police forces at the
present time.) Within Forensic psychology there has been an ongoing program of
research into the production and use of these techniques from the 1970’s
onward and remains an important aspect of eyewitness testimony research within
the area of cognitive psychology in general.
In the first seminar is designed to introduce you to the
software. The actual class will consist of:
A brief demonstration of how to use the FACES program
Hands-on experience in constructing a face (of someone you
know well)
“Homework” – You
will each be given the name of a well known individual. Your task is to use the
FACES program to produce a facial picture of that person (without looking at a
photograph), and submit your work (FACES has a
alphanumeric code which can be cut and pasted into an e-mail) to David Main
(main-as0@wpmail.paisley.ac.uk) by the Monday of the following week. This
information is needed for the second seminar on FACES.
Running the FACES program:
From the Windows Start menu find the InterQuest
folder (it may be in within the programs folder). When this is selected the
FACES program icon will appear, click on this to start the program. You will be
presented with a blank white window on the left of the screen. It is usually
advised to start with the Eyes of the subject you are trying to create, so
click on the Eyes icon in the middle of the screen. A set of eyes will now be
visible in the right hand window. You can navigate through the different eyes
either screen by screen, by using the arrows beneath the right hand window, or
you can use the general types of eyes menu by clicking on the small arrow
located at the top right of the features (right hand) window. Find a rough
approximation of the eyes you want and click on them. You will now see the eyes
you selected appear in the left hand window. Notice the two sets of arrows
beneath the trashcan icon in the centre of the screen, these can be used to
widen or narrow the space between the eyes. Try moving them
about. Note that each facial feature may have different options
available for movement. E.g. noses can be moved up or down the face and resized
(made smaller or bigger). If you are not happy with the eyes you have chosen
simply click on another set of eyes and they will be replaced by your new
selection. You can undo anything you have done in your composition, so don’t be afraid to experiment with a few different
possibilities as your face starts to take shape. Once you have the eyes you
want try finding an upper head for your face using the same techniques. Then go
on to put in a lower jaw, nose and mouth. This will give you a basic face. Next
put in some eyebrows and then proceed to give your face some “character”
by inserting facial lines, and shadows before finally putting some hair on to
your creation. (NB there is less choice in hair style than the other features
and this is a slight weakness of this version of the software – Police
versions have more options). If you wish to remove a feature completely, e.g.
if you have put a pair of glasses on your face that you now want to remove,
then just click on the icon for Glasses so that it is highlighted, then click
on the Trashcan and the glasses will disappear.
Don’t be disheartened if you
initially can not get the face you are trying for, this is a skill that needs
practice, so just keep trying and it will eventually start to come together.
Handing in work for the following week’s
seminar:
Give yourself 30-40 minutes to get to grips with the
workings of the FACES program and produce the face suggested at the start of
the class. When you have accomplished this, either Joy or myself
will give you a small slip of paper which contains the name of well known
person. For the purposes of this practical this could include, actors/actresses,
singers, politicians, TV personalities or people who have been in the news over
the last few weeks. It is very important that you don’t
tell or let anyone else in the class see the name of the person you have been
given. Your task is to use FACES to produce an image of the named person and
save the image to file. Save your work, and copy the FACES InterCode
(27 letter and number characters) for the face you have constructed into an
e-mail.
You have until
Your name,
The name of the person who’s
face you have tried to draw
The 27 character FACES InterCode
for the face. (Ensure you have the full code)
You should try to draw the image from memory only (that is
what eyewitnesses and crime victims have to do). If you have to give up on this
and look at a picture of the named person then be strict with yourself and only
allow yourself a maximum of 2 minutes viewing time.
After midday on the following Monday, I will use the InterCodes to reconstruct the faces you created and then
compile a Powerpoint file which contains all the
faces you have submitted. I will supply a number to each of the received images.
I will then post this file on the Forensic Psychology
Blackboard site.
Make sure you log onto the blackboard site to view the Powerpoint file well before the second FACES seminar. On a
piece of paper, try to identify the famous people your classmates have drawn
(at least you should recognise your own effort!) Note
down the name of the person you think it might be beside the images identifying
number. Bring this piece of paper with you to the second FACES seminar.
Aside from looking at the “artwork” you have
produced the second seminar will consider the serious issues of face
recognition relating to Forensic Psychology and Eyewitness Testimony. E.g. try to appreciate how a witness who got
a fleeting glance at a suspect might feel when asked by the police to
reconstruct a face using a package such as FACES. There are a number of papers on this area
listed below, which you should read to get a grasp on the ideas and problems
involved in designing, understanding and using composite face production packages.
The actual practical should be quite an enjoyable
experience, and for third year students it may offer some possible ideas for
dissertation projects. Remember that the FACES software could be used in a
variety of projects both within and out-with Forensic
Psychology. For example, A project on person perception where you construct one
face then systematically vary it by e.g. changing the hairstyle, adding lines,
moving the eyes further apart or the raising/lowering the brow of the face and
then get subjects to rate the resulting faces on attractiveness,
trustworthiness etc. A similar technique could be used on a project on the
effect of attractiveness on Jury decision making or sentencing by varying a
face and attaching a print out of it to scenarios of court cases.
Lab availability:
In order to complete the task for the second FACES seminar
you will have to use the FACES software. This package is only available on the
machines in Labs F333 & F337. Check the Timetables outside the lab doors to
see when the labs are not being used for classes and work on your project in
the numerous free slots between booked classes.
If the rooms are locked see the Alec the technician who is
based in the room adjoining F337, and he will unlock them for you.
There are many Forensic texts which consider the wide field
of eyewitness testimony. Some of these texts provide useful information on face
recognition research. See for example:
Wells, G. & Loftus, E. (Eds.) (1984) - Eyewitness Testimony: Psychological
Perspectives.
Some useful Journal articles:
Christie, D & Ellis, H. (1981) Photofit
Constructions Versus Verbal Descriptions of Faces.
Journal of Applied Psychology, 66, p358-363
Clifford, B., R. & Hollin, C., R. (1981)
Effects of the Type of Incident and the Number of Perpetrators on Eyewitness
Memory. Journal of Applied Psychology, 66, p364-370
Davies, G. Ellis, H. & Shepherd, J.
(1978) Face Recognition Accuracy as a Function of mode of Representation.
Journal of Applied Psychology 63 180-87
*Davies, G. van der Willik, P. & Morrison, L. (2000) Facial Composite
Production: Journal of Applied Psychology, 85 (1) p119-124
Ellis, H., Shepherd, J., & Davies, G.
(1975) An Investigation of the use of the Photofit
Technique for Recalling Faces. British Journal of Psychology 66, p29-37
*Ellis, H (1986) Face Recall: A Psychological Perspective.
Human Learning, 5, p189-96
*Ellis, H. Davies, G. & Shepherd, J. (1978) A Critical
Examination of the Photofit System. Ergonomics. 21. p297-307
Laughery, K. & Fowler, R. (1980) Sketch Artist and Identi-kit
Procedures for Recalling Faces. Journal of Applied
Psychology. 65, 307-316
McCloskey, M & Egeth, H. (1983) Eyewitness Identification: What can a Psychologist
Tell a Jury. American Psychologist, 38, 550-63
Shapiro, P. and Penrod,
S. (1986) Meta-analysis of Facial Identification Studies. Psychological Bulletin. 100, 139-56
* = In STL
Generally information on Face recognition can be found in
many Perception texts, see for example some of the links between Photofit work and Face Recognition in:
Rakover, S. (2001) – Face Recognition : Cognitive and Computational Processes. John Benjamins.
POSTER PROJECT: Assessed Classwork
Information on the production of a POSTER
based on a forensic linguistic investigation into letters supposedly written by
“Jack the Ripper”.
The production of this poster is the assessed piece of
coursework for Forensic Psychology.
Seminar on how to produce a poster: Week 2
Hand in date for the hypothesis you wish to test: Week 5
Hand-in date for your poster: Friday of Week 9
CONTENTS
Introduction to the concept of posters
The problem of hoax letters
The Whitechapel murders
Letters from the murderer?
Possible ways to approach your investigation
Possible Forensic Linguistic methods to use
Introduction to the concept of posters
You will all have had experience of writing essays and
practical reports. However, producing a poster is something that most of you
will have not encountered before. In academia, the dissemination of information
to fellow professionals is usually undertaken by a few basic methods. For
example, research findings can be presented by writing a paper for an academic
journal (similar to writing a practical report), or longer and more general
information may be produced in the form of a textbook (Some similarity to
essays and dissertations). Alternatively, research findings are presented at an
academic conference. Conference papers (similar to lectures/seminars) are given
verbally and are usually focused on the author’s
current research work. Conferences also afford the opportunity for researchers
to visually present their research findings using a poster. A poster is
typically a standard size piece of board which are either hung or placed upon
stands in the corridors or rooms where a conference is taking place. These
poster boards are used by researchers to provide a brief summation of the
salient points of their research. The elements that comprise a poster commonly
would look very much like the sections of a practical report, i.e. a title,
introduction, hypothesis, methods, results, discussion and conclusion.
Conference poster sessions are usually held in the corridors surrounding
conference lecture rooms and there are typically a large number of posters
being displayed at the same time and location. As the object of the poster is
to provoke interest and comment from those who are attending the conference,
posters have two major aspects to them. Firstly they must present the
information clearly and briefly enough for viewers to be able to “read”
them quickly and understand what the research is about and what the findings
are. Secondly, the poster must be “attractive” enough to attract the
initial interest of people who are browsing among many competing posters. In
this way a poster is similar to the function of an advertising billboard.
Peoples attention must be caught for long enough to entice them to read the
information on the product being advertised. In essence then, the poster can be
considered as a highly summarised practical report,
which must be carefully presented on a board in a manner that looks attractive
and interesting. Obviously, these two facets of the poster have to be balanced.
A poster that is crammed with text and information rarely looks attractive,
while equally a poster which may be well presented is nothing if it does not
contain good information.
Further information on producing posters will be given in
the Poster seminar.
The problem of hoax letters
High profile criminal cases, particularly those involving
serial offences where the perpetrator(s) is unknown often create a lot of media
coverage and public interest. Aside from attempting to investigate the actual
crime, the police also have to deal with information passed on from the public.
Sometimes this is in the form of useful information from someone who has
witnessed something or perhaps has some important knowledge about the crime or
the criminal. However, there are also those who send in hoax letters claiming
to be the perpetrator, or to implicate a named person as the guilty party. All
this correspondence has to be examined and the useful information sifted from
the hoaxes. This can prove to be an enormous strain on police resources as
facts have to be checked up upon and leads followed up. If a false or hoax
letter is mistakenly believed to be valid, the whole direction of a police
investigation can be changed with tragic consequences. An excellent example of
this occurred in the case of the Yorkshire Ripper in 1978 when two letters
posted in
More recently the sending of letters and packages
contaminated with Anthrax (see e.g. www.thetext.co.uk/anthrax.pdf
for a forensic linguistic analysis) have also been accompanied by a host of hoax
letters claiming to contain anthrax. Examining and testing these letters
obviously slows down the search for the real culprit(s) and was of serious
concern to those investigating the actual Anthrax letters.
What kind of person is likely to send hoax letters and why
they do it, is obviously a potentially interesting and useful area of research
for forensic psychology. However, for the purpose of this project we will
concern ourselves with using forensic linguistic techniques to examine some of
the letters concerning the Whitechapel murders. For
instance, were some of the letters written by the same person? Do any of the
letters that are known to have been written by suspects in the case have
anything in common with any of the “Jack the Ripper” letters available
to the police?
The Whitechapel murders
There is an enormous amount of literature on the Whitechapel murders. Much of it is unfortunately, highly
speculative or even misleading. Who actually committed the murders has never
been (and probably never will be) satisfactorily solved. There are almost as
many theories of the perpetrator’s identity as
there are theorists, and even now, well over a century after the events, there
are still many new books both “scholarly” and fictional on the
subject published every year. What we do know is that five prostitutes died
between
Name
Age
Time (approx)
Place
Mary Nichols
43
Fri 31st Aug
Buck’s row
Annie Chapman
47
Sat 8th Sep.
Yard of
Liz Stride
44
29th Sep
46
30th sep
Mitre Square
Mary Jane Kelly
25
9th Nov. 1-2 am
Miller’s court
Who Jack the Ripper was? Why did he kill these women? Why
did he mutilate the corpses? Had he killed others before or after the Whitechapel murders? Why did the killings suddenly stop?
These are all questions which remain unanswered. Students should try to read at
least one of books on the case (see reading list) to familiarise
themselves with the chronology and important points of the case.
Letters from the murderer?
During both the period when the Whitechapel
murders occurred and for some years afterwards, the police, the press and
certain individuals associated with the investigation received numerous letters
purporting to be written by the murderer. Indeed the title “Jack the
Ripper” was taken from one of those early letters. The amount of letters
that were sent certainly runs into the hundreds (many of which can be found in “Letters
from Hell” book in the short term loan section of the library).
Author and journalist, Donald McCormick, is one of a large
number of people who have written about the Ripper case (The Identity of Jack
the Ripper. 1959). Although much of his source material is suspect, he did pose
three pertinent questions about the Ripper letters:
Was Jack the letter-writer the East End Killer?
Was he a practical Joker?
Does his correspondence provide a clue as to his identity?
Even a cursory glance at some of the “Ripper” letters show that
they are unlikely to have been written by the genuine killer. However, one or
more may have been sent by the actual killer. Current thinking would suggest
that many of the early letters were hoaxes. Even the two most famous Ripper
letters, which are the first letter signed “Jack the Ripper” (NB this
was not the first letter claiming to be from the killer), and the “Saucy
Jack” postcard were probably written by an unscrupulous journalist. A favoured contender for a letter actually written by the
killer is the “From Hell” or “Lusk” letter that was sent
along with a piece of human kidney, supposedly taken from one of the
victims.
The increased probability of hoax letters that have
confusing similarities to earlier letters, occurs
because the police at one point in the investigation made poster sized
facsimiles of the first “Jack the Ripper” letter and the “Saucy
Jack” postcard. These were displayed publicly in an attempt to find anyone
who recognised the handwriting. Unfortunately, this
gave future hoax writers complete copies of letters which they believed the
police considered to have had been written by the murderer. Thus, later letters
often used similar styles to these publicly known letters or incorporated terms
of address such as “Dear boss” and signed off with the infamous
signature of “Jack the Ripper”. As the posters used actual
facsimiles, rather than transcriptions there was also the likelihood of some
hoaxers attempting to copy the original handwriting.
In nearly all the letters an analysis of the content shows
that the writer has not presented any evidence of knowledge of the crime scene
or murders that had not previously been available in the public press. Most
either reiterate these known “facts” or make vague claims about
future atrocities. Even those letters which potentially might be pertinent can
be considered as either coincidental, the product of a lucky guess, or fitting
the facts only by stretching the imagination.
Possible ways to approach your investigation
The first thing you need to do is read up on the subject.
Make use of the available literature on the Jack the Ripper case (even your
local public library may have some sources) and then focus on the letters
ascribed to him. Having thought about the case, you need to think of a
particular hypothesis that you can test. There is no point in just randomly
comparing a few of the letters. Which letters might conceivably have been
written by the same person? Do any of the Ripper letters show similarities with
letters accredited to potential suspects in the case? Etc. Whatever
you choose to investigate, you need to be able to justify why you chose the
particular items you have examined. You should also consider the depth of your poster’s focus. Are you attempting to look at a
particular aspect of the Whitechapel murders?
Alternatively, are you going to try to show some more general point about for
instance, investigating hoax letters, or the potential value of Forensic
Linguistics to this aspect of police investigations? Whichever format you
choose will make an impact on the way that you write your poster (particularly
in the introduction, discussion and conclusion).
Plan your poster carefully. You only have limited space on a
poster and you do not want to fill it completely with text. This does not mean
that you need to do less work! It does however require you to be able to
effectively summarise your information. Make use of
diagrams, tables and graphs to reduce or break up large blocks of text, while
retaining a format that is easily read and comprehended. When your poster is
near completion, you might want to try showing it to someone unconnected with
the Forensic Psychology course. If they can follow the point or argument you
present in the poster and understand your findings, then you are probably on
the right track. If they find it confusing or difficult to follow, then find out where the problem is and rewrite or organise the poster accordingly.
Note that certain aspects of the individual “Ripper”
letters need to be considered. For instance, there may have been a deliberate
attempt by the writer to disguise their handwriting, or to write in a style
that would indicate that the writer was for example illiterate or of a
particular nationality. Certain forensic linguistic techniques such as Cusum,
theoretically should not be effected by such devices but are problematic with
many of Ripper letters due to either the brevity of the communications or by
the lack of clear punctuation. If you use any technique that is dependent upon
punctuation, and a particular letter you are examining lacks proper or full
punctuation, then you may have to insert your own punctuation. (Or ask a panel
of five or so people to try and punctuate it and use the most agreed upon
punctuation) If you do this, you will need to note and justify this in your
poster and possibly attempt an analysis using an alternative technique or using
the same letter but with a different potential punctuation
Although there are transcriptions of most of the letters in
the “letters from Hell” book, you should try to work with originals
whenever possible. There are a number of reasons for this. 1) It lets you see
how difficult it is to work with primary source material, e.g. deciphering some
of the actual handwriting. 2) The lack of punctuation, spelling errors, changes
and deletions as well as additional drawings or doodles in many letters becomes
obvious 3) Relying on other people to transcribe the data can lead to errors.
For example in one famous Ripper letter (
POINTS TO REMEMBER:
The letters you choose to analyse
must have some logical reason for a comparison to be made. (I.e. you need to
submit a viable hypothesis.)
Your poster needs to find a good balance between content and
presentation.
Your poster should NOT attempt to simply write a “history”
of the Ripper case.
The poster content needs to be driven by the data you have analysed.
The Ripper case is still unsolved after over 100 years. DON’T aim to produce a project that will finally solve the Whitechapel murders.
Make full use of the collection of Ripper letters available
in Evans & Skinner (2001) “Jack the Ripper: Letters from Hell”
book, or from any other sources you can find.
DON’T draw wild conclusions that claim to have PROVED
anything. At best you might find that some texts may potentially have had a
single authorship.
Forensic Linguistic Analysis of Jack the Ripper Letters –
Possible methods
There are many forensic linguistic techniques that have been
researched and developed over the years, including the use of Corpus
linguistics, Readability Indices and Statistical techniques such as the use of
Cluster analysis and Factor Analysis. Many of these require a long text in
order to be reliable and valid, as well as particular tools and skills to carry
them out. In your analysis of the supposed Jack the Ripper letters, a feature
of these texts, like so many other criminal texts, is that they are often very
short, so techniques have had to be developed that take this into account. In
addition your analysis should use techniques that do not require any specific
equipment or software.
Possible Method 1: Stylometry
Stylometry, also known as
statistical stylistics, is the most frequent and simple type of
psycholinguistic analysis used in the
Under the heading of stylometry,
you should try one or more of following. (The depth and detail of your analysis
will determine whether you use all of these techniques, or focus on one).
Analysis of Open vs. Closed Class words (Subject matter words vs
Function words)
This would involve a classification of the words used in the
letters you choose as either open of closed class.(
this can be difficult as some words can be unspecific to each class) followed by a comparison of the incidence of
these between letters.
Comparison of lexical Vocabulary by Frequency
This would involve counting the top 10 most frequent words
in each text and looking at their concordance in the texts being compared.
Selective Analysis of Vocabulary
Lexical items in common
This would involve a set of comparisons of lexical items
within the texts e.g.
Lexical items in common between texts 1,2
and 3
Lexical items in common between texts 1 and 2
Lexical items in common between texts 1 and 3
Lexical items in common between texts 2 and 3
( A lexical item is the smallest
contrastive unit in a semantic system e.g. walked, walks, walking are all
lexical items of the verb to walk. However the idiom “kick the bucket”,
could also be seen as a lexical item
cy the above definition)
Unique words
This would involve identifying unique or unusual words which
seem to occur in a number of the texts being used for comparison.
Errors/ Repetitions/ Unusual word order
This would involve identifying the above features occurring
in a number of the texts being used for comparison.
Analysis of Type Token Ratio (TTR)
This would involve calculating the type token ratio
(calculated as a decimal, the number of different words used with the total
word count) for each text. Remember this has been shown to be particularly
sensitive to the effects of anxiety.
Possible Method 2: Cusum Analysis
You should be fairly familiar with the procedure required
for Cusum analysis due to the seminar devoted to that
topic.
For more detail, refer to Morton and Michaelson
(1990), The Qsum plot, which can be found in the
Short Loan article bank.
REMEMBER: To perform a valid Cusum,
you need your data (letters) to have a decent length of text containing plenty
of sentences. Texts such as the “Saucy Jack” postcard (and many other
short Ripper letters) are simply not analysable by Cusum.
Possible Method 3: Analysis of Handwriting
This should be used in conjunction with one or more of the
techniques outlined above.
In general, the task you are required to do for your Poster
is to produce some coherent data on the Jack the Ripper Letters using Forensic
Linguistic techniques such as those above or other types of analysis which
detailed in texts on Forensic linguistics. It is to your advantage to engage in
the material and look into the techniques in detail. Any advice required on the
techniques should be directed to Joy and on methodology/statistics should be
directed to David. You never know, you might discover something about the
authorship of the Jack the Ripper Letters that no one else has noticed before!
DATA ANALYSIS: WHAT YOU NEED TO DO
(Adapted from McMenamin, 2002)
1. Get Organized
Arrange and organize the letters you have chosen to use into
manageable sets using some sort of logical basis e.g. chronological order,
handwritten, typed, personal letter, diary entry etc.
2. State the Problem
Articulate the problem as you see it, by identifying your
hypotheses and the research questions for descriptive and quantitative
analysis. (NB This is the step which you will have to
hand in for marking in week 5)
3. Procedural steps
Assess the range of stylistic variables in each of your
questioned writings. Identify style markers and deviations from or variations
within any appropriate norm. Note single occurrences of variation as well as
habitual variation. Identify whether there is a need for a concordance. (See McMenamin)
4. Specify Descriptive Results
Specify individual style markers at all linguistic levels,
separating out those which are a class, and those which are individual.
5. Specify Quantitative Results
Give results of statistical tests used to evaluate
significance of variables. Estimate the probability of occurrence of variables
in compared writings. Apply any other appropriate qualitative approaches to
style marker identification.
6. Specify exclusion conclusion
Identify dissimilarities between the style-markers of
questioned and known writings. Determine linguistic or statistical significance
of dissimilarities and to what degree the candidate writer can be excluded.
7. Specify identification conclusion
Identify similarities between the style markers of
questioned and known writings. Determine linguistic or statistical significance
of similarities and to what degree the candidate writer can be excluded.
8. State opinion
State whether investigation can exclude or identify
candidate, or is inconclusive, i.e. state whether hypotheses can be accepted or
rejected.
The main source for the poster preparation is:
Evans, S. P. & Skinner, K. (2001) Jack the Ripper:
Letters from Hell. Sutton Publishers
This book contains many reproductions and transcriptions of
the best known letters claiming to be from the killer, as well as over 100
transcriptions of other “Ripper” letters that were sent to the
police, newspapers etc.
General sources on Jack the Ripper:
Evans & Skinner have a companion piece to their book
about the Ripper letters. This book provides more general information on the
case. Sugden’s book is considered to be the
definitive examination of the Whitechapel killings,
and contains a useful short chapter on the “Letters from Hell”. Jakubowski & Braund provide
around 100 pages of the “facts” of the case before allowing a variety
of writers a chapter each to put forward their views or theories about Jack the
Ripper.
Evans, S. P. & Skinner, K. (2000)
Ultimate Jack the Ripper Sourcebook. Constable
Jakubowski, M. & Braund, N. (Eds.) (1999) Mammoth book
of Jack the Ripper. Constable
Rubinstein, W.D. (2000) The Hunt
for Jack the Ripper. History Today. May, V50(5)
Sugden, P. (2002) The Complete History of Jack the Ripper. Constable
Web-sites:
Mention of “Jack the Ripper” is to be found on
many web-sites. However, the most comprehensive site appears to be:
www.casebook.org
Previous examination of “Ripper letters”:
The following three papers show some previous examination of
handwriting analysis on some of the Ripper letters. Although interesting, there
are certainly methodological flaws in these investigations. At present I have
not found any papers that have used other Forensic Linguistic techniques on the
Ripper letters.
Macleod, C. M. (1968) A ‘Ripper’
Handwriting Analysis. The Criminologist. No. 9. P120-127
Mann, T. J. (1975) The Ripper and
the Poet: A Comparison of Handwritings. The WADE Journal (
The “Ripper diary”
The controversial discovery of the supposed “Diary of
Jack the Ripper” in the 1990’s is probably a modern or more likely,
an Edwardian forgery. It is dismissed as such by most writers on the Ripper
case.
In terms of Forensic linguistics it may still be of interest
to some students for inclusion in your project. For example in chapter 17 of Feldman’s book he tries to tie in a number of the
“Jack the Ripper letters” with the “Ripper Diary” to show
its authenticity. This assertion could be examined by forensic linguistic
techniques. I.e. testing the letters he cites, against each other (are they by
the same hand) and against the diary. (Did the person who wrote the diary also
write any of the letters). The entire text of the
diary is reproduced (albeit in rather a small size) in Harrison’s
book.
Books on the “Ripper diary”
Feldman, P. H. (2002) Jack the Ripper: The Final Chapter.
Virgin Books
There is also a chapter by
The following web link provides some photographs of the
handwriting in the diary, including the signature. With some image manipulation
there may be enough material to analyse.
www.casebook.org/suspects/james_maybrick/diarypix.html
The web link below includes a brief transcription of part of
the “Ripper diary”
www.parmaq.com/truecrime/JackTheRipper1.htm
Web site for Francis Thompson letters:
Mr Richard Patterson, a "Ripperologist" from
The Thompson letters can be found at the following web
address, and access to the rest of Mr Patterson's
pages on this suspect can be gained from here.
www.geocities.com/darkly_burning/handwriting.html
Forensic Linguistic Techniques
Make use of the following sources to help you to analyse the data (letters). Use appropriate tests for the
material you intend to use. Analysis of ANY data should be planned beforehand.
I.e. don’t just pick a test at random, or pick
one test simply because it “seemed easier to do”!
Crystal, D. (1987). The
Ellis, S. (1994). The Yorkshire Ripper enquiry: Parts 1 and
2. Forensic Linguistics. International Journal of
Speech, Language and theLaw. Vol
1:2, 197-216. Routledge.
Found, B. Dick, D. & Rogers, D. (1994). The structure of forensic handwriting and signature comparisons.
Forensic Linguistics. International Journal of Speech,
Language and theLaw. Vol
1:2, 183-196. Routledge.
Gudjonsson, G.H. & Haward,
L.R.C. (1999). Forensic Psychology. Chapter 7. Routledge,
McMenamin, G., R. (2002) Forensic
Linguistics: Advances in forensic stylistics.
Morris, R. (2000) Forensic Handwriting Identification:
Fundamental concepts and principals. -
Morton A.Q. & Michaelson, S.
(1990). The Q-sum plot.
Nickell, J (1996) Detecting
Forgery: Forensic Investigation of Documents. University Press of
Winter, E (1996) The Statistics of
Analyzing Very Short Texts in a Criminal Context. In.
Recent Developments in Forensic Linguistics, p141 - 179.
(Ed) Kniffka, H
NB - When you hand in your Poster ensure that:
All material is securely stuck on
Your name is on it (front)
It has a Title (front)
A reference list is provided (stick this on the back of the poster.)