Kelly M Socia
Biographic Data
| ID | 122151 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Kelly M Socia |
| GIVEN NAMES | Kelly M |
| FAMILY NAME | Socia |
| SIGNATURE | SOCIA K M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Massachusetts Lowell |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0560-3399 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 23 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 89 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 23 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 6 |
An Immovable Object? In-Group Qualifiers, Credibility, and Expert Claims on Punitive Sex Crime Policy
Punitive policy approaches toward individuals convicted of sexual offenses (ICSOs) remain popular despite limited evidence of their effectiveness. Science communicators face substantial challenges in shifting public opinion on these issues, and prior research suggests that advocating for less punitive but more effective policies can undermine perceived expert credibility. This study reports results from a survey experiment with U.S. adults examin…
Shooting the Messenger: How Expert Statements on Stigmatized Populations Negatively Impact Perceived Credibility
Policies regulating individuals convicted of sexual offenses (ICSOs) are widely supported, despite little empirical evidence that they promote public safety. While research suggests this support is unresponsive to counterevidence, the mechanisms underlying these findings remain unclear. Here we consider whether assessments of an expert’s credibility are impacted by advocating for non-punitive approaches to ICSOs (vs. individuals convicted of drun…
Perceptions of behavioral health care quality for justice-involved veterans: A multi-jurisdictional analysis of Veterans Treatment Court team insights
BACKGROUND: A key function of Veterans Treatment Courts (VTCs) is the facilitation of behavioral health care for criminal justice-involved veterans, and this care may occur in Veterans Health Administration (VHA) facilities and/or in the community. This study explores the perceived quality of care in these two settings based on interviews with 145 VTC team members from 20 court jurisdictions across the United States (US). RESULTS: Team members’ o…
Too Harsh for Me but Not for Thee? Threat Control, Personal Freedom, and Perception of Pandemic Policy
Policies implemented to control the COVID-19 (C19) pandemic have faced public resistance. We examined this issue via an experimental vignette study embedded in a May 2020 national (U.S.) survey conducted by YouGov. Specifically, we explore how the public perceived a local policymaker proposing a C19-related isolation policy, based on the policy’s invasiveness or its punitivity. We find that more intrusive and more punitive policies generally resu…
Driving Public Support: Support for a Law is Higher When the Law is Named After a Victim
Despite the potential symbolic, political, and practical importance of naming a law after a victim, it is unclear whether this practice influences public opinion about the law itself. I conducted a randomized vignette survey experiment on 1,000 American adults to determine if support for a proposed distracted driving law, and the punishment it authorized, was influenced by whether it was named after a victim, as well as the victim’s race, gender,…
Asymmetric Compassion Collapse, Collateral Consequences, and Reintegration: An Experiment
Public opinion is doubly important for reintegration, as it shapes both the policy and the stigma environments that people with criminal records must face. Nowhere are the policy and stigma environments bleaker than for record holders convicted of sex crimes. Drawing on the theory of compassion collapse (or psychic numbing) and using experimental data from a national survey, we examine the effects of informing members of the public about the hard…
The Effect of Reading Prisoner Poetry on Stigma and Public Attitudes: Results from a Multigroup Survey Experiment
We examine how public attitudes toward currently/formerly incarcerated people and their reentry into society are affected by consuming information about imprisoned people. Over 1,500 respondents from a national online survey were randomly assigned one of five sources of written information about currently and formerly incarcerated people (CFIP) (three informative pieces and two sets of incarceree poetry). They then reported their views toward the…
Focus on prevention: The public is more supportive of “overdose prevention sites” than they are of “safe injection facilities”
Research Summary : Using a national survey experiment, we examined Americans’ national and local‐level support for facilities that provide a safer space for individuals to consume illicit drugs under the supervision of medical professionals. We determined whether support levels differed based on (1) the label used to refer to such facilities (“safe injection facilities” vs. “overdose prevention sites”), (2) whether beneficial information is provi…
Public Perceptions of Police Agency Fairness and the Willingness to Call Police
Police leaders strive to improve interactions and practices relating to residents’ perceptions of police fairness and their willingness to report crimes. Research suggests that strengthening community perceptions of police fairness may increase residents’ willingness to contact the police for help. This study uses a nationally representative public opinion survey to examine the factors that influence perceptions of police fairness and the willing…
Boy With Toy or Black Male With Gun: An Analysis of Online News Articles Covering the Shooting of Tamir Rice
The current study explores how online media framed the police shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland, OH. We conducted a qualitative content analysis of a large sample of online news articles published in the first 48 hours following the event. In doing so, we consider how online media outlets used headlines, narrative, quotes, and images to frame this emerging story. We find that the online news media framed the shooting of Rice in ways…
Reporting victimisation to the police: The role of racial dyad and bias motivation
Multiple theoretical perspectives suggest that the racial minorities may be less likely to report victimisation to law enforcement. Likewise, the literature on racially-motivated offenses highlights the importance of the victim’s race in whether the crime is reported. While both bodies of literature suggest that perception of racial bias may be a particularly salient factor in decisions to not report, they have been largely divorced from one anot…
Twenty-First Century Punitiveness: Social Sources of Punitive American Views Reconsidered
Sex Offender Civil Commitment Policies in Context
Public Support for Emergency Shelter Housing Interventions Concerning Stigmatized Populations: Results From a Factorial Survey
Research Summary We examine citizen decision‐making in the context of providing access to safe housing to different noncriminal and criminal populations. More than 4,000 national online survey respondents considered different “emergency housing policy” scenarios that would affect the housing conditions of one of five randomly assigned populations of varying stigma (three noncriminal, two criminal). We find that the criminal populations had the le…
Conflicted conservatives, punitive views, and anti-Black racial bias 1974–2014
Research suggests that the views of “conflicted conservatives,” Americans who self-identify as conservative but express support for liberal governmental policies and spending, are particularly important in policymaking and politics because they are politically engaged and often act as swing voters. We examine punitive views among conflicted conservatives and other political subgroups in three distinct periods in the politics of punishment in Amer…
Evaluating public perceptions of the risk presented by registered sex offenders: Evidence of crime control theater
Is Dangerousness a Myth? Injuries and Police Encounters with People with Mental Illnesses: Police Encounters with People with Mental Illness
Research Summary This study examined all “use-of-force” reports collected by the Portland Police Bureau in Portland, Oregon, between 2008 and 2011, to determine whether their encounters with people with mental illnesses are more likely to result in injury to officers or subjects when force is used. Although several factors significantly predicted the likelihood of injury to either subjects or officers, mental illness was not one of them. Policy I…
Residence Restrictions Are Ineffective, Inefficient, and Inadequate: So Now What
The implementation of county residence restrictions in New York
The policy implications of residence restrictions on sex offender housing in Upstate NY: Implications of Residence Restrictions
Overview of “The policy implications of residence restrictions on sex offender housing in Upstate NY”: Implications of Residence Restrictions
Research Summary Only a handful of studies have evaluated how residence restrictions would affect sex offender housing options, and even fewer have compared different residence restrictions to one another. This study analyzed how different types of statewide residence restrictions would affect the housing options of convicted sex offenders in the Upstate New York region. Combinations of five buffer zone sizes (500 – 2,500 feet) and three scopes o…
Assumptions and Evidence Behind Sex Offender Laws: Registration, Community Notification, and Residence Restrictions
Since the mid‐1990s legislators have enacted a series of laws regulating convicted sex offenders who have returned to communities. Policymakers crafted these laws to appease a worried public, but they were based on assumptions about sex offenders’ behaviors that were not well supported by research evidence. In this paper we examine the social context within which these laws were passed and the assumptions behind the three most common sex offender…
Does a watched pot boil? A time-series analysis of New York State's sex offender registration and notification law
Despite the fact that the federal and many state governments have enacted registration and community notification laws as a means to better protect communities from sexual offending, limited empirical research has been conducted to examine the impact of such legislation on public safety. Therefore, utilizing time-series analyses, this study examined differences in sexual offense arrest rates before and after the enactment of New York State’s Sex …
The policy implications of residence restrictions on sex offender housing in Upstate NY: Implications of Residence Restrictions
Does a watched pot boil? A time-series analysis of New York State's sex offender registration and notification law
Despite the fact that the federal and many state governments have enacted registration and community notification laws as a means to better protect communities from sexual offending, limited empirical research has been conducted to examine the impact of such legislation on public safety. Therefore, utilizing time-series analyses, this study examined differences in sexual offense arrest rates before and after the enactment of New York State’s Sex …
Boy With Toy or Black Male With Gun: An Analysis of Online News Articles Covering the Shooting of Tamir Rice
The current study explores how online media framed the police shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland, OH. We conducted a qualitative content analysis of a large sample of online news articles published in the first 48 hours following the event. In doing so, we consider how online media outlets used headlines, narrative, quotes, and images to frame this emerging story. We find that the online news media framed the shooting of Rice in ways…
Public Support for Emergency Shelter Housing Interventions Concerning Stigmatized Populations: Results From a Factorial Survey
Research Summary We examine citizen decision‐making in the context of providing access to safe housing to different noncriminal and criminal populations. More than 4,000 national online survey respondents considered different “emergency housing policy” scenarios that would affect the housing conditions of one of five randomly assigned populations of varying stigma (three noncriminal, two criminal). We find that the criminal populations had the le…
Is Dangerousness a Myth? Injuries and Police Encounters with People with Mental Illnesses: Police Encounters with People with Mental Illness
Research Summary This study examined all “use-of-force” reports collected by the Portland Police Bureau in Portland, Oregon, between 2008 and 2011, to determine whether their encounters with people with mental illnesses are more likely to result in injury to officers or subjects when force is used. Although several factors significantly predicted the likelihood of injury to either subjects or officers, mental illness was not one of them. Policy I…
Evaluating public perceptions of the risk presented by registered sex offenders: Evidence of crime control theater
Reporting victimisation to the police: The role of racial dyad and bias motivation
Multiple theoretical perspectives suggest that the racial minorities may be less likely to report victimisation to law enforcement. Likewise, the literature on racially-motivated offenses highlights the importance of the victim’s race in whether the crime is reported. While both bodies of literature suggest that perception of racial bias may be a particularly salient factor in decisions to not report, they have been largely divorced from one anot…
Conflicted conservatives, punitive views, and anti-Black racial bias 1974–2014
Research suggests that the views of “conflicted conservatives,” Americans who self-identify as conservative but express support for liberal governmental policies and spending, are particularly important in policymaking and politics because they are politically engaged and often act as swing voters. We examine punitive views among conflicted conservatives and other political subgroups in three distinct periods in the politics of punishment in Amer…
Assumptions and Evidence Behind Sex Offender Laws: Registration, Community Notification, and Residence Restrictions
Since the mid‐1990s legislators have enacted a series of laws regulating convicted sex offenders who have returned to communities. Policymakers crafted these laws to appease a worried public, but they were based on assumptions about sex offenders’ behaviors that were not well supported by research evidence. In this paper we examine the social context within which these laws were passed and the assumptions behind the three most common sex offender…
Public Perceptions of Police Agency Fairness and the Willingness to Call Police
Police leaders strive to improve interactions and practices relating to residents’ perceptions of police fairness and their willingness to report crimes. Research suggests that strengthening community perceptions of police fairness may increase residents’ willingness to contact the police for help. This study uses a nationally representative public opinion survey to examine the factors that influence perceptions of police fairness and the willing…
Residence Restrictions Are Ineffective, Inefficient, and Inadequate: So Now What
Focus on prevention: The public is more supportive of “overdose prevention sites” than they are of “safe injection facilities”
Research Summary : Using a national survey experiment, we examined Americans’ national and local‐level support for facilities that provide a safer space for individuals to consume illicit drugs under the supervision of medical professionals. We determined whether support levels differed based on (1) the label used to refer to such facilities (“safe injection facilities” vs. “overdose prevention sites”), (2) whether beneficial information is provi…
The implementation of county residence restrictions in New York
Does a watched pot boil? A time-series analysis of New York State's sex offender registration and notification law
Despite the fact that the federal and many state governments have enacted registration and community notification laws as a means to better protect communities from sexual offending, limited empirical research has been conducted to examine the impact of such legislation on public safety. Therefore, utilizing time-series analyses, this study examined differences in sexual offense arrest rates before and after the enactment of New York State’s Sex …
Assumptions and Evidence Behind Sex Offender Laws: Registration, Community Notification, and Residence Restrictions
Since the mid‐1990s legislators have enacted a series of laws regulating convicted sex offenders who have returned to communities. Policymakers crafted these laws to appease a worried public, but they were based on assumptions about sex offenders’ behaviors that were not well supported by research evidence. In this paper we examine the social context within which these laws were passed and the assumptions behind the three most common sex offender…
The policy implications of residence restrictions on sex offender housing in Upstate NY: Implications of Residence Restrictions
Overview of “The policy implications of residence restrictions on sex offender housing in Upstate NY”: Implications of Residence Restrictions
Research Summary Only a handful of studies have evaluated how residence restrictions would affect sex offender housing options, and even fewer have compared different residence restrictions to one another. This study analyzed how different types of statewide residence restrictions would affect the housing options of convicted sex offenders in the Upstate New York region. Combinations of five buffer zone sizes (500 – 2,500 feet) and three scopes o…
The implementation of county residence restrictions in New York
Residence Restrictions Are Ineffective, Inefficient, and Inadequate: So Now What
Is Dangerousness a Myth? Injuries and Police Encounters with People with Mental Illnesses: Police Encounters with People with Mental Illness
Research Summary This study examined all “use-of-force” reports collected by the Portland Police Bureau in Portland, Oregon, between 2008 and 2011, to determine whether their encounters with people with mental illnesses are more likely to result in injury to officers or subjects when force is used. Although several factors significantly predicted the likelihood of injury to either subjects or officers, mental illness was not one of them. Policy I…
Evaluating public perceptions of the risk presented by registered sex offenders: Evidence of crime control theater
Twenty-First Century Punitiveness: Social Sources of Punitive American Views Reconsidered
Sex Offender Civil Commitment Policies in Context
Public Support for Emergency Shelter Housing Interventions Concerning Stigmatized Populations: Results From a Factorial Survey
Research Summary We examine citizen decision‐making in the context of providing access to safe housing to different noncriminal and criminal populations. More than 4,000 national online survey respondents considered different “emergency housing policy” scenarios that would affect the housing conditions of one of five randomly assigned populations of varying stigma (three noncriminal, two criminal). We find that the criminal populations had the le…
Conflicted conservatives, punitive views, and anti-Black racial bias 1974–2014
Research suggests that the views of “conflicted conservatives,” Americans who self-identify as conservative but express support for liberal governmental policies and spending, are particularly important in policymaking and politics because they are politically engaged and often act as swing voters. We examine punitive views among conflicted conservatives and other political subgroups in three distinct periods in the politics of punishment in Amer…
Reporting victimisation to the police: The role of racial dyad and bias motivation
Multiple theoretical perspectives suggest that the racial minorities may be less likely to report victimisation to law enforcement. Likewise, the literature on racially-motivated offenses highlights the importance of the victim’s race in whether the crime is reported. While both bodies of literature suggest that perception of racial bias may be a particularly salient factor in decisions to not report, they have been largely divorced from one anot…
Boy With Toy or Black Male With Gun: An Analysis of Online News Articles Covering the Shooting of Tamir Rice
The current study explores how online media framed the police shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland, OH. We conducted a qualitative content analysis of a large sample of online news articles published in the first 48 hours following the event. In doing so, we consider how online media outlets used headlines, narrative, quotes, and images to frame this emerging story. We find that the online news media framed the shooting of Rice in ways…
Focus on prevention: The public is more supportive of “overdose prevention sites” than they are of “safe injection facilities”
Research Summary : Using a national survey experiment, we examined Americans’ national and local‐level support for facilities that provide a safer space for individuals to consume illicit drugs under the supervision of medical professionals. We determined whether support levels differed based on (1) the label used to refer to such facilities (“safe injection facilities” vs. “overdose prevention sites”), (2) whether beneficial information is provi…
Public Perceptions of Police Agency Fairness and the Willingness to Call Police
Police leaders strive to improve interactions and practices relating to residents’ perceptions of police fairness and their willingness to report crimes. Research suggests that strengthening community perceptions of police fairness may increase residents’ willingness to contact the police for help. This study uses a nationally representative public opinion survey to examine the factors that influence perceptions of police fairness and the willing…
Too Harsh for Me but Not for Thee? Threat Control, Personal Freedom, and Perception of Pandemic Policy
Policies implemented to control the COVID-19 (C19) pandemic have faced public resistance. We examined this issue via an experimental vignette study embedded in a May 2020 national (U.S.) survey conducted by YouGov. Specifically, we explore how the public perceived a local policymaker proposing a C19-related isolation policy, based on the policy’s invasiveness or its punitivity. We find that more intrusive and more punitive policies generally resu…
Driving Public Support: Support for a Law is Higher When the Law is Named After a Victim
Despite the potential symbolic, political, and practical importance of naming a law after a victim, it is unclear whether this practice influences public opinion about the law itself. I conducted a randomized vignette survey experiment on 1,000 American adults to determine if support for a proposed distracted driving law, and the punishment it authorized, was influenced by whether it was named after a victim, as well as the victim’s race, gender,…
Asymmetric Compassion Collapse, Collateral Consequences, and Reintegration: An Experiment
Public opinion is doubly important for reintegration, as it shapes both the policy and the stigma environments that people with criminal records must face. Nowhere are the policy and stigma environments bleaker than for record holders convicted of sex crimes. Drawing on the theory of compassion collapse (or psychic numbing) and using experimental data from a national survey, we examine the effects of informing members of the public about the hard…
The Effect of Reading Prisoner Poetry on Stigma and Public Attitudes: Results from a Multigroup Survey Experiment
We examine how public attitudes toward currently/formerly incarcerated people and their reentry into society are affected by consuming information about imprisoned people. Over 1,500 respondents from a national online survey were randomly assigned one of five sources of written information about currently and formerly incarcerated people (CFIP) (three informative pieces and two sets of incarceree poetry). They then reported their views toward the…
Shooting the Messenger: How Expert Statements on Stigmatized Populations Negatively Impact Perceived Credibility
Policies regulating individuals convicted of sexual offenses (ICSOs) are widely supported, despite little empirical evidence that they promote public safety. While research suggests this support is unresponsive to counterevidence, the mechanisms underlying these findings remain unclear. Here we consider whether assessments of an expert’s credibility are impacted by advocating for non-punitive approaches to ICSOs (vs. individuals convicted of drun…
Perceptions of behavioral health care quality for justice-involved veterans: A multi-jurisdictional analysis of Veterans Treatment Court team insights
BACKGROUND: A key function of Veterans Treatment Courts (VTCs) is the facilitation of behavioral health care for criminal justice-involved veterans, and this care may occur in Veterans Health Administration (VHA) facilities and/or in the community. This study explores the perceived quality of care in these two settings based on interviews with 145 VTC team members from 20 court jurisdictions across the United States (US). RESULTS: Team members’ o…
An Immovable Object? In-Group Qualifiers, Credibility, and Expert Claims on Punitive Sex Crime Policy
Punitive policy approaches toward individuals convicted of sexual offenses (ICSOs) remain popular despite limited evidence of their effectiveness. Science communicators face substantial challenges in shifting public opinion on these issues, and prior research suggests that advocating for less punitive but more effective policies can undermine perceived expert credibility. This study reports results from a survey experiment with U.S. adults examin…
Psychology (17 works) · Political science (16 works) · Criminology (15 works) · Crime Patterns and Interventions (14 works) · Criminal Justice and Corrections Analysis (14 works) · Law (14 works) · Sociology (14 works) · Psychopathy, Forensic Psychiatry, Sexual Offending (9 works) · Social Psychology (9 works) · Law (7 works)