Neurointerventions for Criminal Offenders
Psychological Connectedness, Culpability and Justified Punishment
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21701637 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Vera Tesink (0000-0003-2293-8860, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 28 |
| Issue | 5 |
| Pages | 839-855 |
| Publication date | 2025-11-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Ethical Theory and Moral Practice (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1386-2820 • E-ISSN: 1572-8447 |
| Publisher | Springer Science and Business Media LLC (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1007/s10677-025-10526-8 |
| PMID | 41815978 |
| OpenAlex | W4415841068 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 51 |
Neurointerventions may be employed in criminal justice as rehabilitative tools that aim to reduce reoffending. Although ethical debates have concentrated largely on the effects of these interventions on autonomy, bodily integrity and mental integrity, much less attention has been paid to their potential impact on personal identity. On a Parfitian view of identity as psychological connectedness, neurointerventions, by modifying offenders’ psychological traits and dispositions, risk weakening offenders’ psychological connections to their earlier selves. By reducing psychological connections—and by acting directly on the very psychological traits and dispositions implicated in past crimes—neurointerventions could significantly diminish culpability that is grounded in those connections. As most penal systems set the scope of justified punishment in proportion to an offender’s culpability, any neurointervention-induced reduction in psychological connectedness may render further punishment unjust insofar as it becomes disproportionate to current culpability. This suggests that post-neurointervention reassessment of sentences may be warranted to keep punishment proportional to current culpability—and thus morally justified
Criminal justice · Culpability · Economic Justice · Moral responsibility · Psychological intervention · Free Will and Agency · Neuroethics, Human Enhancement, Biomedical Innovations · Psychopathy, Forensic Psychiatry, Sexual Offending
The Neurocorrective Offer and Manipulative Pressure
Clarifying the Normative Significance of ‘Personality Changes’ Following Deep Brain Stimulation
Closed-Loop Brain Devices in Offender Rehabilitation
A note on psychological continuity theories of identity and neurointerventions
Not Just Deserts
Basically Deserved Blame and Its Value
“He’s Back so I’m Not Alone”
Reasons and Persons
Extraordinary and compelling
Punishments, Politics, and Prisons in Western Countries
Motivating Reasons, Moral Culpability, and Criminal Law
Anti-libidinal Interventions and Human Rights
| Highly cited | No |
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