A Comparative Study of Criminal Thinking and Aggression Among Male and Female Convicted Homicide Offenders

Criminology has historically received comparatively little scholarly attention in India, unlike in many other countries where it is well established alongside other social and applied sciences. Against this backdrop, the present study set out to examine criminal thinking and aggression in convicted homicide offenders (N=100, M=50, F=50) using a quantitative design. Data were gathered with the Texas Christian University Criminal Thinking Scale (TCU-CTS; Knight, Garner, Simpson, Morey, & Flynn, 2006) and the Buss–Perry Aggression Questionnaire (BPAQ; Buss & Perry, 1992), and analyzed through descriptive statistics (mean, SD), independent-samples t-tests with equal group sizes, and Pearson product-moment correlations. Findings indicated significant group differences on several psycho-social dimensions—entitlement, justification, power orientation, cold-heartedness, criminal rationalization, physical aggression, verbal aggression, and hostility—along with meaningful correlations among specific dimensions within each group.