Family experience and public support of the death penalty

Abstract

Integration of data on the characteristics of death penalty supporters with data on violence within the family suggests that experience with violence in the family, and the meaning and moral evaluation of punishment and violence learned thereby, lead to support for the death penalty. This paper concludes that the high level of public support for the death penalty may be accounted for in part by the high level of violence within the family and by parental use of retributive physical punishment.