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Criminal Justice

Assignment summary

This assessment help page assumes you have read the unit outline, assessment description and marking rubric provided in Moodle. 

Assessment 2 requires you to write:

An annotated bibliography

  • Summarise and evaluate four peer-reviewed journal articles relevant to one of the three topics listed below. Do not use newspaper articles, websites or material from unit slides

Assessment 3 requires you to write:

A position argument

  • For assessment task 3, students will be required to build on the research undertaken for Assessment Task 2 to produce a position argument on the same topic selected for Assessment Task 2, following the instructions given in the Assessment Description. Each argument for and against recommendation must be supported by evidence with in-text citations, and accompanied by a reference list containing at least four peer-reviewed and two grey literature sources. Do not use newspaper articles, websites or material from unit slides.

Topics to debate

  • Should prisoners always complete the full term of the sentence imposed or should they be eligible for parole?  

  • Is mandatory sentencing always appropriate for repeat offenders?  

  • Should the age of criminal responsibility be raised from 10 to 14 years?   

Assessment 2. Annotated bibliography

The following document and website will help you understand what is expected of you in writing an annotated bibliography.

For more details see https://studyskills.federation.edu.au/assessment/written-tasks/annotated-bibliography/

If you need help with writing your annotated bibliography see a Learning Skills Advisor. Learning skills advisors are professional educators who can help you achieve your academic goals. They are available at all campuses to work with you. For more details see https://federation.edu.au/current-students/learning-and-study/get-help-on-campus/learning-skills-advisors.    Select Book with an LSA now to book a one-on-one appointment and to see the other options available for assistance.

Plan your search

Start planning your search by:

  1. Identify the key concepts in your assignment scenario
  2. Consider alternative terms that authors might use for these
Key concepts Alternative terms
Prisoners inmates, criminals, offenders
Parole probation
Police police officers,  law enforcement
Mandatory sentencing

Minimum sentencing, fixed penalties
Recidivism Reoffending, repeat offending

Now use Boolean operators to connect your search terms. 

Use OR to combine all the terms for the same concept: prisoners OR inmates OR criminals OR offenders

Use AND to combine terms from different concepts: prisoners AND parole

Use quotation marks to search for a phrase: "mandatory sentencing"

Use brackets to group all terms from the same concept together: (prisoners OR inmates OR criminals OR offenders)

Watch the following video to learn more about Boolean operators

When you put it together you have a search strategy

(prisoners OR inmates OR criminals OR offenders) AND (parole OR probation)

You will probably need to conduct multiple searches and alter your search terms as you go.

Consider using the Search Builder Tool which is available in the following tab. This tool will guide you through developing a search strategy and you will be able to cut and paste the suggested search strategy straight into QuickSearch or a Database.

Building a database search strategy

What is your research question?

Type your research question into the box above, then click the Next button (below).

Continue reading these instructions (they change on each step) and clicking the Next button to progress to each new step.
Concept 1
Concept 2
Concept 3
Exclude this concept

 

OR
OR
OR
OR
OR
OR
OR
OR

 

Ready-to-use search strategies

Search strategy for Scopus:
 
Search strategy for other databases:
 

 

Copy and paste the search strategy into Scopus or your preferred database

Although rewritten from scratch, this search builder owes a huge debt of thanks to Ray White of UWA Library for his presentation to the online SpringyCamp Australia 2017.

Search For Resources


Suggested databases for Criminal Justice are:

According to The Twelfth International Conference on Grey Literature (2010), grey literature is the name given to literature that is not widely disseminated, but is of sufficient quality to be housed by repositories or libraries. It is usually distributed by individuals or non-commercial publishers. 

Common examples of grey literature include:

  • Dissertations
  • Unpublished or pre-print studies and manuscripts
  • Government reports and policies
  • Business reports
  • Conference proceedings
  • Articles published by non-commercial publishers
  • Maps, newsletters and fact-sheets

To find out more about Grey Literature and how to find it check out our Grey Literature subject guide

How to search for reports

Google offers advanced features to allow you to limit your search by domain:

  • Add site:.gov.au  to limit your search to only Australian government websites
  • Or try site:.org.au to find websites of Australian organisations
  • Try filetype:PDF to limit your search to PDFs – the format most commonly for official reports
  • You can limit to a date range: daterange:2014-2024
  • You can combine these options into one search with your keywords:
Eg: "criminal responsibility" AND "minimum age" site:vic.gov.au filetype:PDF daterange:2014-2024

  • To narrow results by date, click on the "Tools" button and then the "Any time" drop-down menu. 

Assessment 3. Position argument

This task requires the use of formal academic writing, and the presentation of clear arguments backed up by evidence. The following helpsheets will help you with your planning, structuring and writing your position argument:

If you need help with planning and writing this piece of work, see a Learning Skills Advisor (LSA). LSAs are professional educators who can help you achieve your academic goals. They are available at all campuses to work with you. For more details see https://federation.edu.au/current-students/learning-and-study/get-help-on-campus/learning-skills-advisors.  Select Book with an LSA now to book a one-on-one appointment and to see the other options available for assistance.

The Study Skills website includes the full list of helpsheets, available as downloadable PDFs.

Your online referencing guide: FedCite

FedCite is the one stop shop for all your referencing needs. In this unit, you need to use APA 7. Look at the Using APA7 section to find out general information on how to cite and reference, and the source types for specific examples.

Go to FedCite

 

Don't forget to check out the Referencing tab located in this guide.

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