Compare methods

	Regression Discontinuity in Sentencing	Deterrence Analysis
Field	Criminology	Criminology
Family	Process / pipeline	Process / pipeline
Year of origin	1983	1968
Originator	Richard A. Berk & David Rauma (criminological application); Donald L. Thistlethwaite & Donald T. Campbell (design origin)	Cesare Beccaria & Jeremy Bentham (classical); Gary Becker & Daniel Nagin (modern)
Type	Quasi-experimental causal design at a policy threshold	Theory and empirical analysis of how punishment deters offending
Seminal source	Berk, R. A., & Rauma, D. (1983). Capitalizing on nonrandom assignment to treatments: A regression-discontinuity evaluation of a crime-control program. Journal of the American Statistical Association, 78(381), 21–27.	Nagin, D. S. (2013). Deterrence in the twenty-first century: A review of the evidence. Crime and Justice, 42(1), 199–263.
Aliases	Sentencing Threshold RDD, Cutoff-Based Justice Evaluation, Risk-Score Discontinuity Design, Age-of-Majority Discontinuity	Deterrence Theory, Certainty-Severity-Celerity Analysis, Perceptual Deterrence Analysis, Focused Deterrence Analysis
Related	4	4
Summary	Regression discontinuity (RD) in sentencing exploits the sharp thresholds built into justice policy — sentencing-guideline cutoffs, the age of majority, risk-score thresholds that trigger detention or diversion — to estimate causal effects without a randomized trial. Units just above the cutoff receive a different treatment from units just below it, yet they are otherwise nearly identical, so comparing their outcomes isolates the effect of crossing the line. Berk and Rauma's 1983 evaluation of a crime-control program showed how criminologists can 'capitalize on nonrandom assignment' created by such rules.	Deterrence analysis studies how the threat and imposition of legal punishment discourage crime. Rooted in classical criminology and formalized in Gary Becker's economic model, it distinguishes the certainty, severity, and celerity of punishment, separates perceived from objective sanction risk, and uses quasi-experimental and perceptual evidence — synthesized by Daniel Nagin — to test how much, and through what channels, punishment actually deters.