It should not be confused with profiling which grew out of the experience of police officers offering opinions to their colleagues about the possible characteristics of unknown offenders.
This field provides a system for the integration of many aspects of psychology into all areas of police investigations and forms of crime.
One aim of investigative psychology research is determining behaviourally important and empirically supported information regarding the consistency and variability of the behaviour of many different types of offenders, although to date most studies have been of violent crimes there is a growing body of research on burglary and arson.
The most recent advances have seen the development of a Narrative Action System Model for differentiating criminals' styles of offending, allowing empirically based 'modus operandi' to be identified within a broad range of offence types from sexual assault and serial murder to stalking, burglary and robbery.
[5] This method of analysis has also expanded upon the original theoretical distinction by identifying sub-themes of aggressive action which can be used to further discriminate amongst offenders (Santilla, Hakkanen, Canter & Elfgren, 2003).