Criminal Justice and Behavior

The authors examined the interrelationships and the independent contributions of three major constructs associated with male criminal violence (neurodevelopmental insults, antisocial parenting, and psychopathy) using structural equation modeling. Subjects were 868 violent offenders assessed or treated at a maximum security psychiatric hospital. Results indicated that neurodevelopmental insults and psychopathy are not interrelated but are both directly and independently related to criminal violence, and antisocial parenting is related to both neurodevelopmental insults and psychopathy but has no direct relationship to criminal violence. These results are not consistent with a view of psychopathy as a disorder but are consistent with the view of psychopathy as an evolved life history strategy. Criminal violence has at least two separate developmental pathways originating very early in life, one involving neurodevelopmental damage and one involving psychopathy.

Psychopathy, as measured by the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), has emerged as one of the most important factors in understanding and predicting adult criminal behavior, including sex offending. The authors used extensive file information to score a youth version of the PCL-R (the PCL:YV) for 220 adolescent males in an outpatient sex offender treatment program. The authors coded charges and convictions for an average of 55 months following cessation of treatment. The PCL:YV was positively and significantly related to total, violent, and nonviolent reoffense rates. Offenders with a high PCL:YV score and penile plethysmographic evidence of deviant sexual arousal prior to treatment were at very high risk for general reoffending. The results suggest that psychopathy may have much the same implications for the criminal justice system in adolescent offenders as it does in adult offenders.

It has recently been argued from studies of adults that chronically antisocial offenders constitute a discrete class of individuals. If this is true, it is likely that the class can be identified in childhood. Taxometric analyses were applied to items assessing antisociality in children. These items were similar in content to several established measures of antisocial behavior in children: the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition, Conduct Disorder; the Psychopathy Checklist–Youth Version; and the Childhood and Adolescent Taxon Scale. Participants were 1,111 school-age boys from a community sample of students. Taxometric analyses using each of the three measures of antisocial behavior yielded evidence of an underlying taxon. In addition, two other tests of consistency strengthened the conclusion that a taxon underlying serious antisocial behavior can be demonstrated in children.

The predictive accuracy of the Psychopathy Checklist–Revised, Level of Service Inventory– Revised, HCR-20, Violence Risk Appraisal Guide, and the Lifestyle Criminality Screening Form were compared in a sample of male offenders. Both correlations and receiver operating characteristics measured the relationship between the instruments and the predictive outcome criteria of institutional misconduct and release failure. Although some instruments performed better across the outcome measures, there were no statistical differences in predictive accuracy among the instruments.

Five actuarial instruments and one guided clinical instrument designed to assess risk for recidivism were compared on 215 sex offenders released from prison for an average of 4.5 years. The Violence Risk Appraisal Guide, Sex Offender Risk Appraisal Guide, Rapid Risk Assessment of Sexual Offense Recidivism, and Static-99 predicted general recidivism, serious (violent and sexual) recidivism, and sexual recidivism. The Minnesota Sex Offender Screening Tool–Revised and a guided clinical assessment (Multifactorial Assessment of Sex Offender Risk for Recidivism) predicted general recidivism but did not significantly predict serious or sexual recidivism. On its own, the Psychopathy Checklist–Revised predicted general and serious recidivism but not sexual recidivism. The results support the utility of an actuarial approach to risk assessment of sex offenders.

Male undergraduates and men from the local community completed questionnaires dealing with antisocial behavior, aggression, mating effort, and self-esteem. An exploratory maximum likelihood factor analysis revealed three factors, labeled Aggressiveness, Mating Success, and Antisociality. No clear mating effort factor emerged. Number of sexual partners and Preference for Partner Variety loaded on Mating Success, but age at first intercourse loaded on Antisociality. The only significant correlation among the factors was between Aggressiveness and Antisociality. Variables from each of the 3 factors discriminated between individuals scoring at the extreme ends of the Childhood and Adolescence Taxon Scale–Self Report, a measure containing items previously shown to identify a discrete class of antisocial offenders.