This study examined the individual beliefs and attitudes (e.g., sexuality, aggression, criminality) and victimization histories of 100 male youths who were divided equally into four demographically similar groups: (a) sexual offenders in residential placement, (b) sexual offenders in outpatient treatment, (c) nonsexual offenders in residential placement, and (d) nonsexual offenders in outpatient treatment. Based on youths' reports on the Multidimensional Assessment of Sex and Aggression and the Millon Adolescent Clinical Inventory, results showed that juvenile sexual offenders in residential placement had the most negative sexual and aggressive attitudes. There were also other noted differences between the two groups of sexual offenders as well as between youths with histories of sexual offenses and juvenile offenders with no such histories. The implications of these findings for research, theory, treatment, and risk assessment are discussed.

This research was supported by research grants MH54263-01 from the National Institute of Mental Health and 94-IJ-CX-0049 from the National Institute of Justice. The authors wish to express their deep appreciation to the staff in the numerous institutions at which we have tested for their considerable commitment of time and energy to our research program. We also thank all the offenders who participated in our research. Special thanks are due to David Cerce and Alison Martino for coordinating the coding of files and organizing all of our data, to Nick Fadden and Karen Fadden for help in coordinating and collecting the Minnesota data, and to Karen Locke for her programming and data processing skills.