The authors investigated the validity of the Antisocial Features (ANT) scale of the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI; L. C. Morey, 1991) with respect to assessments of psychopathy in 2 offender samples. Study 1 included 46 forensic psychiatric inpatients who were administered the Screening Version of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist (PCL:SV; S. D. Hart, D. N. Cox, & R. D. Hare, 1995). In Study 2, 55 sex offenders were administered the Hare Psychopathy Checklist--Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991). ANT scores correlated highly with the PCL:SV total score (r = .54) and moderately with the PCL-R total score (r = .40). ANT tapped primarily behavioral symptoms of psychopathy rather than interpersonal and affective symptoms. Also, ANT had low to moderate diagnostic efficiency regarding diagnoses of psychopathy, suggesting that it may be better used as a dimensional rather than categorical measure of this construct.

This study examined the utility of the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI) to identify prison inmates in a mandatory sex offender treatment program prone to engage in institutional misconduct. Archival PAI and institutional disciplinary data were coded for 137 inmates in treatment for an average of 1.59 years. The Antisocial Features scale predicted various forms of general and major infractions (e.g., verbal aggression), with no other scales providing any incremental validity beyond this measure. The Treatment Rejection scale was uniquely but modestly correlated (r=.14) with treatment noncompliance, even though such infractions were rare in this sample.

This study compares the utility of two measures of psychopathic traits, the Antisocial Features (ANT) scale of the Personality Assessment Inventory and the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R), to predict serious institutional misconduct among incarcerated sex offenders over a 2-year follow-up period. Archival disciplinary data for 58 offenders were classified as major infractions involving physical aggression, verbal aggression/acts of defiance, or nonaggressive offenses. Significant correlations were obtained between both measures of psychopathy and each type of disciplinary offense except physical aggression, the occurrence of which was rare in this sample. Regression analyses indicated that each measure accounted for unique-or incremental-variance in one of the criterion measures. Overall classification accuracy based on standard cut scores was somewhat more positive for ANT than for the PCL-R.

Psychopathic personality disorder (psychopathy) consists of a distinct pattern of affective, interpersonal, and behavioral symptoms. Emotionally, psychopaths lack empathy for others or guilt for their misdeeds, and they have difficulty forming strong affective bonds. Behaviorally, psychopaths tend to be irresponsible and prone to criminality. Interpersonally, psychopaths are grandiose, callous, and deceitful (Cleckley, 1976;Cooke & Michie, 2001;Hare, 1991). The relevance of the construct of psychopathy to forensic mental health services hardly can be overstated, in that it repeatedly has been shown to identify individuals who are at increased risk for various negative outcomes (e.g., treatment failure, criminal recidivism, violent recidivism) across several forensic and criminal justice populations (

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