A Multisite Comparison of Actuarial Risk Instruments for Sex Offenders.

Abstract

Four actuarial instruments for the prediction of violent and sexual reoffending (the Violence Risk Appraisal Guide [VRAG], Sex Offender Risk Appraisal Guide [SORAG], Rapid Risk Assessment for Sex Offender Recidivism [RRASOR] and Static-99) were evaluated in 4 samples of sex offenders (N = 396). Although all 4 instruments predicted violent (including sexual) recidivism and recidivism known to be sexually motivated, areas under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) were consistently higher for the VRAG and the SORAG. The instruments performed better when there were fewer missing items and follow-up time was fixed, with an ROC area up to .84 for the VRAG, for example, under such favorable conditions. Predictive accuracy was higher for child molesters than for rapists, especially for the Static-99 and the RRASOR. Consistent with past research, survival analyses revealed that those offenders high in both psychopathy and sexual deviance were an especially high-risk group.

Psychopathy and offending behaviour: Findings from the national survey of prisoners in England and Wales

“…Sex offending was not specifically associated with psychopathy among male prisoners. This is consistent with several previous studies in which psychopathy was not associated with sex offending (Gretton, Mcbride, Hare, O'Shaughnessy, & Kumka, 2001;Långströ m & Grann, 2000) and is only a moderate predictor of sexual recidivism (Hare, 2003;Harris, Rice, Quinsey, Lalumière, & Boer, 2003;Porter, Woodworth, Earle, Drugge, & Boer, 2003). In representative samples of sex offenders, paraphilias are likely to be of greater importance than the abnormal personality features and antisocial lifestyle measured by the psychopathy construct.…”

Sexual Abuse – Current Medico-legal, Forensic and Psychiatric Aspects

“…Risk assessments are used to determine the sex offender's current level of sexual aggression and to possible predict future violent or sexual behavior [25]. Risk factors for sexual reoffending were classified, by consensus between the authors, into four categories based on the following criteria: supported, promising, possible, and unlikely [26].…”

The Assessment of Treatment‐Related Issues and Risk in Sex Offenders and Abusers with Intellectual Disability

“…In addition, psychopathy as measured by the psychopathy checklist -revised (PCL-R: Hare 1991) is related to certain PDs, including antisocial PD, and also successfully predicts future aggression in a range of populations of criminals (Grettan et al 2001, Hill et al 2004. A final important finding is that anti-social PD and the PCLR makes significant contributions to the prediction of recidivism in a range of offences (Harris et al 2003). Therefore, from a number of points of view, research on PD has 9 been shown to produce extremely important findings in relation to the planning and development of services and treatment.…”

“…However, in mainstream sex offender work, inappropriate sexual preference and sexual drive have been suggested as primary motivation by several authors (Blanchard, Watson, Choy, Dickey, Klassen & Kuban 1999, Harris et al 2003. Although some of this work is beginning to extend to men with lower intellectual functioning, perhaps the main inferences can be drawn from studies which have noted previous sexual offending and patterns of offending in cohorts of referred clients.…”