title: Examination of the screening properties of the personality diagnostic questionnaire 4+ (PDQ-4+) in a prison population.
abstract: There is a high prevalence of personality disorder in most prison populations. Many pass through the system undiagnosed. A screening instrument would improve identification. This study examined the screening properties of the Personality Diagnostic Questionnaire-4+ (PDQ-4+) in prisoners convicted of violent and sexual offenses. A sample of British prisoners completed the self-report PDQ-4+ and were interviewed using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis II disorders. When used to generate a total score, the PDQ-4+ had an acceptable overall accuracy as measured by the area under the Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) curve. The PDQ-4+ appears to have the properties suitable for use as a screening instrument, particularly when screening for the presence or absence of personality disorder rather than for individual personality disorder categories. A graph is presented from which choices of cut-off score for different combinations of sensitivity and specificity can be made. A cut off total score of 25 or above yielded near optimal sensitivity and specificity. The suggested cut off score for this population is lower than that previously suggested.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, London, SE5 8AF, UK. s.davison@iop.kcl.ac.uk
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Davison
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Leese
authors.forename: P J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Taylor
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D003417:Criminal Psychology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010554:Personality Disorders / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D010555:Personality Inventory / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011329:Prisoners / Q000523:psychology*; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012742:Sex Offenses / Q000523:psychology; D014754:Violence / Q000523:psychology