Field validity of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised in sex offender risk assessment.
Several studies have concluded that scores from Hare's (2003) Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) predict reoffense among sexual offenders, but most of those studies examined the predictive validity of scores from trained research staff, not clinicians in the field scoring the measure as part of actual forensic assessments. Therefore, we examined the field validity of PCL-R scores that forensic evaluators assigned to 333 male sexual offenders who underwent evaluations during a civil commitment selection process. Overall, no PCL-R score was a significant predictor of sexually violent recidivism. Facet 4 was the only PCL-R score with an area under the curve (AUC) greater than .50 (AUC = .53, p = .85) and the only PCL-R score that approached statistical significance for predicting the combined category of violent or sexually violent offending (AUC = .63, p = .08). However, scores from a subset of evaluators revealed stronger predictive effects, indicating that predictive validity was higher for scores from some evaluators than others. Overall, these results suggest that the stronger predictive validity values in controlled research studies may not apply to all evaluators when the PCL-R is administered in the field.
Institute of Law, Psychiatry, and Public Policy, University of Virginia, USA. Murrie@Virginia.edu
Daniel C
DC
Murrie
Marcus T
MT
Boccaccini
Jennifer
J
Caperton
Katrina
K
Rufino
D000328:Adult; D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D057237:Criminals / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology*; D005555:Forensic Psychiatry; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D015588:Observer Variation; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000592:standards*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D018570:Risk Assessment; D012742:Sex Offenses / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000523:psychology*; D013781:Texas; D014754:Violence / Q000523:psychology