Predicting future violence among individuals with psychopathy.
Structured risk assessment aims to help clinicians classify offenders according to likelihood of future violent and criminal behaviour. We investigated how confident clinicians can be using three commonly used instruments (HCR-20, VRAG, OGRS-II) in individuals with different diagnoses. Moderate to good predictive accuracy for future violence was achieved for released prisoners with no mental disorder, low to moderate for clinical syndromes and personality disorder, but accuracy was no better than chance for individuals with psychopathy. Comprehensive diagnostic assessment should precede an assessment of risk. Risk assessment instruments cannot be relied upon when managing public risk from individuals with psychopathy.
Jeremy W. Coid, MD, Simone Ullrich, PhD, Constantinos Kallis, PhD, Queen Mary University of London, Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine, Forensic Psychiatry Research Unit, London, UK.
Jeremy W
JW
Coid
Simone
S
Ullrich
Constantinos
C
Kallis
D000987:Antisocial Personality Disorder / Q000523:psychology*; D019540:Area Under Curve; D057237:Criminals / Q000145:classification* / Q000523:psychology; D005555:Forensic Psychiatry / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007406:Interview, Psychological; D008297:Male; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000592:standards; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D018570:Risk Assessment / Q000592:standards*; D055502:Secondary Prevention; D006113:United Kingdom; D014754:Violence / Q000517:prevention & control / Q000523:psychology*