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Distinguishing and combining risks for sexual and violent recidivism
David Thornton1, Ruth Mann, Steve Webster
1Sand Ridge Secure Treatment Center, Mauston, Wisconsin 53948, USA. david7thornton@aol.com
Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences
|July 4, 2003
Summary
A new two-dimensional risk assessment system for sexual offenders offers comparable accuracy to existing tools but is easier to score. This system aids in classifying recidivism risk for sexual and violent offenses.
Area of Science:
- Forensic Psychology
- Criminology
- Psychometrics
Background:
- Accurate risk assessment is crucial for managing sexual offenders.
- Existing tools like Static-99, VRAG, and SORAG have limitations in ease of use.
- A need exists for a user-friendly yet accurate risk assessment system.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and validate a novel two-dimensional risk assessment system for sexual offenders.
- To evaluate the system's ability to predict sexual recidivism, nonsexual violent recidivism, and composite reconviction risk.
- To compare the system's ease of scoring and predictive accuracy against established tools.
Main Methods:
- Development of a two-dimensional risk assessment system.
- Cross-validation using separate follow-up samples.
- Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analyses to assess predictive accuracy.
- Comparison of scoring efficiency with Static-99, VRAG, and SORAG.
Main Results:
- The system demonstrated comparable predictive accuracy to existing tools across follow-up periods of 2 to 19 years.
- ROC AUC coefficients ranged from .74 to .81 for various scales and samples.
- The new system was found to be significantly easier to score than Static-99, VRAG, and SORAG.
Conclusions:
- The developed two-dimensional risk assessment system is a practical and accurate tool for evaluating sexual offender recidivism risk.
- Its ease of scoring enhances its utility in clinical and forensic settings.
- The system provides reliable predictions of sexual and violent recidivism.