Volitional impairment and the sexually violent predator

Area of Science:

• Forensic Psychiatry
• Legal Psychology
• Behavioral Sciences

Background:

• Psychiatry's current conceptualization of volitional capacity is limited.
• This limitation impacts its application in sexually violent predator (SVP) laws.
• Key legal cases like Kansas v. Hendricks and Kansas v. Crane highlight these issues.

Purpose of the Study:

• To explore psychiatry's conceptualization of volitional capacity.
• To examine its application within SVP laws.
• To identify psychiatry's potential contributions and limitations to the legal field regarding volition.

Main Methods:

• Review of pertinent psychiatric literature on impaired volition.
• Analysis of legal opinions in landmark SVP cases.
• Exploration of potential assessment methodologies for volitional capacity.

Main Results:

• Psychiatry can offer insights into volitional capacity relevant to legal contexts.
• Current psychiatric understanding requires refinement for legal application.
• Specific assessment approaches are proposed, including ego-dystonicity, self-assessment, and laboratory evaluations.

Conclusions:

• Elements of volition are psychiatrically evaluable, potentially aiding judicial understanding.
• Operational definitions and validated assessment tools for volitional capacity are needed.
• Further research is crucial for reliability and validity in psychiatric assessments of volition.