A Systematic Review of Risk Assessment Measures for Adolescent Family Violence

Adolescent family violence (AFV) has become a topic of increasing attention, yet our understanding of how to assess the risk of future family violence among this cohort is limited. This systematic review aimed to determine what risk assessment tools have been validated for use with AFV and investigate their predictive validity. It also sought to determine whether the literature adhered to the Risk Assessment Guidelines for the Evaluation of Efficacy statement (i.e., RAGEE guidelines). Out of 11,663 studies identified, seven met inclusion criteria and validated six instruments, including the Structured Assessment of Violence Risk in Youth (SAVRY), Youth Level of Service/Case Management Inventory (YLS/CMI), Victoria Police Screening Assessment for Family Violence Risk (VP-SAFvR), Static Assessment of Family Violence Recidivism (SAFVR), Dynamic Risk Assessment for Family Violence (DYRA), and the Integrated Safety Response (ISR). The discriminant ability of the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version (PCL-YV) was also considered in one study. Three key findings arose from this review. First, there are very few validated risk assessment tools for AFV behaviours, and variability in predictive and discriminant validity amongst those few that have been validated (with Area Under the Curve values ranging from .54 to .67). Second, there is a reasonably positive adherence to RAGEE guidelines. Third, there appears to be a high risk of bias among studies which validated risk assessment tools for use with AFV. The findings underscore the need for validated risk assessment tools tailored specifically for use with AFV, particularly for clinicians and professionals working in the family violence field.