The Habitual Female Offender Inside: How Psychopathic Traits Predict Chronic Prison Violence

Psychopathy is considered one of the best predictors of violence and prison misconducts and is arguably an important clinical construct in the correctional setting. However, we tested whether psychopathy can be used to predict misconducts in prison environments for women as has been done for men. To date, few studies exist that examine and validate this association in female offender samples. The present study included 182 ethnically diverse female offenders. 

The aim was to prospectively predict violent and nonviolent misconducts over a 9-month period using official records of prior violent criminal history (e.g., homicide, manslaughter, assault), and self-report measures of psychopathy, impulsivity, and empathy. Using negative binomial regression, we found that past violent criminal history, and callous and antisocial psychopathic traits were predictors of violent misconducts, whereas antisocial psychopathic traits and impulsivity best predicted nonviolent misconducts. Although empathy was negatively associated with psychopathy it was not a significant predictor of violent or nonviolent misconducts. Statistical models, which included impulsivity, were considered the most parsimonious at predicting misconducts. 

Our findings demonstrate how risk-factors found to be reliable in male offender samples, such as psychopathic traits, impulsivity, and past violent criminal history, generalize to female offenders for predicting nonviolent and violent misconducts. One notable difference is the importance of callous psychopathic traits when predicting chronic violent misconducts by female offenders. In sum, there are more similarities in psychopathy and impulsivity than differences in the prediction of misconducts among men and women.

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By:  Thomson ND, Towl GJ, Centifanti LC.

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Cross-Sectional Analysis of the 1039 U.S. Physicians Reported to the National Practitioner Data Bank for Sexual Misconduct, 2003–2013

Background

Little information exists on U.S. physicians who have been disciplined with licensure or restriction-of-clinical-privileges actions or have had malpractice payments because of sexual misconduct. Our objectives were to: (1) determine the number of these physicians and compare their age groups’ distribution with that of the general U.S. physician population; (2) compare the type of disciplinary actions taken against these physicians with actions taken against physicians disciplined for other offenses; (3) compare the characteristics and type of injury among victims of these physicians with those of victims in reports for physicians with other offenses in malpractice-payment reports; and (4) determine the percentages of physicians with clinical-privileges or malpractice-payment reports due to sexual misconduct who were not disciplined by medical boards.

Methods and Results

We conducted a cross-sectional analysis of physician reports submitted to the National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB) from January 1, 2003, through September 30, 2013. A total of 1039 physicians had ≥ 1 sexual-misconduct–related reports. The majority (75.6%) had only licensure reports, and 90.1% were 40 or older. For victims in malpractice-payment reports, 87.4% were female, and “emotional injury only” was the predominant type of injury. We found a higher percentage of serious licensure actions and clinical-privileges revocations in sexual-misconduct–related reports than in reports for other offenses (89.0% vs 68.1%, P = < .001, and 29.3% vs 18.8%, P = .002, respectively). Seventy percent of the physicians with a clinical-privileges or malpractice-payment report due to sexual misconduct were not disciplined by medical boards for this problem.

Conclusions

A small number of physicians were reported to the NPDB because of sexual misconduct. It is concerning that a majority of the physicians with a clinical-privileges action or malpractice-payment report due to sexual misconduct were not disciplined by medical boards for this unethical behavior.

Below:  Physicians with Sexual-Misconduct–Related NPDB Reports, 2003–2013 (Physician-Level Analysis)

Full article at:   http://goo.gl/EUIYLx

By:  

Azza AbuDagga, Sidney M. Wolfe, Michael Carome

Health Research Group, Public Citizen, Washington, District of Columbia, United States of America

Robert E. Oshel

National Practitioner Data Bank (Retired), Department of Health and Human Services, Silver Spring, Maryland, United States of America

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Lies & Crimes: Dark Triad, Misconduct & High-Stakes Deception

Highlights

• Dark Triad correlated with most dimensions of misconduct behavior.
• Dark Triad correlated with most dimensions of high-stakes deception.
• Psychopathy added significantly to the prediction of misconduct factors.
• Machiavellianism added significantly to the prediction of high-stakes deception factors.

The goal of the present investigation was to assess whether the Dark Triad traits (Machiavellianism, narcissism, psychopathy) add significantly to the prediction of misconduct and the propensity to engage in high-stakes deception. Self-report scores were collected (n = 464) via the Short-D3 assessing the Dark Triad traits, the Comprehensive Misconduct Inventory measuring misconduct, and the Propensity to Lie Questionnaire investigating lying tendencies. Significant correlations were observed between nearly all variables, but in a multiple regression only psychopathy added significantly to the prediction of the misconduct factors. Further, only Machiavellianism was a significant predictor of high-stakes deception over and above the other predictors in the model.

Full PDF article at:  https://goo.gl/MVoXpm

By:  

Nicole Azizli^a, 

Breanna E. Atkinson^b, 

Holly M. Baughman^b, 

Kristi Chin^b, 

Philip A. Vernon^b,,

Elizabeth Harris^b, 

Livia Veselka^b

• ^a Department of Psychology, Adler Graduate Professional School, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
• ^b Department of Psychology, The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada
• vernon@uwo.ca

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Moving From the Neighborhood to the Cellblock: The Impact of Youth’s Neighborhoods on Prison Misconduct

This study examines how prior neighborhood characteristics affect youth’s offending when youths move into an incarceration context. 

Neighborhood ethnic heterogeneity, residential stability, and disadvantage are often predictive of neighborhood crime, but it is unclear how these neighborhood constructs continue to affect youth’s behavior inside a secure facility. In a sample of recently incarcerated juvenile offenders (N = 320), this study examined how prior neighborhood characteristics affect institutional offending over the first 8 weeks of incarceration. 

Although disadvantage did not relate to institutional offending, results indicate that youths from racially/ethnically homogenous communities are more likely to offend during the initial weeks of incarceration, whereas youths from residentially stable communities are more likely to offend in the latter weeks.

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By:   Adam Boessen1, Elizabeth Cauffman1

¹University of California, Irvine, USA

Adam Boessen, Department of Criminology, Law and Society, University of California, 3331 Social Ecology II, Irvine, CA, 92697, USA. Email: aboessen@uci.edu

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Disciplinary Responses to Misconduct among Female Prison Inmates with Mental Illness, Substance Use Disorders & Co-Occurring Disorders

OBJECTIVE:

Most female inmates have mental health, substance use, or co-occurring disorders (CODs), which can create greater difficulty adjusting to incarceration and higher rates of prison misconduct. The response of prison officials to institutional misbehaviors has important implications for female inmates' experiences while incarcerated, their likelihood of parole, and the clinical course of their condition. This article examined whether disciplinary actions are more severe for women with CODs.

METHOD:

Data were provided by the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections for all female state prison inmates incarcerated between January 1, 2007, and July 30, 2009 (N = 2,279). The final sample of 211 women included those who had committed a minor misconduct during their incarceration. Disorder categories were created based on intake assessments, and multivariate models were estimated to determine the effect of disorder category on whether the prison imposed a severe or minor disciplinary response to the misconduct.

RESULTS:

The odds of receiving severe disciplinary responses to minor misconduct was significantly greater for women with CODs than those with the singular disorders of mental illness or substance abuse disorders, or those with no disorders.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE:

Findings suggest correctional institutions are responding in a punitive manner to the symptomatic manifestations of CODs in female inmates. These findings suggest the importance of screening instruments in correctional settings that assess for the presence of dual disorders. In addition, correctional administrators must implement training protocols for correctional officers and staff on the complexity of CODs and the ability to identify behavioral and emotional symptoms associated with this vulnerable subset of the offender population. 

Purchase full article at:   http://goo.gl/q184xm

By:   Houser K1, Belenko S2.

• 1Department of Law and Justice Studies.
• 2Department of Criminal Justice, Temple University. 

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