From prediction to explanation: Is the relationship between youth psychopathy traits and continued offending in adulthood mediated by social environment?

Evan C McCuish, Patrick Lussier
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Abstract

Studies that focus on whether psychopathy statistically predicts reoffending are not informative of the process that connects the putative cause (psychopathy) to the expected outcome (offending). Understanding the causal mechanisms responsible for the relationship between psychopathy and offending has received minimal empirical attention even though fourth-generation risk assessment protocols and treatment strategies regularly require a specific focus on psychopathy. Theory can help guide an improved understanding of the causal mechanisms underlying the relationship between psychopathy and offending. Cumulative disadvantage theories anticipate that the relationship between psychopathy and reoffending is mediated by a person's social environment. Propensity theories anticipate that psychopathy is a common cause of both a person's negative social environment and reoffending. These two theoretical perspectives were compared using longitudinal data covering the transition from adolescence to adulthood among 490 male and female participants from the Incarcerated Serious and Violent Young Offender Study. Psychopathy was measured in adolescence using the Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version. Social environment was measured in adulthood using an informal social control scale from the Community Risk Needs Assessment. Conviction frequency was measured over a 3-year period after the Community Risk Needs Assessment rating. Bias-corrected bootstrapped confidence intervals indicated that informal social control partially mediated the relationship between Psychopathy Checklist: Youth Version scores and conviction frequency. The mediating effect was robust to unobserved confounders. Findings supported the philosophy of risk management and intervention strategies that target a person's social environment when aiming to reduce reoffending for persons with psychopathy traits. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved).

从预测到解释:青少年精神病特征与成年后继续犯罪的关系是否受社会环境的中介?
关注精神病是否在统计上预示着再次犯罪的研究,并没有提供将假定的原因(精神病)与预期的结果(犯罪)联系起来的过程的信息。尽管第四代风险评估协议和治疗策略经常要求对精神病进行特别关注,但对精神病和犯罪之间关系的因果机制的理解却很少得到实证关注。理论可以帮助我们更好地理解精神变态和犯罪之间关系的因果机制。累积劣势理论认为,精神病态和再犯之间的关系是由一个人的社会环境所介导的。倾向理论预测,精神病是一个人的负面社会环境和再次犯罪的共同原因。这两种理论观点通过纵向数据进行了比较,这些纵向数据涵盖了来自在押严重暴力青少年罪犯研究的490名男性和女性参与者从青春期过渡到成年期的情况。使用《青少年精神病检查表》来测量青少年的精神病。社会环境测量在成年期使用非正式社会控制量表从社区风险需求评估。定罪频率是在社区风险需求评估评级后的3年内测量的。偏差校正后的自举置信区间表明,非正式社会控制部分介导了青少年版精神病量表得分与定罪频率之间的关系。中介效应对未观察到的混杂因素是稳健的。研究结果支持风险管理和干预策略的理念,即针对一个人的社会环境,以减少具有精神病特征的人的再犯。(PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA,版权所有)。
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