Sexual Offenders (From Personal Construct Perspectives on Forensic Psychology, P 55-85, 2003, James Horley, ed., -- See NCJ-213479)

• NCJ Number: 213481
• Author(s): James Horley
• Date Published: 2003
• Length: 31 pages
• Sale Source: Brunner-Routledge
• Publication Format: Book Chapter
• Publication Type: Issue Overview
• Language: English
• Country: United Kingdom

Annotation

This chapter presents a review of personal construct theory (PCT)-informed research on sexual offenders, as well as their assessment and treatment.

Abstract

To date, research on sexual offenders has indicated that they are a psychologically diverse group, which has led to problems in theoretically explaining the phenomenon of sexual offending, leading in turn to challenges in treating those who sexually offend. The author begins by reviewing the research literature on the different types of sexual offenders: child molesters, rapists, and other sexual offenders such as exhibitionists. Overall, a PCT account of the different forms of sexual offending is only now emerging and much more empirical and theoretical research on understanding sexual offenders is needed. Assessment issues with sexual offenders are also discussed, which have focused mainly on penile plethysmography or phallometry for the past 3 or 4 decades. The main question involving the assessment of sexual offenders is the type of assessment device that should be used. Several assessment scales have been developed toward this end and are reviewed, including the Cognition Scale for examining the distorted beliefs of child molesters and the Rape Myth Inventory, used to investigate the beliefs and attitudes of rapists. Finally, the author considers the range of psychotherapeutic treatments available to sexual offenders that are based on the principles of PCT, including individual psychotherapies, such as fixed-role therapy and cognitive restructuring therapy, as well as group psychotherapies, including problem identification and relapse prevention therapy. Overall, although more research is needed, it does appear clear that sexual offenders are a diverse group who hold distorted beliefs that may be most appropriately treated through a multimodal approach that offers a variety of types of psychotherapy to address a range of personal problems. Therapies based on the principle of PCT certainly have a place among these. References