reoffending than those who completed treatment. The predictors of nonsexual violent recidivism and general (any) recidivism were similar to those predictors found among nonsexual criminals (e.g., prior violent offenses, age, juvenile deliquency). Our results suggest that applied risk assessments of sexual offenders should consider separately the offender's risk for sexual and nonsexual recidivism. Assessing chronicity is crucial for clients whose sexual behaviors have brought them into conflict with the law. Many exceptional criminal justice policies, such as postsentence detention (e.g., Anderson & Masters, 1992), lifetime community supervision, and community notification, target those sexual offenders likely to reoffend. Clinicians need to judge whether the client's behaviors are truly atypical of the individual (as the client would like us to believe) or whether the client merits a virtually permanent label as a sexual offender.

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Predicting relapse: a meta-analysis of sexual offender recidivism studies.

Federal Abortion Policy and Politics: 1973-1996 Why is Abortion Such a Controversial issue in the United States Barriers to Access to Abortion Services The Impact of Anti-abortion Activities on Women Seeking Abortions Black Women and the Question of Abortion Latinos and Abortion Abortion and Asian Pacific Islander Americans The Acceptability of Medical Abortion to Women Understanding the Relationship of Violence Against Women to Unwanted Pregnancy and it's Resolution Testing a Model of the Psychological Consequences of Abortion Men and Abortion: The Gender Politics of Pregnancy Resolution Abortion Among Adolescents A Cognitive Approach to Patient-Centered Abortion Care Abortion Issues in Psychotherapy Bringing Lessons Learned to the United States Improving Access to Abortion Services Abortion Practice, Policy, and Research: Recommendations for the 21st Century

Violent offenders: Appraising and managing risk.

Multivariate techniques were used to derive and validate an actuarial instrument for the prediction of violent postrelease offenses by mentally disordered offenders. The 618 subjects were a heterogeneous group of men who had been charged with serious offenses. Approximately half had been treated in a maximum security psychiatric institution and the rest had been briefly assessed prior to imprisonment. The actuarial instrument consisted of 12 variables and significantly predicted violent outcome in each of five subgroups. The instrument's practical application and its use in clinical appraisals of dangerousness are discussed.

Violent recidivism of mentally disordered offenders: The development of a statistical prediction instrument.

This meta-analytic review examined the effectiveness of psychological treatment for sex offenders by summarizing data from 43 studies (combined n = 9,454). Averaged across all studies, the sexual offence recidivism rate was lower for the treatment groups (12.3%) than the comparison groups (16.8%, 38 studies, unweighted average). A similar pattern was found for general recidivism, although the overall rates were predictably higher (treatment 27.9%, comparison 39.2%, 30 studies). Current treatments (cognitive–behavioral, k = 13; systemic, k = 2) were associated with reductions in both sexual recidivism (from 17.4 to 9.9%) and general recidivism (from 51 to 32%). Older forms of treatment (operating prior to 1980) appeared to have little effect. Future directions for improving the quality of sex offender treatment outcome evaluations are discussed.

First report of the collaborative outcome data project on the effectiveness of psychological treatment for sex offenders.

The article reports a meta-analysis on controlled outcome evaluations of sexual offender treatment. From 2,039 documents published in five languages, 69 studies containing 80 independent comparisons between treated and untreated offenders fulfilled stepwise eligibility criteria (total N = 22,181). Despite a wide range of positive and negative effect sizes, the majority confirmed the benefits of treatment. Treated offenders showed 6 percentage points or 37% less sexual recidivism than controls. Effects for violent and general recidivism were in a similar range. Organic treatments (surgical castration and hormonal medication) showed larger effects than psychosocial interventions. However, this difference was partially confounded with methodological and offender variables. Among psychological programs, cognitive–behavioral approaches revealed the most robust effect. Nonbehavioral treatments did not demonstrate a significant impact. There was no outcome difference between randomized and other designs, however, group equivalence was associated with slightly larger effects. Various other moderators had a stronger impact on effect size (e.g., small sample size, quality of outcome reporting, program completion vs. dropout, age homogeneity, outpatient treatment, and authors’ affiliation with the program). More differentiated, high-quality evaluations are needed to clarify: What works for whom under which circumstances?

The effectiveness of treatment for sexual offenders: A comprehensive meta-analysis

The increasing recognition of the large number of people victimized by sexual assault has focused considerable attention on methods for deterring its perpetrators. In particular, law enforcement and mental health professions alike seek ways to prevent sex offenders from repeating their criminal behavior. Some evidence suggests sex offenders often continue offending even after incarceration or clinical treatment. However, recidivism rates for sex offenders are unusually hard to establish, owing to gross underreporting of sex crimes. This article presents a comprehensive review of empirical studies of sex offender recidivism. It brings together data from a wide variety of studies on both treated and untreated sex offenders of all types. Because of the variety and gravity of methodological problems in these studies, guidelines are discussed for sample selection and description, study design, criterion assessment, and data analysis. With these methodological principles in mind, the results of some 42 studies are examined for what they can tell us about sex offender recidivism and efforts to reduce it.

Mark R. Weinrott

Papers

Sex offender recidivism: A review.