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FPSYCH > Chapter 10: Risk Assessment > Flashcards

Chapter 10: Risk Assessment Flashcards

1
Q

What is risk assessment?

A
  • making a prediction about behaviour
  • will a criminal re-offend if released?
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2
Q

Q: What were the 2 key findings in the Baxstrom and Dixon studies?

A
  • violence during follow-up was low
  • error rate was high (high rate of false positives - predicted to re-offend and then don’t)
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3
Q

Q: How was risk assessment viewed prior to the 1990’s? How is it viewed now?

A

Risk was seen as dichotomous - either someone is dangerous or they’re not
Now, it is seen as a scale/range

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4
Q

Q: What was the significance of Baxstrom v. Herald?

A

challenged the accuracy of mental health professionals in predicting violence

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5
Q

What are 5 uses of risk assessment in civil settings?

A

1) civil commitment
2) child protection
3) immigration
4) school and labour
5) duty to warn

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6
Q

use in civil settings

Civil commitment

A
  • deals with mental illness
  • in Canada, a psychiatrist can determine the probablitity that someone is a danger to themselves or others and hospitalize them against their will if needed
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7
Q

use in civil settings

Child Protection

A

CAS may get involved to predict how safe a child is where they live

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8
Q

use in civil settings

Immigration

A

laws prohibit immigration into Canada if it is believed the individual may pose a risk (background checks - terrorism?)

They may apply to get a risk assessment done if they feel they are in danger when going back home (ex. punished for leaving)

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9
Q

use in civil settings

School and Labour

A

risk assessment to prevent violence

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10
Q

use in civil settings

Duty to Warn

A

therapist has to go against the confidentiality agreement and get authorities involved if their patient confesses dangerous ideas (ex. wanting to shoot people at school)

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11
Q

What are 4 ways risk assessment is used in criminal settings?

A

1) pretrial
2) sentencing (how long)
3) case management
4) release (parole)

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12
Q

Criminal settings

How is RA used in pretrial?

A

ex:
person could be denied bail if it is belueved there is substantial likelihood they will commit another criminal offence

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13
Q

criminal settings

How is RA used in sentencing?

A

ex:
judge can apply adult criminal sanctions depending on the age, type of offence, and risk level posed by the youth

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14
Q

criminal settings

how is RA used to determine types of custody?

A

ex:
- adolescent offenders should only be committed to secure custory if they are considered high risk. otherwise they should be in open custory or be given community service
- level of security (maximum, medium, minimum) is determined partially by RA

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15
Q

criminal settings

how is RA used to determine release?

what is statutory release?

A

ex:
- parole board uses risk assessment to decide the likelihood that the offender will commit another violent offence if released
- can be denied statutory release (serving only 2/3 of their sentence) and made to stay the last 3rd

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16
Q

True Positive Prediction

A

Correct!
predicted to re-offend > re-offends

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17
Q

True Negative Prediction

A

Correct!
predicted not to re-offend > doesn’t re-offend

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18
Q

False Positive Prediction

Who does it affect?

A

Incorrect
predicted to re-offend > doesn’t re-offend

Affects offender because they’ve been wrongfully labelled as dangerous

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19
Q

False Negative Prediction

Who does it affect?

A

Incorrect
predicted not to re-offend > re-offends

Society/community affected because violent offender is now free

20
Q

Why is determining base rates a problem when it comes to risk assessment?

Base rate: % of pop. (community) who commit a violent or criminal act

A

low base rates make it hard to predict because they are so infrequent and therefore lead to false positives

high base rates make it hard to narrow down

21
Q

What is an issue with the methods of risk assessment? What does it assume?

A

Risk assessment assumeas that risk is something that can be measured

22
Q

What are 3 main weaknesses of research on predicting violence?

(according to Monahan and Steadman, 1994)

A

1) limited number of risk factors being used (it’s very complex and there are many different factors that can play a role into why someone commited a crime ex. social situation, background, etc.)
2) how it is measured - how can it be generalized? (many crimes go unnoticed meaning there is likely a low base rate making it hard to make accurate predictions)
3) how the criterion variable is defined

23
Q

Judgement error and bias

Illusory correlation

A

belief that a correlation exists between two events when in reality they aren’t correlated or correlated to a much lesser degree than assumed

24
Q

Approaches to risk assessment

Unstructured Clinical Judgment

A
  • no guidelines or pre-determined rules (blueprint) - clinicians argue this is because each case is different
  • professional discretion
  • subjective
  • illusory correlations
25
Q

Approaches to risk assessment

Actuarial Prediction

A
  • objective
  • empirically derived risk factors
  • blueprint for decision/prediction
26
Q

Approaches to risk assessment

Structured Professional Judgment

A
  • risk factors derived from research
  • decided by professional
  • **considers presense and severity of each risk factor **
  • accuracy is only starting to be assessed
27
Q

Structured Professional Judgment

What are the 5 steps to risk assessment?

A
28
Q

What is a risk factor?

A
  • measurable feature of an individual
  • predicts behaviour of interest (ex. recidivism (tendency of a convicted criminal to reoffend))
29
Q

Static Risk Factors

A

factors that don’t change (ex. age at the time of offence)

30
Q

Dynamic Risk Factors

A
  • factors that can be changed (ex. through treatment)
  • may fluctuate naturally over time
31
Q

Acute Dynamic Risk Factors

A

factors that can change rapidly within days, hours, or minutes (ex. level of intoxication)

32
Q

What are the 2 main processes of risk assessment?

A

Prediction - describes the probability that they’ll re-offend - what led them there in the first place?

Management - tries to manage/reduce future violence - identifying underlying issues (ex. substance abuse) and providing treatment

33
Q

What is the main goal of risk assessment?

A

prevention

34
Q

Important Risk Factors

Dispositional

A
  • reflects an individuals traits and tendencies
  • demographic variables (ex. age, gender)
  • personality characteristics (ex. psychopathy, impulsivity)
35
Q

Important Risk Factors

Clinical

A

Symptoms of mental disorders that could lead to violent behaviour (ex. substance abuse, schizophrenia, depression, etc.)

36
Q

Improtant Risk Factors

Contextual

A

Aspects of the current environment
- ex. having access to weapons, lack of social supports (emotional, financial, etc.), access to victims (sent back to live w/the person they were abusing after their release)

37
Q

Important Risk Factors

Historical (static) (general and criminal history)

(4 main factors)

A

1) past behaviour
- often the most accurate predictor of future behaviour
2) age of onset
- convicted before 14-16 = likely to re-offend
3) history of childhood neglect or maltreatment
- research suggests that being sexually abused as a child isn’t a strong indicator for future violence but general abuse is
4) past supervision failure, escape, or institution maladjustment
- ex. breaking parole

38
Q

Current Issues

What are protective factors?

(4)

A

Factors that reduce the likelihood of voilence re-occuring
- prosocial involvement + strong attachments
- strong social supports
- intelligence
- employment stability

39
Q

Recidivism

A

Tendency for a convicted criminal to re-offend

40
Q

What are some explanations of desistance? (when people stop offending on their own)

A
  • maturity
  • better decision making
  • situational factors (stable job, income, family, etc.)
41
Q

What is an issue regarding the use of scientific research?

A

Found that clinicians aren’t really using the instruments and that they are overestimating the violence of many of their patients (false positives)

42
Q

What is a criticism regarding the theory of risk assessment?

A
  • lack of theory guiding evidence
  • don’t really address WHY people re-offend and therefore can’t help much in designing treatment
43
Q

Why is research limited for female recidivism?

A
  • mostly men commit crimes so they are the sample
  • women commit different crimes
  • factors are smiliar, however. Just not identical
44
Q

Risk Assessment Instruments

Actuarial Instruments (used in actuarial prediction)

(GSIR)

A

GSIR
General Statistical Information on Recidivism
- 15 static (don’t change) risk factors used
- good predictor of criminal behaviour
- less so in females because sample was taken from males

45
Q

Risk Assessment Instruments

Violence Risk Appraisal Guide

A
  • 12 items to assess long-term recidivism in individuals with mental disorders
  • good predictor of violence
46
Q

Instruments for Specific Types of Violence

Spousal Assault Risk Assessment (SARA)

A
  • 20 risk factors
  • 10 for past history
  • 10 for severity
47
Q

Instruments for Specific Types of Violence

RRASOR

A

Rapid Risk Assessment for Sex Offence Recidivism

FPSYCH (10 decks)

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