Lecture 1: Introductions Flashcards
What does a forensic psychologist do?
- 1-1 Assessments
- Develop, implement and review treatment rehabilitation programmes
- Research to evaluate situations affecting prisoners
- Deliver training to support staff
*Provide expert eyewitness testimony in court - Contribute to policy and strategy development to ensure improvement
What is assessed in risk assessments?
Risk of:
reoffending
suicide
self harm
other high risk behaviour
Examples of offender treatment rehabilitation programmes
Anger management
Drug and alcohol addiction
Social and cognitive skills training
What do forensic psychologists research? (+ Examples)
Research anything to do with crime, criminals, prisons etc.
For example:
The impact of bullying on staff in prisons
Effectiveness of anger management programmes
Examples of things forensic psychologists train prison staff to do?
Anger management
How to cope with understanding bullying in the prison
Techniques for crisis negotiation
What is the public and professional view of criminal profilers?
Public and other professionals = strong belief in their effectiveness
86% of mental health professionals endorse that it is useful tool for law enforcement (Torres et al., 2006)
Example of ‘ bad’ criminal profiling
October 2002, Washington = series of shooting over 23 days, left 10 people dead. Appeared random.
Consensus= male, white, worked alone, mid 20s, no military training, no children
Real = two people (age 41 and 17), African American, 4 children and former soldier
Kocisis et al (2002): criminal profiling study design
Real murder cases.
Ppts given extensive background info on the case
Asked to evaluate aspects of the perpetrator (physical, cognitive, offence, social history and habits)
Ppts = profilers, homicide detectives, senior police, trainees, chemistry undergraduates
Koscisis et al (2002) criminal profiling study results
People better than if no info given at all
Chemistry students consistently outperformed
No relationship with experience and accuracy
Snook et al (2008) study and results: criminal profiling
Meta analysis of available studies to this time
Conclude: CP = pseudoscience
Why do people believe in criminal profiling?
- Physicians phallacy = only report when they go well
- Barnum Effect = (cognitive bias) people pick out of parts of a profile that seem to fit even if they fit ‘everybody’ and ignore the details that do not much
- Expertise heuristic - people believe training must do something to improve the accuracy of criminal profilers
If criminal profiling doesnt work, what can forensic psychologists do that does help?
Try and understand why the person has committed the crime
Learn about the psychology behind violence throughout development
Can this info be used to develop prevention programmes?
What assessment techniques do forensic psychologists use?
Interview
Psychometric tests
Projective tests
Objective tests (neuropsychology)
Physiological and neurophysiological tests
What else needs to be considered during assessments?
Criminal records
Medical records - inc mental health
School and employment records
Other reports from professionals
What is spoken about in clinical / forensic interviews?
Childhood attachments, attitudes, sexual fantasies
Key features of clinical / forensic interviews:
Normally semi structured
There are particular standardised interviews for some diagnoses (e.g PCL-R)
Requires clinical skills
What are the DIFFERENCES between a therapeutic assessment (clinical) and a forensic assessment?
Primary aim of therapeutic = treat presenting problems
Primary aim of forensic = report to the court on these problems and possible consequences of the problem
Client has a lot to gain from therapeutic but a lot to lose in forensic
Confidentiality - therapeutic assessment is mainly confidential, forensic mainly not
What are the SIMILARITIES between a therapeutic assessment (clinical) and a forensic assessment?
Both seek to understand the current problems and behaviours
They may try to diagnose any mental health problems
What is important in both clinical and forensic assessments?
Clinical skills
Form rapport to make sure client is aware they are trying to help them
If client is not open about why things have happened, cannot understand and help them in the future
What clinical skills are required in assessments?
Opening statements - confidentiality, risk, note taking
Rapport
Nonverbal communication
Active listening skills
Summarising
What are psychometric assessments?
Standard and scientific methods use to measure individuals mental capabilities and behavioural style
The tests that gain a score that have meaning - e.g. Becks Depression Inventory Score
What are the key aspects of psychometric assessments?
Standardised (know what is normal and abnormal score)
Test-retest reliability
Can be used to track changes in symptoms
What are examples of psychometric assessments?
IQ tests
Beck depression inventory
Impact of events scale (measures trauma)
Paulhaus Deception scale
Reactive and proactive aggression questionnaire
Multiphasic sex inventory
Personality tests
What are projective tests?
Give a stimulus which is ambiguous - answers are used to infer underlying traits
Often used in children e.g give them a doll see what they do with it
Idea = project their behaviour onto the object
What are some example of projective tests?
Rorschach test
Thematic apperception test
House-tree-person test
Study evaluation of projective tests
Lilienfield et al (2000, 2001): meta-anlaysis = little support for their use and no more insight than simply asking the person
How are neuropsychological assessments distinguished from others?
They are performance based
What are some examples of neuropsychological assessments?
IQ: Weschler adult intelligence test (avg=100 - 1SD is 15 points away)
Memory: WMS-IV (used when there is a possible problem in memory)
Frontal lobe function (stroop, DKEFS) (many tests of EF = important in regulating behaviours)
What are examples of physiological assessments?
Skin conductance response (SCR) - arousal
Pupillometry - arousal (sympathetic nervous system)
Heart rate
Corrugator (frown)
Genital response
Burley, Gray and Snowden (2019) study (psychopathy + pupil dilation)
Method:
Examined pupil dilation to arousing and non-arousing pictures in a sample of male offenders
For most the pupil dilates to both positive and negative pictures
Results:
Those with high scores on psychopathy show reduced dilation to negative images and normal reaction to positive images
Conclusions:
Measures emotional processing, dysfunctional emotional processing in psychopaths
What are some problems with assessments? (Honesty)
Honesty -
“Fake bad” e.g to pretend to have a mental illness to gain more lenient sentence (CALLED MALINGERING)
“Fake good” = hide thoughts, intentions - things that will hinder their process
As humans we are not good at spotting lies
What are some problems with assessments? (Intelligence)
Have to be sure offenders can understand the question: people with learning disabilities / very low intelligence may not understand words used in assessment / cannot read or write
What is the reference group effect? Heine et al., 2002
All people have to norm themselves
E.g people think I have a high opinion of myself = depends who is around them
Describe Chesterman et al (2008) malingering study
Review of studies: malingered psychosis is not a rare condition, particularly in forensic populations.
Assessment of malingering in forensic settings should always be based on a range of recently developed instruments that evaluate cognitive as well as psychiatric symptoms
How can psychologists tell that malingering has occurred?
Standard tests: (SIRS - structured interview of reported symptoms - identify rare symptoms, unusual symptom combinations, severity of symptoms etc to see if someone is lying)
Suggestibility = likelihood that malingerers will endorse symptoms they believe will make them appear mentally ill
Questionnaires with a lie scale: e.g paulhaus deception scale
What are some malingering tests to tell if criminals are faking neuropsychological assessments?
Test of Memory Malingering (TOMM):
Present criminals a v difficult task (e.g remembering 50 pics) but it is acc really easy
Ask ppts to recall the pictures
When someone scores less than chance: it likely means that they know what the correct answer is and purposefully choose ones they know are wrong to make it look like they have poor memory
What are lie detectors?
Polygraph
Takes a physiological responses (typically galvanic skin response) as answering Q’s
Abnormal reaction when lying
Accuracy of lie detectors?
Wild claims from 100% to 50%
Likely to be somewhere in between
Ahlmeyer et al (2000): lie detector study
Compared various measures of disclosure at 4 stages (Presentence report, sexual history diclosure form) and then again with polygraph
The belief they were being assessed by a lie detector was enough to get them to tell the truth
Overview of lecture
- No single way to get info needed for risk assessment
- You are only as good as the info you have
- Psychologists rely on good clinical practice
- IMHO - the use of psychometrics in isolation is not appropriate
- Assessment is complex due to the nature of the population and possible consequences of disclosure
