THE CRIMINAL APPROACH - FORMULATIONS Flashcards
What is a psychological formulation?
Trying to make sense of a person’s difficulties by looking at their relationships, biological and social circumstances, life events and how they have interpreted these experiences
There is no fixed/standardised way of undertaking a psychological formulation as they’re adapted to each person
The BPS have issued guidelines regarding psychological formulations
The psychological formulation shows that whilst the offence itself may have seemed impulsive or spontaneous, if psychologists start to understand the background of an individual it can help to identify some of the important factors that may have influenced their behaviour
What are the phases of a psychological formulation?
Phase one: offence analysis
Phase two: understanding the function of offending
Phase three: application to treatment
In what ways may a psychological formulation be useful?
Establishing the likelihood of such behaviour being repeated
Enabling a psychologist to piece together all the factors influencing an offending behaviour
Providing treatment strategies (eg identifying triggers, coping strategies)
According to Hart et al, what must psychological formulations be?
Individualised - focused on the individual
Narrative - giving qualitative data in easy to read language
Diachronic - spanning from the past through the present to the future
Testable - measurable and can be found to be wrong
Ampliative - doing more than describing, it must add information
What is the evaluation of psychological formulations?
They are not all standardised as there is no fixed way which reduces it’s reliability
Yet more likely to be tailored to individual experiences, increasing validity
It can be difficult to collect all the relevant information about the offender, and such information may be distressing for the offender to disclose
Often based on collaboration of difference agencies (eg the police, social services, the probation services) which can be beneficial ad more information is generated yet may be an issue if the information is contradictory
Some offenders lack the insight about themselves and their experiences to make the formulation effective and valid, or may be unaware of relevant medical or psychological diagnoses
Ghaderi, McKnight et al
What did Ghaderi find?
suggested that there was mixed evidence with regard to whether formulations improved offender outcomes
What did McKnight et al find?
found that formulations did predict which treatments would be effective and which would not
Currently it is estimated recidivism rates are around 70% and psychological formulations could help to reduce this, however a lot of reoffending goes undetected
