A comparison of rapists and sexual murderers on selected psychological measures

Caroline Oliver, Anthony Beech, Dawn Fisher, Richard Beckett

Research output: Contribution to journalArticle

48 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

This study compared 58 sexual murderers and 112 rapists who were about to undergo treatment in prison for their sexual offending behavior. The two groups were compared on background, personality, offense, and victim characteristics. The sexual murderer group were less likely to have been involved in a relationship at the time of their index offense, generally attacked older victims, and had higher self-esteem. The rapist sample were found to have more violent previous convictions and scored higher on measures of historical deviance (nonsexual), paranoid suspicion, and resentment. No differences were found on the personality or clinical syndrome scales of the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory-III. However, the rapist sample had significantly higher mean scores on the Paranoid Suspicion, Resentment, and Self-Esteem subscales of the Antisocial Personality Questionnaire. Future research should compare the two groups on dynamic or changeable factors to determine differential treatment needs.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)298-312
Number of pages15
JournalInternational Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology
Volume51
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jun 2007

Keywords

  • sexual murderers
  • rapists
  • offense characteristics

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