PERSONALITY DISORDER PROFILES IN INCARCERATED MALE RAPISTS AND CHILD MOLESTERS

Abstract

This study examined personality disorders and their features in two groups of incarcerated male sexual offenders, rapists (N = 251) and child molesters (N = 311). These groups were compared to a control group of non-sexual offenders (N = 296). All of these inmates (N = 858; M age = 35 years, range 17-73 years) had been routinely administered the Coolidge Correctional Inventory (CCI), a 250 item, self-report, DSM-IV-aligned, personality and neuropsychological inventory, upon their admission to the Colorado Department of Corrections. The anonymized data were analyzed through analyses of variance and chi-square. The results indicated that nonsexual offenders do have more classically criminal personality characteristics than sexual offenders, however, the rapists appeared to have more important psychopathological similarities with the non-sexual offenders, particularly in regard to antisocial and sadistic personality traits, than with the child molesters. Limitations of the study are discussed, including the use of a self-report measure and validation of criminal history. This study examined personality disorders and their features in two groups of incarcerated sexual offenders, rapists and child molesters. A previous study using the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI-III) (1) by Ahlmeyer et al. (2) compared incarcerated rapists (N = 223) and child molesters (N = 472) with non-sexual offenders (N = 7,226) and found that nonsexual offenders had more classically criminal personality characteristics such as antisocial, narcissistic, and sadistic personality disorders, whereas sex offenders were more likely to have personality disorders related to emotional and social distress, for example, depressive, avoidant, and schizoid personality disorders. With regard to differences between the sex offender groups, Ahlmeyer et al. (2) found both groups had the highest prevalence rates for the avoidant personality disorder (28% of rapists met criterion whereas 41% of child molesters met criterion) and this difference was significant (odds ratio, p < .05).