Citation

Jones NJ, Mitchell D, Tafrate RC. Crim. Justice Behav. 2021; 48(4): 442-458.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2021, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/0093854820942561

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

Because much of our understanding of criminogenic thinking (antisocial cognitions) has been based on male justice populations, questions remain about the applicability of this construct to justice-involved women. Based on an item-level analysis of 216 justice-involved clients, results of this pilot study suggest that criminogenic thinking in women is relevant, and both overlaps with and diverges from that of men. In fact, the predictive accuracy for rearrest attained with a gender-responsive model developed for women exceeded that of the corresponding model developed for men (area under the curve [AUC] =.86 vs. AUC =.67). We recommend the creation of parsimonious criminogenic thinking instruments that optimize predictive criterion validity. Gender-responsive scales that capture the gender-specificity that exists in criminogenic thinking patterns can assist in (a) optimizing the prediction of reoffending and (b) identifying essential constellations of treatment targets among forensic populations.

Language: en

Keywords

criminal thinking; gender; gender differences; predictive validity; risk assessment; women offenders